This is a reflection …

Medea Benjamin and Charles David point out in their well researched article, “A Look Back at 8 Years of War In Iraq” …

“More than 4,400 Americans have died as a result of the invasion and occupation of Iraq – more than the 3,000 killed on 9/11.

Over 32,000 US soldiers have been seriously wounded, many kept alive thanks to the miracle of modern medicine. But those numbers don’t tell the half of it.

Stanford University and Naval Postgraduate School researchers who examined the delayed onset of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) found that by 2023 the rate of PTSD among Iraq war veterans could rise to as high as 35 per cent.

And for the second year in row, more soldiers committed suicide in 2010 than died in combat, a tragic but predictable human reaction to being asked to kill – and watching your friends be killed.”

- Mede Benjamin and Charles Davis

They wrote this portion well and there is no denying the research … of course, it’s an opinion piece, and culminates in just that, but they do link their facts and that’s why it’s posted here on a blog that points to health and healing … later in the article they note the rise in domestic violence after Vets return home.

This concerns.

CraniOcean was one of the first blogs to report and reflect on PTSD in this country.  How much has really changed since then?  It doesn’t have to be like this, not with proper information.  If you are suffering from PTSD, or know anyone that is, or from Mild Traumatic Brain Injury(TBI) please consider to visit the site, CraniOcean.Calm today.  After all, it couldn’t hurt.

Thank you.

**********

ONLINE DEFINITION OF THE WORD, “CHEERFUL”!

cheerful [ˈtʃɪəfʊl]

adj 

1. having a happy disposition; in good spirits

2. pleasantly bright; gladdening a cheerful room

3. hearty; ungrudging; enthusiastic cheerful help 

cheerfully adv

cheerfulness n

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003

The award winning book, Touch the Ocean: The Power of Our Collective Emotions by James Nemec LMT, CST-D is available as an AudioBook and Mp3 Download.

Here is the description distributor, New Leaf:

Touch the ocean, Your ocean! The Award Winning, TOUCH THE OCEAN: THE POWER OF OUR COLLECTIVE EMOTIONS, by celebrated craniosacral therapist, James Nemec, narrates compelling stories of heart centered presence and ocean healing. Capturing the moment-by-moment details of actual sessions with dolphins and clients, the prescient author learns how to participate with nature and touch the ocean.  Music by Rusty Crutcher from “Ocean Eclipse,” an Ivy League endorsement for Afterward, the tones of the Audio Book and Mp3 take us into fluid matrices that can open Gaia and the listener. The Author draws on his theater background as an actor and playwright for “really engaging” listening.  Revised, Unabridged. “Ocean fresh delivery.” - New Leaf Distributing

With additional vocals by Suzanne Catty, Sound Engineering, JC Spradley, and consultant Editor, Alex Earley.

The video trailer for the AudioBook posted on Youtube:

(The two women are both craniosacral therapists, Deborah McConnell and Athena Zesik.)

Readers of the CraniOcean.Calm News, might consider ordering the Audio Hard copy here at Amazon International for supplies will be quite limited.

Thanks for your purchase!  A refreshing mental health break for you in your car!  Enjoy the Ocean Fresh AudioBook/Mp3 for Touch the Ocean: The Power of Our Collective Emotions.

[If you are seeking actual relief and treatment-headaches, lower back pain, anxiety, and more, please go to the Author's page on CraniOcean.Com -- Contact Us!]

Watching this video is like reading a certain, related chapter from the book, Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell … for in this chapter, we learn how some drugs — hallucinogens — can lodge in the walls of the core ‘craniosacral system’ … for years

Particularly moving are some of the comments associated with this video posted on the left leaning online paper, The Huffington Post. If you happen to go to this link, please do scroll down for the comments – it’s refreshing to see many people processing their personal experiences with this experimental drug in an online forum …

For even more contemplation, why not check out this video clip by stand up comedian, Bill Hicks, “Positive Drug Story”… ?

What does this have to do with CraniOcean?  Is there a point?  Need we go into the statistics of medical errors and drugs?  On the other hand, perhaps it might be of interest to some readers who have been there.

You might visit the book by James Nemec entitled, Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell, and a certain chapter entitled, “Freddy.”  Freddy’s case history demonstrates how drugs including LSD and psychotropics can become locked in the chambers of the fluid craniosacral system, and how with the help of non-surgical and non-intrusive ‘craniosacral therapy,’  safely and harmlessly released.

 

Nemec's, "Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell"

Stand by for updates!

Thanks for your visit. Why not subscribe to something harmless? You can do that here today.

UPDATE:

Grateful to report that HBO is airing “WAR TORN” on November 11, 2010, Veterans Day.  We are moving right along with this subject!  It you have suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Traumatic Brain Injury(TBI), or Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI), or know of anyone that has, please feel free to call this Therapeutic Facilitator for a free phone consultation from the number posted on the website, CraniOcean.com.  Or contact a craniosacral practitioner in your area. No need to hesitate.  Make your appointment now for the relief and treatment and discover what really works.  Thankfully, the word is getting out there.

