The FLOURISH Center logo
Boundaries~ Safe, Seen and Loved

Boundaries~ Safe, Seen and Loved

by | Sep 12, 2024 | Mind-Body Medicine

A few weeks ago, I spent the weekend with a dear friend who is battling cancer for the second time. The days following a chemotherapy treatment can be daunting for her – physically, emotionally, and mentally – and my friend has no problem asking for support. Our time together highlighted the importance of boundaries, the lines and limits we create for ourselves so that we can function well in relationships with others. With my friend, for example, I knew it would not go well if I told her to do something, no matter how essential it was for her at that moment. How do you feel about the boundaries in your current relationships?

There are many types of boundaries including physical, emotional, relational, sexual, intellectual, time, financial, spiritual, and material boundaries. The limits we set are defined by multiple factors including our experiences as we grow up in our families. To narrow this topic a bit for today, let’s consider your relationships with a friend or family member.

Ask yourself these questions:

  • What do I value in a relationship?
  • What behaviors bother me?
  • What qualities do I admire in others?
  • How do I like to spend my time? What makes me feel fulfilled?
  • How much time do I like to spend with others? What do I currently have time for now in my friendships?
  • How easy is it for me to say no? To say yes?

Setting a boundary with someone can be difficult. Our boundaries may be too rigid (picture a wall without any doors and no access to others), too porous (the wall and door are there, but others can come and go as they please) or collapsed (no walls at all). When we find it difficult to set a limit, typically we’re afraid of something. We may fear . . .

We may fear . . .

  • losing the love or approval of another person.
  • the other’s anger.
  • loneliness
  • guilty feelings, feeling like a bad person when we say no.
  • hurting the feelings of others.
How do you strengthen your boundaries? One step might be to explore your own boundaries in a specific relationship. Be curious and notice how you interact with that person. You might want to identify an area to practice setting healthier boundaries, limits that look much more like a wall with a door that you use to invite people in and out. The goal? For both of you to feel safe, seen and loved.

If boundaries in relationships are challenging for you, another step may involve seeking the support of another person, including a counselor. In my practice, I collaborate with clients to change their boundaries through experiential therapy that includes experiments where we explore the body’s role in boundary setting. If you’re interested in working with me, click below. 

WORK WITH ME
Tips for Better Digestion & Gut Health

Tips for Better Digestion & Gut Health

by | Aug 23, 2024 | Food Medicine

Written by our Functional Nutritionist & Health Coach, Cindy Wiedoff

Optimal gut health begins with our daily habits. In order to set yourself up for success, the focus must shift to making mealtime a priority.

After all we spend a good amount of time eating, typically an average of 3 to 5 times daily.

The more we can do to start the digestion process off right, the more likely we are able to absorb nutrients and avoid digestive dysfunction.

I put together a few helpful HINTs (see what I did there) to help improve your overall gut health and digestive processes.

Digestion should be visualized as a “north to south” process.

It begins in your brain (north), not your stomach!

The act of smelling and seeing the food tells your brain its time to eat, so it sends out a signal telling the digestive system to get ready to eat. This stimulates the production of stomach acid and enzymes needed to assist the body in breaking down food as it moves down “south”.

If we skip this crucial step, the next stage of digestion will become more difficult.

It’s important to be in a relaxed frame of mind. Proper digestion can only happen when we are in a parasympathetic (relaxed) state of being.

That means being mindful about the entire process and avoiding potential distractions like multitasking. Mindful eating includes taking the time to be seated, to eat slow, breathe, look, and smell before you even take your first bites of food.

For my clients, I provide an in depth examination of digestion and eating habits. I help pin point areas that may be hindering optimal health, then guide them through the process to improve certain aspects.

Tips for optimal digestion and overall gut health:

1. Choose your location wisely.

Sitting and eating in a relaxed or parasympathetic state helps the brain to focus on the task at hand, which is the digestion process. When we sit in a relaxed state, both the brain and body can work together to accomplish all that comes with digestion.

It is especially important to find a quiet space away from distractions like work, television, and computers. Mindful eating is much easier to accomplish when there are no distractions.

In my opinion, this is the most important step.

2. Prepare more meals at home.

Preparing food at home should be a sensory experience. When we see, smell and handle food, the brain tells the body that it is time to eat.

Doing this helps the brain and body begin the digestion process.

Many clients will notice some weight loss when making the majority of their meals at home.

Eating out often adds unwanted calories and the overconsumption of processed foods. You also have control over what goes into your food and the quality of ingredients used.

An additional benefit would be using that time as an opportunity to connect with loved ones and those around us.

3. Drink the majority of your water between meals.

You need potent stomach acid to help break down food while eating so more nutrients can be absorbed. Water and other beverages consumed during meals dilute the necessary stomach acid needed to begin breaking down food and absorbing nutrients.

