Covid
It was 2020, the COVID 19 Pandemic hit, and like everyone else, I could not meet face to face, and therefore could not practice neurofeedback with my clients. All of us were making every imaginable adjustment to the changing times. It was also quite soon after my father died, and I was trying to write a book, so all this is to say, it was a time of great stress and transition. I was no whiz at technology so Zoom was a whole new universe to me as with so many of us. And “surprisingly,” at least it seemed so initially, all of my clients chose to continue their sessions remotely, so I had to learn. Of course, it was no surprise. All of us, and certainly all of my clients, were scrambling for how adapt to every imaginable and unimaginable sort of change. Thinking back on it now, it seems surreal, and distant, like remembering a science fiction movie viewed long ago. Occasionally I have that same feeling when I walk over faded sidewalk markings that say “six feet…”
Blessedly, we have a big enough house, so there was a room that readily adapted to an office for me. It was enough out of the way that I did not bother my husband and our then two dogs with my Zoom sessions. I set up shop at home, something I had never imagined I would do. In reality, the Pandemic was very kind to us. We stayed healthy, were able to stay pretty much “undisturbedly” employed, and had the resources to discover the vast universe of having things delivered. I missed doing errands, but really never wanted for anything, except of course freedom, and freedom from worry. And I was not in a great state of mind. I don’t remember if it was that I was feeling out of sorts physically, from being couped up, or if it was feeling a relentless pressure from deadlines. But I needed something. I remember somehow it came up in a consultation with my esteemed colleague Ruth Lanius, that there was a modality, new to me, called DBR, Deep Brain Re-orienting, that could be administered remotely.
DBR
I had never heard of DBR then, now it is somewhat ubiquitous, at least in the growing neurofeedback and trauma communities. Originated by Scottish neuroscientist/psychiatrist Frank Corrigan, it is a somatic therapy procedure targeting deeper and more primitive brain structures than what we had previously been working with. I was most familiar with the trauma responses in the over-active right amygdala trauma activations. Frank’s work went even earlier, even further outside of conscious awareness to reptilian brainstem regions, with unpronounceable names like periaqueductal grey (PAG.) These areas, located in the area at the foot of the scull, implicated in what Frank called “attachment shock,” a vivid and powerful nomenclature for attachment trauma that resonated intuitively with me, and with my work. So, I was intrigued. And I also needed something.
Perhaps due to the times, I had the good fortune of being able to do a series of sessions online with Frank himself, a privilege that I am sure would be much harder to come by today. For a number of months we had nearly weekly sessions that were at the interface of somatic and psychological. To be honest, I don’t remember them well, except on the sensory and emotional level. I remember that Frank was so utterly kind and gentle. Although he did not go as far as to sport a cardigan sweater, there was something attractively Mr. Rogers-like in his bearing and his care. I remember that the sessions were “hard,” kind of reminding me of when I was wildly anorexic and way too weak, and trying to work out with the junior high school water polo team. I lasted two weeks because during the workouts, unable to keep up, all I could think about was wanting them to be over. It was not quite that bad, but somehow that long lost memory was jarred loose. And I discovered what I had not really experienced before or allowed myself to feel, which was physical pain. Particularly my neck and back ached.
I remembered the work of Allan Schore, the first attachment researcher that ever compelled me. He talked about the essential need for the infant’s head to be supported. It is far too heavy for that scrawny little neck, certainly at the beginning. I remember him describing how that lack of early support, even in that blatantly physical expression, results in a flopping back, a disorientation, even dissociative experience for that unformed creature. I don’t know if that was my early experience, but my neck and emotions seemed to be telling such a story as I worked with Frank. It was enlightening, although admittedly not much fun, during an already difficult time.
When the pain continued mounting, and again, I was unaccustomed to consciously feeling, let alone acknowledging physical pain, Frank in his undying and merciful kindness, suggested we bring in his colleague and often collaborator, Martin Warner, an advanced practitioner of the longstanding modality of Alexander Method body work. I had some familiarity with Alexander from graduate school years ago, but had probably never experienced it. For a period of months I had the luxury of online sessions with Frank and Martin together, e rather remarkable arrangement with Frank in Glasgow, Martin in London and myself in San Francisco. Again, the memory is blurry, so I honestly can’t describe what happened, but I do remember coming away from the probably six months of work feeling inspired to study DBR when I can clear the time and band-width. Meanwhile, there had burgeoned a growing bandwagon in the neurofeedback community and admittedly I suffer from FOMO, not being able to join the important study at this time. But at least I am learning some version of regulation in not hopeless and self destructively overloading myself with yet another compelling undertaking.
Straightening Up…
That does, however, bring us to the present. In recent months, increasingly I began to notice, the pain in my neck and back, rearing up again, but much more than before, I became aware, it was harder to turn my head, harder to straighten up my back, and a seizing up in my neck seemed sometimes to even wrap around to the front. It was suggested to me, among other things, that perhaps Alexander work would help. Fortunately, I knew who to call.
In my first reunion session with Martin, as with many a potent somatic methodology, while working with the body, an awareness came to me, right out of the neck pain. My neck spoke to me and said since my father’s death at the end of 2019, I have become much more public and self-revealing about his/our story in my writing and speaking. In a way, I have “stuck my neck out” differently. My there be ambivalence, relief, guilt, the shipwreck of the Bermuda Triangle all thrashing around in y neck and back? Some part of me impelled to constrict, collapse, hide again? Curious again how the body throws out these profound questions. In my first return session. Oy vey! What would be next?
In our second session, I had the water polo feeling again. It was hard. Martin had me doing a sequence of movements in my neck and shoulders that were not necessarily strenuous, per se, and yet something about them made me unable to think about anything else but “when will this be over?” Martin asked, “Have you ever been diagnosed with scoliosis?” No, I answered. The he proceeded to describe that there was a pull backward and leaning forward at the same time. He instructed me in putting my attention toward the weight going forward. I was however, so very struck by his words, pulling forward and back at the same time, sounds insidiously like, you guessed it, the old Dilemma Without Solution, so much the heart of neglect trauma, where the source/object of comfort, longing, love; and the source/object of terror, loss, distress, are the same person. So the infant, child, even seasoned adult are in a tug of war between the simultaneous impulse to reach toward and pull back. This dilemma is at the heart of my teaching work, here it is again, at work in my own body.
The saga continues. Clients ask me, when is this work ever done? Maybe never? But that is OK. The journey is fascinating, much more so than painful. Thanks Martin!
Today’s Song:
