Meditation/relaxation practice

Submitted by kiko on September 26, 2011 - 3:20am
Body: 

I'm a yoga-teacher-in-training, and prolapse has really affected my studentship. When I told one of my teachers how upset I was, and how I blamed some yoga postures and "rules" for making it worse, she gave me this practice to work with. I felt it really helped everything settle for me, so thought I'd share it with you all:

Lie down, or sit; just get into a comfy position where you can stay for a few minutes. Hands can be by your sides or on our lower abdomen. Breathe normally for a few minutes and feel your whole body relax. Then, with each inhale, imagine breathing in prana (life energy) into your whole body, but particularly the organs which have prolapsed. There's no need to breathe deeply; just breathe normally and feel energy being directed to your bladder, uterus, colon with each breath. Stay with this breathing for a few minutes, then gradually move fingers and toes to wake your body back up, and if you're lying down, roll onto your side to get back up.

Daphne11

September 26, 2011 - 8:54am

Thank you. Sometimes I don't know what to do and what not to do.
This introductory willingness exercise helps me listen to my body; after that I'll know what to do.
Daphne11

wholewomanUK

October 27, 2011 - 9:45am

That sounds like a lovely healing intervention.
Just to add that, as a yoga practitioner, I found it really helpful to buy the WW book and dvd. I found these helped me to understand what was and was not advisable to do as a woman with POP. I would highly recommend any yoginis out there with POP to follow the yoga WW dvd's.

louiseds

October 27, 2011 - 7:50pm

Hi All

This does sound like a lovely exercise to do every day, and especially before doing other yoga.

With great respect Kiko, I just picked up a cue from your post while reading about "breathing prana into your whole body, and particularly your prolapsed pelvic organs".

I would just like to clarify and to remind everyone that there is nothing wrong with your pelvic organs. We are told over and over again in publicity materials for gyn clinics and by the gyns themselves that "...bla-bla-bla ... pelvic organs have fallen down into the vagina ... bla-bla-bla ...". We pick up the implication that there is something wrong down there, and it is the pelvic organs which are the problem, ruining the vagina. The pelvic organs (and maybe the vagina) need 'fixing'.

The word 'dysfunctional' is often used as an adjective to describe the pelvic floor and the pelvis. DysfunIction is simply a word used to describe 'not functioning properly', but I hear it used most often as a way of describing families where relationships are working intractably badly.

The word has become for western society a put down, a name calling term, used by others in social welfare bureaucracies, never by people inside the family. It is a shorthand descriptive term used by people who do not live in families they would describe as dysfunctional, even if they are dysfunctional! It is a word used to de-humanise an essentially difficult human condition, like referring to old people as "the aged", or people who have a type of disability as "the disabled".

Gynaecologists and other doctors depersonalise our body parts, partly, I think, because they are dealing with dis-ease and this has serious implications for their patient (whom they would describe as 'the patient', not 'my patient'). They are removing their doctor/patient relationship from the situation, understandably so that they can remain objective, and not be emotionally overcome by the difficulties experienced by all their patients.

*Your* pelvic organs are fine! The problem is that the endopelvic fascia which is designed to keep them in position, and to help them to position each other, has been damaged, stretched by wear and tear, or by episiotomies and obstetric tearing, or simply by the effects of ageing. Our bodies, for whatever reason have become slumped over, unable or unwilling to support themselves tall and proudly.

I would prefer to use the term "... especially the skeleton, and the muscles and the soft tissue that joins them together and supports our pelvic organs", or "the supports of our pelvic organs". These are the body parts we need to attend to.

We need to get into our heads that our pelvic organs are healthy and simply need to be carried better, to enable them to function properly.

If our house is falling over the answer is to go back and underpin the foundations or replace the stumps and get the house on a good, square footing again. Then, if necessary place ties from one side of the building to the other, to tie the walls back together. That will often make the house square again and restore its structural integrity. Propping up the outside will only prop up the area near the prop. It will not stop the settling of the foundations. It will create more cracks where the prop stops. The answer is not to keep shaving more of the doors so we can close them. We will just end up with a very small door, and gaps where the wind and wild animals can get in through. The house will no longer provide shelter from the storm, or from predators.

As you so rightly point out, we need to breathe prana into our whole body, because it is the body that carries all our organs. It is the structure which needs attention.

Rant over.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to inhale some prana.

Louise

:-)