Monthly Archives: December 2009
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Posted: December 27, 2009Read more »
We got this lovely note from a happy Katrina K.:
“Just a comment... used your cancer/surgery cds for my breast cancer…. such a godsend. Was very upset and frightened… can’t even describe… cds settled me down… got me through. Thank you, thank you. If someone told me it would help, would never have believed them… got from being terrorized to calm in no time. Amazing…. Thank you for what you do…. gave them to my hospital when finished with them…. Please post this.”
K.K.
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Posted: December 27, 2009Read more »
Question:
As a practitioner, I want to know some technical things: how do you prepare your voice; modulate your vocal tone and pacing? Also, if we record in our own voice, should we adjust the language to be in first person?
John -
Posted: December 27, 2009Read more »
In a really fascinating and important meta-analysis, researchers from Tufts University studied identical twins to see whether resting functional brain abnormalities found in combat-related PTSD are acquired characteristics or familial risk factors.
Recent neuroimaging research has shown functional abnormalities in the anterior cingulate cortex, amygdala, and hippocampus in people with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
This study compares the PET scans (of resting regional cerebral metabolic rate for glucose) in fourteen combat-exposed veterans with PTSD and their fourteen identical co-twins, not exposed to combat, as well as nineteen combat-exposed veterans without PTSD (n = 19) and their nineteen identical co-twins, not exposed to combat. -
Posted: December 27, 2009Categories: Update from Health JourneysRead more »
All of us at Health Journeys want to wish you all a very happy, healthy, fun, productive, joy-filled and loving New Year!!
All best,
Belleruth, George, Cindy, Cheryl, Rich, Elizabeth, Walter, Mary, Steve, Bruce, Nancy, Reed and David -
Posted: December 18, 2009Read more »
Dear Belleruth,
I have been listening to the Guided Imagery CD, Combat Depression, for a month now, everyday. I have gotten very emotional during the part where a being enters your thoughts and touches you in a deep spiritual way. I cry, sob, tense up, get really emotional and then the CD (after a few minutes) has the being leave saying that you can call on him/her at any time, it is YOU that come and go, and suddenly you feel better for this...... Meanwhile I feel like crap - I don't feel better - I am now an emotional wreck. What am I doing wrong or what can I do to suddenly feel better for doing this? Please help.
Lucy -
Posted: December 18, 2009Read more »
The very inspiring Dr. James Gordon and his awesome, kickass team of volunteer mental health professionals are currently doing advanced PTS training in Gaza City. This is something, folks. Yep, they work separately with both Israelis and Palestinians, and continue in the wonderful tradition of what they did in Bosnia and post-Katrina New Orleans.
These folks get it that posttraumatic stress is a biochemical and neuro-physiological condition, and that the way to healing is through the primitive brain and nervous system. -
Posted: December 18, 2009Read more »
A research team from New York University and the University of Texas at Austin demonstrated that timing is critical in extinguishing a fear response – and this has groundbreaking potential for the treatment of phobias, anxiety disorders and posttraumatic stress. Evidently, there’s a brief window of opportunity for rewriting painful emotional memories immediately after re-activating them, when the imprinted memory becomes labile and open to change.
Simple fear was created in 65 subjects by giving them a mild electrical shock on the wrist one third of the time when shown a colored square appear on a computer screen (Earlier research in conditioned learning shows that this is the frequency of ‘punishment’ that creates a lasting association). -
Posted: December 18, 2009Categories: Update from Health JourneysRead more »
Season’s Greetings, everyone!
All of us at Health Journeys are wishing you a joyous and stress-free holiday season – or at least as much as is realistically attainable! (How’s that for assuming nothing?) And that includes our hopes for a new year that’s filled with joy, love, creativity, health and many satisfying new adventures.
My own new year’s resolutions are as follows (writing this down and making it public might be just the right move to seal my intention and my fate!: -
Posted: December 11, 2009Categories: Hot ResearchRead more »
Researchers from the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley evaluated how two, 8-week, 90-min/wk training programs in meditation-based stress-management were able to affect stress, rumination, forgiveness, and hope in college undergraduates.
Subjects were randomly assigned to either (1) training in mindfulness-based stress reduction or MBSR (n = 15) or (2) Easwaran's Eight-Point Program or EPP (n = 14), or (3) a wait-list control condition (n = 15). Pretest, posttest, and 8-week follow-up data were collected on self-report outcome measures. -
Posted: December 11, 2009Categories: Inspiring StoryRead more »
Our staff received this wonderful note last week about how some simple, stress-reducing imagery helped reduce a man’s back pain and shorten recovery time with a back that chronically goes out on him for weeks:
I feel compelled to write to you to thank you for the wonderful audio on Relieving Stress. For the umpteenth time, my back gave out on me. While a student at MSASS [Ed. note: This is The Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences at Case Western Reserve University),
a professor introduced our class to these wonderful healing tapes.
After a few short days of using the Stress tapes twice a day, my back
feels so much better. I can't believe how much faster I recovered this
time compared with other episodes of debilitating back pain in the
past. Wow!
I am going to recommend these tapes to all my friends that lead hectic and chaotic lives. A few minutes out of the day to listen can be so beneficial to general well-being!
Thank you again!
MC
