Issue link: https://www.massageandbodyworkdigital.com/i/68185
SPECIAL NEEDS CHILDREN MEET SOPHIE It was two years ago when Sophie first came to see me. I remember her eyes as they scanned the room. Barely pausing, she was soon exploring the space, circumambulating the periphery, pausing at significant places like at the photograph of my energy medicine teacher, Mary Iino Burmeister. Cathy, Sophie's mother, stood at the entryway, smiling as she tracked her mobile, inquisitive daughter. The two had come to see if my work could help this special needs child who, as a toddler, was diagnosed with Rett Syndrome, a genetic developmental and sensory dysfunction. Now, at 11, Sophie continues to benefit from the sensory integration journey we started together that day. Rett Syndrome is a little known condition, but the lessons that Sophie teaches are for a broad spectrum of needs that apply to adults, as well as children. My TARA Approach team and I are learning more about sensory integration every day, and what we develop as a result can be used by the adults who see themselves in the children we portray. 1. USE ATTUNED COMMUNICATION Sophie's characteristic gait veers slightly to the right and her chest is compressed. These are the by-products of the hand- clapping (one hand pushes repetitively into the palm of the other) that is the keynote of Rett Syndrome. Another structural consequence of the hand- clapping is a predictable scoliosis that will demand the greatest optimism and creativity to combat. Scoliosis for the child with Rett Syndrome is an osseous gauntlet, summoning the bodyworker to attention. If we can orchestrate an effective harmony of fascia, bone, and energy to offset scoliosis growth, it will be paramount to Sophie's journey. Cathy knows the richness bodywork brings to Sophie's life. Cathy is the ultimate hands-on parent and is a model of what every special needs child requires. Cathy will explore whatever will make a difference for her daughter. She is always ready and open and trusts in the guidance that directs her to practitioners. Cathy heard about how I combined therapies, integrating mental and emotional healing with energy medicine and cranial treatment. What she couldn't have predicted was the link that her daughter and I made almost immediately. Even before she was on the treatment table that first day, Sophie and I were resonating with each other. Now, two years later, it's easy to see the impact of the interventions we discovered and implemented for Sophie's evolution. The way Sophie and I understand each other, I believe, contributes to this success. Seeing how Sophie responded to me with expression, vocalization, movement, and gesture, I knew from the beginning that she understood my words and intentions. Despite her limited vocabulary, we created a fluid 36 massage & bodywork september/october 2010 dialogue. Some would say that Sophie has no language at all and that our communication is wishful thinking. Nevertheless, there is evidence from the perceptions of others who knew nothing of my relationship with Sophie that after she began her TARA Approach sessions of integrated therapies that a new level of social engagement became dramatically apparent. Her mother testifies to the fact that Sophie began to reach out in new empathic ways to others not long after our initial meetings. When working with Sophie, I respect her directives and honor all her requests for changes in treatment and decisions about when treatment starts and ends. I read her body as an advertisement of her needs and talk to her about everything that I do. I make suggestions for her self-care, including visualizations and healing imagery. She responds. The results are evident. For instance, I treated Sophie one day when she was alarmingly collapsed, folded over, and stooped in a way that I had never witnessed before. While treating her, I spoke about how she could see herself as upright. I encouraged her to visualize herself as long and tall, with a fluid, relaxed spine that supported her body. My worst fear, and her mother's nightmare, was that the scoliosis would win, overtaking any effort to stimulate length in Sophie's spine. Was that what we were seeing now with her collapsed body? I oriented instead toward the resilience in Sophie's tissue and her vibrant will. I spoke adamantly and decisively about the unquestionable possibility that she could arise out of this collapse and find her own vertebral grandeur. I honored her need for rest and recommended a warm bath following treatment. When I saw Sophie two days later, she was upright. That was several months ago, and while she has not collapsed to that extent since, we are pursuing structural support in the form of a soft bracing