auto immune and similar, continued

photo by @Saffu from Unsplash

Flexibilities. The untaught and forgotten aspect of much yoga in The West.

Why am I so keen on them? When I was in my early twenties, I went to my first yoga class. Yoga was pretty unknown back then. We started every single class with standing flexibilities. Honestly, by the time that I did my first ever pose, I was not as stiff as usual. They made such a difference to my well being and general mobility, even at that young age.

Every body ends up with some problems, over time

Fast forward, many decades. I had The Back from Hell. From my first ever Iyengar yoga class. Way Back In The Day, soon after I first started yoga, where they screamed at students and forced them into positions. I never went back, and to this day, I still don't like that style of yoga. And I also now have a foot that has a little bone that keeps slipping out of place (causing painful walking). Oh, and anemia. Causing incredible weakness. I seemed to spend my whole life trying to "get better". It was so hard. I was still teaching and practising yoga. I didn't know what to do. Honestly, I was in such a quandary over my health.

Then I remembered the flexibilities from my youth. Many years ago, I had gone on to learn the seated joint movements from the Satyananda Yoga system, but, to be honest, I didn't like them. I have incredible memory with yoga and it's techniques, and gradually started to remember those standing looseners. I went on to meet a man who also had learnt them, and he helped me out there, too. 

I started doing them again. They have restored my body in so many ways. I am so grateful. I said that I would do stick figures for the flexibilities that I wrote about here. However my old computer is not allowing me to upload any pictures. I'm quite gutted about this, and I do apologise. So, I'll just have to hopefully remember when I have my new laptop sometime early next year.

Many of the processes for repair are similar for most problems

How does this all relate to auto-immune disorders and similar? To be honest, it's the same as recovering from a serious illness, or an accident. Just getting the body to be able to have some movement. And each day may well be different. 

Some days, you may barely be able to move. But at other times, you will be able to. And it's in these moments when you do simple, non-threatening movement, that you are enabling the body to start repairing itself. How do I know this? I now have an auto-immune disorder too, and these moves are my lifeline. It came on quite suddenly after many years of overload of stress. So painful. Some days, many days, I now have no symptoms, thanks to just regularly safely putting my body through an easy and gentle range of motion, getting energy flowing through my physical being. But when I first started doing them again? It was so hard, I could barely do them. It was way too painful. On a good day, I just did my best. On a very painful day, I didn't do them at all, I rested instead. The good days became more and more. I did other things too, but these are like the backbone. And I hope, deep in my heart, that this happens for you too.

If you're quite unwell, it really is fine to do as many as possible, seated. And hold onto a bench or chair for the standing ones. When our body is hurting, it needs to feel safe.

As I've gotten older, I've become less rigid in how yoga is practised. Particularly as there honestly are so many differing styles of performing the same moves. I first learnt flexibilities, surya namaskara and poses, done twice each only, with deep breathing. Very effective. I then went on to learn doing tons of fast yet incredibly precise surya namaskara (ten to fifty-four rounds), doing joint movements and reclining abdominal moves ten times each. Holding poses for three minutes each time. And yet, I was far less flexible doing this, than when I only did everything twice. Why was this? 

With chronic inflammation, we need to be careful of overheating our body

My first teacher seldom taught bhastrika (bellows breath). We did do a lot of fast kapalabhati (skull cleansing breath/breath of glow). With the Satyananda system, we did (omg moment) tons of bhastrika. Pumping the abdomen style - very heating. And the kapalabhati (strong sneezes) was done very forcefully and slowly. Both pranayamas, done this way, made my body too hot. I later went on to do lots of warriors and down dogs, too. Bad moves for me. Too overheating for me as well. 

I do teach them, however. I know that lots of people do well with the Big poses. I don't. 

Why did the differing styles of breathing practices, and number of repetitions of poses, and the types of postures, matter?  

Because they did matter. It was a remarkable difference. I am that person whose body overheats very easily. So tons of forceful pranayama and strong asanas.... turned out to not be so good for me. I get stiff when I practice yoga this way. It also helped me to pile on weight. However, in contrast, my first teacher taught yoga with a more cooling effect. And it was way less stressful. Stress also overheats me.

And now, I have a tendency to rheumatoid arthritis (gene pool tendency). So, I've gone back to that easier style of yoga. Which I actually love. And I have to avoid nightshade foods like the plague. When I do this, the pain dramatically recedes. And, if have sugar - it flares back up again. Bad news for someone whose comfort foods are hot potato chips, and creamy sweet cakes. 

This is one of the most important aspects of auto-immune. I am no nutritionist, but for sure some foods cause me to overheat and get that incredible arthritic pain. Everywhere. You no doubt may have your own food triggers, or not at all. It's not at all about avoiding gluten and adding superfoods. It's just about you and your body.

Ongoing stress causes incredible problems

And other stress in your life. Oh my goodness. Number one. The number of people who suddenly get auto-immune things after and during incredible stress, is more than you would think.

For me, I don't do shaming about this. I really do not like that sort of behaviour and these days I've removed myself from many who have these attitudes. Dr Swami Gitananda, who had run a psychiatric hospital in Canada decades ago, said at a seminar in the early 1970s, that it was preferable to get physically sick than mentally sick. And I have noticed that someone who suddenly gets an auto-immune disorder, is usually mentally very strong. 

I do not recommend doing power, vinyasa, Ashtanga, Iyengar or any styles of yoga which are performed in a full-on way, for those who have auto-immune problems. Just to be clear, I do teach vinyasa - as both power yoga and flow yoga. They are great. I love them. But at the moment - no, I should not be doing them. 

When our body turns on itself, as in auto-immune, we need to be friendly to it. Kind. Do yoga flexibilities and gentle poses. Go for easy walks, lift light weights. Sleep well. Make your body feel loved. Make friends with it. 

If you have any queries, I'm happy to answer them.

** If you want to add some gentle poses, a lovely little sequence that I put together, here

** A very small simple evening sequence here

** More very easy and simple evening yoga poses plus breathing, here