It’s best to sip a little water as needed when eating.

4. Consider digestive support products.

Products like bitters, apple cider vinegar, or HCL (hydrochloric acid) prior to mealtime help create the appropriate level of stomach acid needed to breakdown food.

Products like digestive bitters help digestion because of their bitter taste See my blog here about bitters here. They stimulate your bitter taste buds, which signal different activities in your digestive system that start making more saliva, stomach acid, and enzymes (like pepsin) that help you start to break down your food.

As we age, the level of gastric juice we make naturally begins to decrease, making it more difficult to break down food, absorb nutrients.

So adding bitters to your diet can assist you.

5. Incorporate probiotics and/or cultured and fermented foods into your diet.

Take a probiotic daily and change the type every few months to introduce a variety of strains.

If the digestive system is strong enough, and histamines aren’t an issue try adding some fermented foods into your diet.

Fermented and cultured foods create (probiotic) and feed (prebiotic) our beneficial gut bacteria. For example, kefir, low sugar cultured yogurts, kimchee, saurkraut, kombucha, miso, and fermented vegetables are all great sources.

6. Chew, chew, chew your food slowly and thoroughly.

Eating slowly and chewing thoroughly helps mix the saliva and enzymes needed to break down food properly and ensures vitamins and minerals are absorbed.

Proper chewing also helps the digestion process break the food down to a size that is safe to enter the next phase of digestion. If food particles are too large, they can stay undigested, ferment, and become food for undesirable bacterial overgrowth and create conditions like Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO).

When large pieces of undigested food moves further down the digestive tract, it can create holes in the mesh-like lining of the intestines and cause situations such as irritable bowl syndrome, leaky gut, and food sensitivities.

7. Increase fiber intake

Fiber encourages the elimination of waste in a timely or “regular” cycle.

Increasing the amount of fiber you consume daily feeds beneficial gut bacteria needed to maintain balance and harmony.

It will also make you feel full longer and help stabilize blood sugar, which helps control unwanted food cravings.

Here are some small changes that can make big differences.

And they don’t cost you any money

1. Try to savor and enjoy your food. Take deep breaths before you start to eat and have a grateful mindset or attitude for the food in front of you.

2. Time yourself eating. See if you can extend that time to slow down and chew food longer.

3. Challenge yourself to reduce the amount of liquids around your meal time, especially during and after eating. This will increase the stomach acid available for proper digestion.

Having digestion issues? Not sure what to eat or what probiotic to take? Looking to lose weight or eat optimally for a chronic condition?

I can help!

I can work with you at The Flourish Center in Portland, or anywhere in the world via online sessions.

BOOK A FREE DISCOVERY CALL HERE

The Body~A Pathway to Change

The Body~A Pathway to Change

by | Aug 22, 2024 | Mind-Body Medicine, Uncategorized

Written by our Licensed Professional Counselor, Jody Cecil

If you’re new to the process of counseling, you might imagine it looking something like this: the client does most of the talking while the therapist listens. During the session, the therapist might provide insights into your experiences, share advice on how to navigate issues and help you feel and express emotion. Even as you read this, you might recall a scene from a movie or book you’ve recently read.

Counseling or psychotherapy does involve our thoughts, beliefs, behaviors and emotions. But what about the body?

Will you join me in a little experiment? For just a moment, pause. Put everything down and turn your attention to your body. Slow down and notice your breath. Follow it as you breathe in and out. You don’t have to change it or fix it. Simply be curious, much like watching the flow of a river or clouds in the sky. What did you notice? Perhaps you’ve found yourself caught in thoughts, unable to follow your breath. Maybe your chest tightened, and your breathing became more shallow. Perhaps, as you were breathing in and out, you noticed your shoulders drop and there was an openness in your chest.

When I first began my work as a counselor, my focus was primarily on the narrative – what the client was saying and feeling. What I eventually learned was that I was missing a large part of the client’s “story” and an important pathway for change, healing and growth. The body was telling us something; we needed to slow down and pay attention to it.

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (SP), developed by Pat Ogden, is a therapeutic modality that incorporates the body in the treatment of trauma and attachment/relational issues. You may have heard the phrase, “the body keeps the score,” taken from the title of Bessel Van Der Kolk’s well-known book. Our bodies remember and adapt to keep us safe. Returning to our breathing experiment, even how we breathe is a part of our story. If you learned to “hold it all in” and not feel emotion, you might also hold your breath when feeling distress. Using SP, clients can discover how their body currently functions and work with it to change patterns that currently interfere with health and well-being.

As a licensed professional counselor, I have completed extensive training in SP and other modalities that incorporate the whole person – mind, body and spirit. If you’re interested in a wholistic form of therapy, please contact me to schedule a session: https://takingrootcounseling.com/get-started.html. For more information on Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, visit https://sensorimotorpsychotherapy.org.

