Yoga therapy helping treat symptoms of Parkinson's Disease
Houston - We're taking the ancient practice to the next level through yoga therapy. This form helps treat pain and relieve symptoms from diseases. Bobby Sherman has been dealing with symptoms of Parkinson's Disease more than a decade. Bobby says coming here, and working with yoga therapist Nancy Martch, is a real life changer! He says it's helping restore plus maintain his quality of life.
"Parkinson's is such a totally consuming disease, because it affects every bit of your body. It's you're walking, you're gait, you're postural stability, your ability to think, and all these things come together and in a total body - mind synthesis," explains Bobby.
Bobby also relies on non-contact boxing and stem cell treatments to help lower his symptoms. Here, is where he finds peace and a way to quieten his mind and soul. This, combined with proper breathing, helps calm his symptoms from Parkinson's. "Before I ever have him step, I have him look forward, figure out where he's going, and then we step into that space," states Nancy.
Nancy has been working with Bobby for five years.
"Bobby and I work a lot on gait. How does he walk, and part of the typical Parkinson's patients is that they begin to round forward and look down at the floor. When you're walking that way, you're more likely to trip, so we work a lot on standing tall, having the chest open, using the legs and the hips to walk, and not just swinging the legs forward and back," says Nancy.
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Nancy typically works with one client at a time. This is different from typical yoga, where everyone is following the same instruction in class.
Nancy says she has witnessed yoga therapy help many conditions. "I've worked a lot with people with back pain, surgical recovery, illness recovery, people with long-term progressive illness. In that case, we try to mitigate symptoms and we also try to think of ways to live comfortably with a diagnosis that is probably not going to become better from a physical sense, but how do we live most vitally with whatever life has given us," states Nancy.
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I tried something called "yoga nidra" with Bobby. This is a state of consciousness that falls somewhere between being awake to asleep through guided meditation. "There are times where there's difficulty concentrating, difficulty finding words, and I would go through the yoga nidra and I go into complete relaxation. The tremor would stop for the rest of the day, and the brain fog would go away. It's amazing," exclaims Bobby. We could physically see the difference! Only 30 minutes earlier, Bobby was dealing with hand tremors. After his session, a different story! "The brain fog is gone, and the tremor is gone," says a smiling Bobby. I noticed a sense of peacefulness and restfulness, almost as though I had taken a power nap, after only a few minutes of trying it out.
This type of yoga is science-based, and many studies show it can alleviate all types of symptoms. Many health Insurance companies are taking notice about how yoga therapy is helping many types of conditions, so they're starting to cover the costs of the therapy.
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For more information: you can find Nancy Martch through Jai Yoga Houston on Facebook and Instagram or by calling 281-397-8877.