Blog: What’s Happening in Yoga Therapy
Back off! Yoga therapy and scoliosis: Part 2
By Gabriella Barnstone During a class I was teaching on scoliosis, one of the students—a vital, stylish woman in her 80s—mentioned that her friend was constantly pestering her about her posture. “Tell her to back off!” I said. Let me explain. This woman was in...
A key to aging gracefully?
Two IAYT-certified yoga therapists, Carol Krucoff and Kimberly Carson, have just published a paper in the medical journal Topics in Geriatric Rehabilitation detailing the elements of safe yoga practice for seniors. They write that more than a third of the people who...
Never too old: Yoga for healthy aging
We are always changing, but during our senior years the shifts may become more noticeable to us. Two prevalent physical changes are the loss of muscle mass and the stiffening of our tendons, both of which lead to many functional changes. Although yoga therapy cannot...
Ancient and modern approaches to whole-person health
Has your doctor mentioned whole health to you yet? The movement toward whole health, or whole-person health, is being led in the United States by the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) and the Veterans Administration (VA). Other...
How yoga therapists work: Behind bars
Tianna Meriage-Reiter is a physical therapist and an IAYT-certified yoga therapist who is now practicing her professions in a prison. She writes in her blog about her intention to demonstrate how yoga is much more than physical exercise or stretching: I know yoga is...
Yoga for people living with dementia
By Robyn Lewis For more than 8 years I have provided group seated yoga practices in residential elder-care and day-respite as well as younger-onset dementia-care settings. Although dementia begins with deterioration of mental functions, the condition has clear effects...
Back off! Yoga therapy and posture: Part 1
By Gabriella Barnstone Whenever I tell someone I am a yoga therapist I usually get one of several responses. “What is that?” “I need to do more yoga/get back to my yoga practice.” Or, often, “I need to fix my posture!” Although the true purpose of yoga (to calm the...
How yoga therapists work: Supporting empowerment and agency in healing
By Richelle Muscroft The foundational idea of mind-body therapies is that all parts of us—emotional, mental, social, spiritual, and physical—affect our health. The effects of distress and trauma are not just cognitive experiences: They’re embedded into the body and...
Yoga: Therapy for lifestyle diseases
By Santiago Buompadre Lifestyle is now the main driver of mortality and morbidity in the world. In other words, our habits, activities, and how we treat ourselves have become the primary reasons for early death and chronic illness. Yoga offers a wide variety of...
“Something that I can’t feel anywhere else”
LoveYourBrain was founded by two brothers, one of whom, Kevin Pearce, was an elite snowboarder and sustained a traumatic brain injury (TBI) in a snowboarding crash. Kevin states the challenge of this often-invisible injury: “TBI is complex and leads to whole person...
