Upledger Craniosacral Therapy is a gentle physical therapy designed to help release both physical and emotional pain, and stress. Typically people come for assorted musculoskeletal issues (especially back, neck & head), nerve issues including sciatica, headaches, stress, sleep problems, emotional issues, deep relaxation and increased well-being.
Upledger Craniosacral Therapy is a cloths on gentle physical therapy. It was created by an osteopath, it and is now taught in 50 countries around the world.
I work from Follaton, on the outskirts of Totnes: Tuesday to Friday. My standard rate is £50 for 60 – 75 minutes of therapy. Please ring or text me: Nick on 07792594634 if you have any questions or wish to book in.
I use Upledger craniosacral therapy primarily to work with the fascia, our bodies connective tissue. The fascia is all interconnected, and runs thru out our body, holding all our skin, bones, muscle fibers, organs, nerve and blood vessels all together. it literally keeps us whole.
The fascia has many unusual qualities. The fascia can allow great flexibility in our bodies, allowing certain gymnasts and yogis to perform amazing stretches, yet under different circumstances the same fascia can tighten up and provide very rigid protection for our body’s internal organs, especially our very delicate brains and central nervous system. On a microscopic level, the fascias ability to morph it’s structure is truly unique.
From the foetus onwards, illness, accidents, lifestyle, upbringing, shock, toxins, surgery, and childbirth can leave detectable tensions, misalignments, and tight constrictions in our fascia. The effect of these on our posture, organs and nerve fibers can cause ongoing health problems that may be difficult to treat fully with other therapies. Releasing fascial constrictions has the potential to help improve ones mobility, organ function, brain function, nerve efficiency and blood supply. ……..And very importantly: how we feel! Our feelings/emotions at any moment in time usually corresponds to subtle or dramatic tightness or relaxation going on in various areas of our bodies. For example: if we’re happy our heart area tends to relax, if we’re frightened, it often tenses up. The study of this is called somatics. There are various practices that can help people become more conscious of how our emotions affect our bodies.
The fascia also has the amazing ability to absorb, or ‘bury’ various unresolved physical and emotional issues and trauma, allowing us to feel healthier, happier and more balanced: it helps create more homeostasis in the body. As brilliant as the fascia is at this, it can eventually become overloaded, causing ongoing tightness in various areas, resulting in physical pain or causing emotional distress. Note: because the fascia is all interconnected, it can be largely responsible for refereed pain, but on the plus side of this: releasing any one area should relax the whole system, including the nervous system held within it, which is probably why many people experience deep relaxation during treatments. Craniosacral therapy aims to aid the gentle release of these tensions, and the ‘suppressed’ or ‘buried’ memories related to them.
Most of the craniosacral treatment uses very light touch, and is done in the quiet, or with gentle music, and is done fully clothed lying on a massage couch. Clients often experience deep states of relaxation. Sometimes: old thoughts and memories re-surface, and occasionally clients have revelations or new understandings about themselves. The treatments aren’t all about releasing ‘negative’ issues, sometimes suppressed happy memories are released!
Strait after the treatment clients usually feel very calm, relaxed, happy and have greater mobility. Integration may take a few days.
I love doing Upledger craniosacral therapy. It is a physical therapy, not an energy therapy. The training includes a lot of anatomy, and increasing my kinaesthetic/touch sensitivity many times till I can feel through the body to different organs, vessels, impactions and subtle body rhythms. Although scientists seem uncertain how memory is held, I feel this therapy actually touches upon the most physical aspects of clients memories, and often meeting these with the gentle non-judgemental craniosacral methods encourages healing. Every treatment feels different and is an adventure for me, and I feel honored to be able to help with the clients’ processes.
If you are interested in trying craniosacral therapy for specific issues, for when other alternatives haven’t worked, for a relaxing fascial ‘tune up’, for when you just aren’t ‘feeling right’, or if you are looking for something different and wish to experience the potential of craniosacral therapy, please ring me. Craniosacral therapy is a lesser known form of bodywork, and not for everyone, so I sometimes do special offers for the first treatment to make it easier to trial it: contact me and ask.
John Upledger ‘discovered’ craniosacral therapy in the early 1970’s, and the Upledger Institute is now the largest school of craniosacral therapy in the world. Most of the local Totnes craniosacral therapists have however been taught at the smaller biodynamic schools in the country, including the Karuna college in Dartington, which have taken the practice in a different directions. I find the experience of receiving Upledger craniosacral therapy very different from receiving biodynamic treatments. Biodynamic therapsists often treat mostly holding the head, sacrum or feet. Upledger craniosacral therapists spend a lot more time working around individual parts of the body, and I find this change of focus can often give a greater sense and understanding of what the issues being worked on are. I find the Upledger style is more pro active at meeting issues (in a gentle manner), whilst Karuna is more about standing back and ‘allowing’ issues to do their ‘own thing’. If you’ve already tried biodynamic craniosacral therapy and fancy a change, do contact me.
I believe Upledger craniosacral therapy has a lot of potential: call me if you have queries.
“I highly recommend craniosacral therapy with Nick, whether you have a specific health problem, or you’re just looking for something nourishing to give yourself.”
“The therapy was extremely gentle and subtle and I felt a great sense of warmth, peace and well-being. After the treatment the pain had gone and I was trouble free for several weeks afterwards and also slept much better.”
“Nick is certainly among the best I’ve encountered. His approach is warm, understanding and down to earth.”
“My first craniosacral treatment was a revelation, rapidly transporting me into a blissful state of relaxation.”
“Everytime I walk away feeling emotionally balanced and nurtured.”
“I have intense pain flare-ups due to chronic illness (ME) which normally last between 1 to 4 weeks. During a flare-up of my neck, which was quite unbearable, Nick gave me a 20 minute session of his craniosacral therapy. By the end the pain had almost completely gone, and the last remnants had completely disappeared within 3 days. This shocked me.”