Medallion Member, International Association of Health Care Practitioners

Medallion Member, International Association of HealthCare Practitioners

James Nemec LMT, CST-D

Medical Offices, 1900 South Olive Avenue, West Palm Beach, FL 33401

National Certification Board

Thank you.

This Summer!! from CraniOcean Media, an Inter-dependent Publisher -

“Cranio-What?” A Craniosacral Therapy Primer

By James Nemec, LMT, CST-D

Excerpt:

Welcome!  This short, illustrated Primer is for You.  Since a  Primer is an A-B-C,  it can be browsed and enjoyed in any office lobby, spa, or medical clinic, or handed out to others for their benefit.  Designed for both givers and receivers, it shows how the term, “CranioSacral Therapy,” might be more difficult to pronounce than “long haul tractor trailer,” or “nautilus shell,” but the essence of simplicity after learning a few basic points!  This user friendly Primer is also meant to support, supplement and enhance the reading pleasure of a small handful of lyrical books by certified massage therapist and craniosacral therapy Diplomat certified, James Nemec, LMT, CST-D.  “Poet of Bodywork.”  And hopefully, it will inspire others to learn even more! What is the theme?  Few know that just as there is an art to giving craniosacral therapy, there is an art to receiving it. Have fun.

All Rights Reserved

“Cranio-What?” A Craniosacral Therapy Primer, Publication date, August 11, 2010 [ISBN 978-0-9792805-7-3] $11.93

"Cranio-what?" A CranioSacral Therapy Primer

Soon!! available everywhere online and at better bookstores!  Order your illustrated, 62 page copy for your office today!

Compliments of CraniOcean Media, an Inter-dependent Publisher –

“How can craniosacral therapy have anything to do with the relief of Cesarean Section?  Although “C-Sections” are required for the safety of both mother and infant, the image of the Cesarean birth taught in craniosacral therapy is that of the deep sea diver who comes up to the surface too fast and “bends” due to the rapid change in air pressure.  Not just the head, but the infant’s whole body is subject to constant pressures within.  The rapid change in just air pressure can create a very unpleasant cranial base situation in the infant to be dealt with in adulthood if not minutes after the actual time of delivery.  At best, both the mother and the newborn would soon be treated for Cesarean, for the relief of the one can assist in the relief of the other, sympathetically and energetically.  On the other hand, the relief of Cesarean section later in life can help soothe, and calm adolescent malaise and endogenous depression, with a very light touch …. “

Excerpt from the forthcoming –“Cranio-What?” A CranioSacral Therapy Primer, by James Nemec, LMT, CST-D.

For more, visit the sidebar, Craniosacral for Pediatrics on CraniOcean.com

All rights reserved.

On Memorial Day, we often return on the CraniOcean Blend to the subjects of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and of suicides in the Military.  What has changed is that in the past few years, more military people are beginning to talk about this subject.  This is hopeful.  Maybe they will begin to see the light.

The online article today, “PBS’s ‘This Emotional Life’: Memorial Day — Remembering Military Suicides, by Ret. Brigadier General Stephen N. Xenakis, MD, describes the bewilderment of the military.  This is tragic. One reason it’s tragic is because no one in the military can accept what is going on. This is a good article because it is a truly brave article.

Not just the soldiers require relief and treatment that works, but after such an event, the loved ones need support and attention too. Otherwise, this can lead to a vicious cycle in the families.

“The body, not just the mind, has stories to tell. These stories can remain in the body as tissue memories. These memories can surface in dreams at night. What can we do to let these memories and stories thaw and melt away, without force, harmlessly?”

– from the book, “Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell.”

Non-surgical, light touch, craniosacral therapy is also proven successful in the relief and treatment of Vietnam Vets, as we have seen in this blend in the work founded by Susan Trider, PT and the Upledger Institute in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.  The program was ended due to lack of funding.

Also, as we have seen in this Blend, the VA Hospital here continues to ignore this form of treatment, not because they don’t mean well, but because they refuse to have the vision and look again. Once upon a time, however, the VA Hospital embraced it, and what happened? It worked.  Later, Dr. Upledger complained to me that they wouldn’t answer his letters anymore than they would answer mine.

Please refer to my friend and colleague’s timely article,  “The Role of CranioSacral Therapy in Addressing Post Traumatic Stress Disorder,” (Dr. John E. Upledger) Why not share it with your own friends, family members, and the world?

The only way one will ever know, for sure, is to find out for oneself, in one’s own experience.

Anyway, it’s worth a try.

Remember also the trauma that the loved ones of those who have committed suicide in the military experience today. It’s confusing, bewildering, and its painful. It hurts. This pain is very real. There is no shame. And because one person in a family commits suicide, does not mean that others must. It is not the same.

This goes for the troop members, also: This is not the same as that.

Thank you, and be at Peace.