Cultivating Beauty

Cultivating Beauty

by | Aug 1, 2024 | Mind-Body Medicine

Written by our Licensed Professional Counselor, Jody L. Cecil

As I continue to enjoy the summer season, I’ve spent a fair amount of time tending to the flowers planted in the yard of our home. New to Oregon, I’m learning about each plant’s needs and growing seasons. Water, sunshine, and fertilizer all matter. And then there’s deadheading.

For those who might be new to gardening and flower care (like me!), deadheading is the process of removing the old blossoms and seed heads from the plant. While it’s not always necessary, many flowering plants need it. With the dead blossoms gone, the plant directs its energy into growth and more flowers. If I’m being honest, I often find the task of deadheading quite tedious. The flowers I have seem beautiful enough, right?

Surrounded by daisies, I recently paused and saw the process of deadheading through the eyes of a growing and healing human being. Caring for ourselves requires a type of pruning at times, doesn’t it? Long-lasting change often occurs when we accept the invitation to “prune”, to explore old wounds and survival strategies that may no longer be serving us. Growth must be stimulated, and much like a plant, our brains have the ability to change and rewire themselves. Our energy can be redirected to create even more beauty.

As a member of the Flourish team, I’d be honored to walk with you on your personal journey of healing and growth. If you feel counseling might be helpful, please contact me. Together, we’ll collaborate on a plan that invites more beauty and hope into your life.

The Fear Melters®

The Fear Melters®

by | Jul 25, 2024 | Mind-Body Medicine

Shared by our Founder & Nurse Practitioner, Jen Owen, N.P.

In February 2024, I finished a yearlong coaching program with the Hendricks Institute to become a Big Leap Coach. One of the main areas of exploration was Body Intelligence, how we have innate wisdom within our bodies and how we can unlock and unblock this wisdom.

One of the main ways our body wisdom is blocked is by fear.

Fear, even in small doses, can get locked in the cells of our bodies causing anxiety, insomnia, depression, worry, stress, etc. We get stuck in fight-or-flight. Read the details about what it means to be in fight-or-flight here.

Through the Hendricks, I learned an easy and effective way to release fear called the Fear Melters.

You may know that I’ve had a particular challenging year so far in 2024. Without doing the Fear Melters every day, I’m not sure where I’d be.

There are four ways that fear shows itself: fight, flight (flee), freeze, or faint.

All of these are accompanied by shorter and shallower breath. We cannot be talked out of fear. Fear is a physiological response and can only be melted with breath, movement and love. There are specific movements that can be applied as an antidote to each type of fear.

FIGHT

Is often confused with anger. Your body weight moves forward, arms get tight, hands may form into fists, talking is faster and louder. You are ready to fight.

To combat FIGHT: OOZE your body

Begin to move slowly as if you are warm chocolate oozing off a spoon. Ooze your arms, shoulders, and hips and even your jaw; slow your words down and change your tone of voice.

FLEE

Part or all of you leaves the vicinity. Can be accompanied by a nervous laugh or eyes glazing over. You may flee by using drugs, alcohol, technology, or food. You’re not present in the moment.

To combat FLEE or FLIGHT: ROOT your body

Widen your stance and bend your knees a little or a lot. Let your toes spread out as you imagine beautiful roots extending from your feet into the nourishment of the earth. Imagine the earth’s energy infusing you with aliveness here and now. Learn more about rooting (grounding) here.

FREEZE

Your body becomes stiff and tight and you might have a nervous smile. Your thoughts may go round and round in your mind. You are frozen in place.

To combat FREEZE: WIGGLE your body

Begin to wiggle your fingers and toes, eventually wiggle your hips and shoulders; to unfreeze you will eventually need to wiggle your core. Literally “shake it off”.

FAINT

Your thinking becomes foggy and confused. You may feel drained or sleepy with your jaw hanging open. You may feel “stupid” and not like yourself.

To combat FAINT: give yourself LOVE SCOOPS

Reach your arms out around you as if you are gathering energy and love towards you. Bring your hands towards you, touching your head, chest, belly or wherever love is needed.

Often, you will be experiencing a combination of fears. Do the one(s) that feel(s) best in the moment. I find that the right Fear Melter feels very good in my body.

For prevention, do the Fear Melters for at least 2 minutes every day and do them more often during times of high stress. While my dad was dying and tensions were high, I practiced the WIGGLE move many times a day.

If you need help, let me know at an appointment and I’ll walk you through them. You can learn about the Fear Melters from my teacher, Katie Hendricks, in this video.

Please report back about your experiences with these helpful and easy tools as you shift from FEAR to FLOW.