Groups

I am not currently offering a chronic illness therapy group; however, I recommend the following group resources for those living with chronic physical conditions. Finding a safe and gentle way to connect with your body can be a powerful aspect to learning to live more fully with your condition or disability, as well as an avenue to decreasing stress and improving overall quality of life.

The Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction class at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle is an eight week class, offered multiple times throughout the year. A brief description and contact information is found below and more information can be found Carolyn McManus' website: Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction

Description of the 8 week program:
Mindfulness-based stress reduction offers you instruction in mindfulness meditation, gentle yoga and a range of strategies to manage stress and physical symptoms. This eight-week class is designed to complement your medical care.
Join physical therapy instructors who will provide you with:
• Effective ways to manage stress, pain and illness
• Instruction in relaxation and mindfulness meditation
• Gentle stretching exercises that enhance mobility and
build mind-body awareness
• Specific tools to integrate class material into daily life
• A supportive group for sharing experiences and feelings
about illness and healing

To find out more about the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program at Swedish Medical Center click on the above links, or to register, call (206) 215-6966.

The Pain Puzzle: Empowering You to Put the Pieces Together also offered at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle in which Carolyn McManus shares the role of class instructor with her colleague, Cate Brummett, DPT. Classes are held monthy. Please call (206) 386-2035 for the dates of upcoming classes. Research indicates if patients are educated about the physiology of pain they experience reduced pain and improved function. Based on this research, Carolyn developed an educational class program that provides people with chronic pain the medical facts about pain physiology and pain perception. Carolyn uses easy-to–understand language to explain how the nervous system works when you experience pain. Contact information and more information can be found on Carolyn McManus' website: The Pain Puzzle Class

Yoga Empowered for Chronic Conditions is a class taught by Suzanne Stephens and is located in the Ballard area of Seattle. Suzanne specializes in teaching clients how to empower oneself using various yoga tools and accommodates each client's specific physical limitations in her classes. Living with Multiple Sclerosis, Suzanne has been empowered by the yoga tools she has learned to incorporate into her daily life and states: "she still has Multiple Sclerosis but Multiple Sclerosis doesn’t have her any more."

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.
~Albert Camus