Memorial Day, 2010

It started an an acute care clinic on Melrose Avenue in L.A. in 1992.  But by 1998, there were no websites with general information and for those in crisis on Craniosacral Therapy and other light touch modalities.  CraniOcean.Calm was  the first website up in the Craniosacral Therapy trade for this purpose and has influenced many more over the past decade.

CraniOcean.Calm - First Generation - From 1998

After all these years, it doesn’t matter the school or approach that one uses in craniosacral, what matters is the truth.

Information on other light touch therapies was added and this site served as one of the only information providers for these services online.  Now, it’s time for an upgrade and certain things will look a bit different.  We have put this off as long as possible because so many liked the old website, it’s very familiar, and protested any changes.

There are some refreshing new additions to this website, designed as before by J.C. Spradley, such as drop down Menus, Books, and a Calandar function, and now the Blogs (Blends) are easier to access.  Theses Blogs were never posted before on the site or advertised, but are as quiet as before — for those who happen to find them, along with the book gardens.  Later, there might possibly be a shopping cart added.

This site will be a work in progress – just as the old site was — for the next several months.  For those who would like to take a walk down memory lane and visit the old website, CraniOcean.Calm, feel free!

Thank you for the privilege of your support over these years and for this visit with us.  Comments are fine now, if you actually feel inspired to do so. Let us know what you like about the site now, if anything.

We hope you find a friend in the pages of the new upgrade too!

JN, LMT, CST-D

FYI, I just love Jeff Bridges’ announcement when he won the Academy Award for Best Actor this year, 201o.  As he accepted the award, he said, “This award will bring peace, harmony, and prosperity to MY world!”

Did anyone reading this ever see him in, Starman?  The writer, Thomas Wolfe during his tour for I Am Charlotte, suggested on Book Span that any movie with Jeff Bridge’s in it is worth seeing.

Anyway, “Can One light touch change the world,” is not only the question to ponder in the book, Touch the Ocean: The Power of Our Collective Emotions, written by yours truly, but also the title of a magazine article on both of the books in the last issue of Evolve! Magazine.

It’s quite miraculous that out of the thousands of books out there, both Touch the Ocean and Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell, were given a four page spread in Evolve! (A Magazine of Evolutionary Products, People, and Ideas).  It was a total surprise!  I hope you will follow this link and check it out, certainly if you have read these books.  No, it’s not an Academy Award, or a Tony, but it reveals another side of this playwright, my “other life.”

Evolve! Magazine - Can One Light Touch Change the World?

These books were made to honor the work that clients did in whole body emotional release sessions in combination with “craniosacral therapy,” and to show others what is possible.  Several of the stories are of those who had suffered years with “incurable” or unsolvable cases that improved rapidly (and safely) never to reoccur again.  All of this would be a search for the miraculous if the miraculous wasn’t so ordinary.  Good health and harmony is at your fingertips, now. Find out for yourself!

The article also delves into the safe relief and treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and takes some of the mystery out of it.

As a hopeful author, I once set up an advertisement for Touch the Ocean in Evolve! magazine.  Only a quarter page ad and it cost a lot of money.  That’s when I began to move away from advertising, ouch.  Anyway, please enjoy this special gift from the Universe!  It was very thoughtfully posted by webmaster, JC Spradley.

Just click on this link : Can One Light Touch Change the World?

And what of YOUR world?

Thank you.

You might feel it unusual to visit a blog that might sound so “un-medical” – and the language here is quite intentional.  These pages can be quickly made “medical” out of common recognition, and what is the gain in that? And what after all, are those in our nation’s VA Hospital’s doing with all their languages, devices, ideas and ideals of what is normal?  who deny that PTSD and now, Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI) can be relieved and treated? Of course, it’s “complicated.”

It doesn’t have to be this way.

It’s usually the poets and artists that lead changes in society.  Next, scientists, but medical scientists can lag a few hundred yeas behind, no joke.  (see Lymph Drainage Therapy history) Well, the playwright, David Rabe describes Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)  much better in his play, Streamers, as does playwright David Berry in his Obie award winning play, G.R. Point, (How are you, David?) but  it’s nice to see someone, anyone, chipping away at the mechanisms behind PTSD and considering the possibility of its existence.  And does this new panel really know what Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is, or anything about its safe and effective relief and treatment?

From Reuters and Canada.com, Review confirms PTSD, other syndromes in Gulf vets

Might there be a connection between the body and the mind?

Might there be a Connection?

For the safe and sane relief and treatment of PTSD, one might browse a few chapters in the book, Journeys: Stories Our Bodies Can Tell. Peter Levine, who draws from the same or similar sources in his book, Waking The Tiger, also beneficial and a man of heart.

An article by the Editorial Staff of Massage Today also brings up some of the graphs used in the Vietnam Veteran Intensive Therapy Program developed by my colleague, Susan Trider, PT – “The Power of Touch: Helping Vietnam Veterans.” Susan is now considering leading a similar program, but as yet there is neither interest nor funding.  Or maybe, no one yet knows that craniosacral therapy provides a safe and effective relief and treatment for PTSD and MTBI, or even wants to know.  Think about it.

Thank you.