PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION

Craniosacral Therapy

• What is Craniosacral Therapy?
• How does Craniosacral Therapy work?
• Can Craniosacral Therapy help me?
• Craniosacral Therapy for Babies
• Conditions which Craniosacral Therapy can help to alliviate

What is Craniosacral Therapy?
It is a “hand on” therapy. For treatment, you will usually lie on a treatment table and experience the very light touch of the Therapist’s hands. You may feel a deep sense of relaxation, and possibly become aware of heat, tingling, pulsations or other sensation.

This extremely gentle therapy uses no manipulation. The Therapist listens, via the hands, to what is going on in your body, and in this way both identifies and relieves pains or tensions held in the body.

Craniosacral Therapy is client-led. Your body will set the pace of work, so you will remain comfortable, in control and able to integrate the changes that occur.

Since it is your body (rather than your mind) that sets the priorities, you may find that the reason you came for treatment is not what changes first. Also, some people find that it can take a few sessions to get used to what they are feeling. For these reasons, you may need to consider having a series of treatments to gain the full benefit of Craniosacral Therapy and its cumulative effects.

Craniosacral Therapy is becoming much better known these days. It is based on a number of findings about the body’s subtle physiology, which were made by osteopaths in the USA nearly 100 years ago.

These findings show that every cell in a healthy body expresses a rhythmic movement, which is fundamental to life – and which has been called Craniosacral motion.

At the core of the body the cerebrospinal fluid, which bathes and cushions the brain and spinal cord, expresses this motion in a tide-like ebb and flow; while bones, organs and other structures in the body each follow their own particular pattern of movement. This motion is so subtle that it is barely measurable with instruments, but the hands of a trained therapist are able to perceive it.

As the implications of these findings were realised, during the first thirty years or so of this century, Craniosacral Therapy gradually developed. Since then the therapy has been refined and further developed into the subtle, deep healing process, which is available today.

How does Craniosacral Therapy Work?
In response to physical knocks or emotional stress, the body’ s tissues contract. Sometimes particularly when then shock is severe or occurs within an emotional situation, the tissues, stay contracted.

Any stresses, strains, tension or trauma, which have been “stored” in the body in this way will restrict the body’s functioning and may give rise to problems over the years. The effects may be both physical (such as back pain, migraine or digestive disorders) and emotional (such as anxiety or depression).

Restrictions in the body’s functioning show up in the way that craniosacral motion is expressed. Craniosacral Therapists are trained to feel this subtle motion in the body, and can use it to identify areas where there is congestion or restriction. In this way they can identify the possible origin of a problem. Then, using the hands to reflect back to the body the pattern it is holding, the therapist provides an opportunity for the body to let go of its restrictive pattern and return to an easier mode of functioning.

This happens at a deep, unconscious level within the body, but it occurs in the same way as we might take other, more conscious decisions. For example, if someone holds a mirror in from of you when you are frowning, you suddenly become aware of your expression and may well choose to relax your eyebrows.

As well as releasing the body’s tensions, this frees the energy which the body was previously suing to hold itself in contraction. So one of the benefits of the therapy is an increase in the level of energy available.

Can Craniosacral Therapy help me?
Craniosacral Therapy is so gentle that it is safe and suitable for people of all ages, from babies to the elderly, and also in fragile or acutely painful conditions.

Indeed, it is often appropriate when other therapies may be unsafe, such as during pregnancy, after an operation accident, fall or injury, and for young babies. As a whole body therapy, Craniosacral Therapy may aid people with almost any condition, by raising the vitality and enabling the body’s own self-healing processes to be utilised.

But you don’t have to be ill or have any particularly symptoms to benefit from Craniosacral Therapy. The alleviation of life’s stresses, and the increased sense of vitality and well-being that Craniosacral Therapy can bring are welcome to most of us at any time.

Craniosacral therapy for Babies
One of the joys of treating babies is that they tend to respond so well to treatment, and more quickly than adults. Many infant problems, like colic, suckling problems, breathing difficulties, restlessness and irritability, may result from craniosacral imbalances caused during the birth process.
Treatment of young infants may help to relieve such problems.

Conditions which Craniosacral Therapy can help to alliviate

The following is a list of some of the wide range of conditions which may resong favourably to treatment:

Allergies
Arthritis
Asthma Autism
Back Pain
Birth trauma
Bone / joint disorders
Breathing disorders
Bronchitis
Cerebal Plasy
Chronic Fatigue
Colic
Depression
Digestive problems
Drug withdrawl
Dyslexia
Emotional problems
Exhaustion
Frozen shoulder
Headaches and migraines
Hormonal imbalances
Hyperactivity
Impotence
Infertility
Insomnia
Learning difficulties
ME
Menstrual pain
Muscular aches and sprains
Nervous disorders
Post dental trauma
Rheumatism
Sciatica
Sinusitis
Spinal curvatures
Stress-related conditions
Stroke
TMJ / jaw disorders
Trigeminal neuralgia
Visual disturbances

Stephanie Harrington practices Shiatsu, Craniosacral Therapy and Indian Head Massage at the Haelan Clinic.

For Clinic times, contact details and information about the Haelan Clinic practitioners see The Practitioners page .

Back to top