Spinal Cord Injury

The reason I'm devoting a special page to regeneration from Spinal Cord Injuries, is because I was inspired by my final year student nursing experience, during which I spent six weeks assisting in the Spinal Unit of the Royal Adelaide Hospital (1989).

More recently I have worked as a personal carer for people with spinal cord injuries. From this I gained an appreciation of lifestyle issues and potential problems which can arise for many individuals.

I would like to preface this discussion with the notion that people with a disability are not disabled. The label is not always helpful. They.. or.. We merely experience difficulty expressing our true ability to varying degrees.

Although the following is about spinal cord injury, it may be relevant to many people with other spinal conditions and levels of abilty.

I'll start with a couple of testimonials, firstly an eye-witness experience of mine:

During my inspired trip to the Cook Islands in 1995 to learn about Body Electronics from Dr. John Ray in his clinic, I helped with pointholding of a lady with paraplegia.

She had flown half way around the world to finally meet John Ray and have an intensive few weeks of pointholding. Although she had brought with her a couple of people to pointhold, I volunteered to give extra help for the experience.

Over a four week period, we held various points on her spine and pelvis. With each session she regained a small amount of nerve supply below where the points were held. This was tested by her feeling responses and subjective reports of new sensations. It was assessed also that her muscles around her pelvic region, were beginning to become toned again. In this way, it was evident that the line of sensation gradually moved downwards on her body.

By the end her stay, new feeling was gained from the top of her pelvis to around mid-thigh on both sides and she had new feeling at a 'bone level' in her lower leg and, to a minor degree, in her feet.

Secondly, there was a gentleman at the Body Electronics seminar I attended in 1996, who had quadriplegia. During his early pointholding sessions at this time, he regained enough strength and movement in his arms to be able to feed himself properly, write slowly and sign his name. This gave him more independence so that, although not yet able to mobilize his trunk or legs, could lead a much more productive and comfortable life. Prior to this, he had used a chin control to direct his electric wheelchair.

It became evident to me more recently (2012) after watching the last video of the end of this six week seminar, that this man had gained even more mobility and strength in his arms.

Offering a Choice

Immediately following spinal cord injury, people can spend any time between a couple of months to a whole year (or sometimes even longer) recovering in hospital. Early in this time, the injury is medically and/or surgically stabilized. Rehabilitation to the maximum level possible is attained through physical re-education. Emotional acceptance of the injury and a gradual resocialization process are also vitally important for rehabilitation and general wellbeing. All this is very necessary and most major health care providers and agencies, now have this down to a fine art.

What Body Electronics may help with, is to take this rehabilitation process a good deal further.

Unfortunately, once a person has accepted their injury which is a positive thing, they may remain totally convinced that there is nothing they can do about it for the rest of their life. I am not condemning anyone for this. From the medical perspective, it is the truth. Medicoes cannot be expected to educate their patients any other way. It's just the way it is.

But then someone like me comes along and says: "Hey wait a minute... maybe there is something that the injured person could do about their predicament... and it doesn't have anything to do with stem cells or more surgery."

With Body Electronics we have a natural, self-healing method. To a medical specialist working in the area of spinal cord injury, this might sound ludicrous! All the thoughts of my offering 'false hope' and the assumption that I don't understanding spinal injury, could occur.. this may be a normal reaction, born out of genuine concern for the people under their care.

What I would like to do, is to offer a choice to individuals with such injuries. There is no rush. Body Electronics can be started at any time.

The interest and energy for Body Electronics must come from the individuals themselves. They make the decisions for their lives; nobody else. After all, isn't this what 'client centred care' is all about? - allowing individuals to gradually take responsibility for their lives.

An Extended Model of Care

I would also like to offer an extended model by which people with spinal injury may learn about and apply Body Electronics in their lives. The primary needs here are safety and ongoing comprehensive care.

Medicoes are accustomed to a multidisciplinary team approach, and now we just add the Body Electronics practitioner to that team, which already includes the client, of course. Open mindedness, patience and understanding are the main keys here.

Once a person has chosen to be a Body Electronics participant, this process becomes the priority. This is partly due to the major paradigm shift, which is necessary for understanding Body Electronics. It is also quite a major project for the participant, requiring a committment of time, energy and intention.

With continuing assessment by and communication with medicoes, any medical problems arising for the participant may be helped. So the medicoes involved must understand the Body Electronics process, if only theoretically. See my "Open Letter to Health Professionals & Others...".

During my experience as a carer, I have seen differences between individuals who had much better nutrition than those who had adequately 'normal' nutrition. In fact one young man was consuming many foods and supplements of the Body Electronics program. His skin and general health was very much better that others of his age.

So even if the person is not interested in Body Electronics, they could still benefit hugely from the individualised nutritional program at a maintenance level. Many potential problems may be lessened by this. For example, benefits may include the improvement of skin integrity and more effective prevention and healing of pressure areas; also an improvement of mood, so that the person is more likely to reach out in life rather than to withdraw into depression.

Many Issues

There are many personal issues which may arise for the individual making the decision of whether to be involved with Body Electronics or not. The opportunity however, is always open for them to do so.

A lifestyle which is fairly difficult to cope with as it is, may seem more complicated when undertaking Body Electronics as well. This would require for example, a different style of organisation of nutrition and, participation in seminars and pointholding sessions.

Just as there is a great deal to take into consideration in the first year after a spinal cord injury both medically and psychosocially, these factors may need readdressing to some degree, as regeneration of the physical body gradually becomes apparent.

Regarding the seminars and pointholding sessions, it would be advantageous if these were timed according to needs of the participants. They could also be targeted specifically for spinally injured people, their families and carers.

Outcomes

The purpose of Body Electronics is not just to heal the physical body, but to help people heal their whole lives on the emotional and mental levels as well.

With spinal cord injury, the application of Body Electronics pointholding begins with bringing the bodymind upscale from numbness or unconsciousness to at least some degree of enlightened consciousness. It is hoped that people will remain interested in Body Electronics long enough to lift their awareness and everyday mood a lot higher. That is, to live with the enthusiasm they expressed prior to their injury or better.

The individual who decides to be involved in Body Electronics may have a goal to (say) feel their bottom when they're sitting down or, develop arm strength. There is however, a potential problem involved with such goal-setting. This occurs if the person and/or those around them, become emotionally attached to their goal.

This means investing emotional energy into having to reach that goal; while unwittingly investing equal emotional energy into resisting any other possibility, including not healing at all. This leads to a no-win situation, where the likelihood of healing is continually postponed.

The principle operating here is that: "What we resist, persists."

What is required therefore is an open, non-resistant attitude; for example: "I am doing my best to learn and apply the Body Electronics principles... I am succeeding whatever happens..." The idea is to be enthusiastic whether the goal is attained or it's not. This encourages an optimism that includes committment, intent, persistence, consistency, etc., but without any pressure. Whatever happens is OK. Love the situation now... love the situation if it changes, while maintaining the direction of desire.

It strikes me that although it is theoretically possible with Body Electronics, to help a person with spinal cord injury become fully mobile, this does not need to be the primary goal. In my opinion, it is the quality of life that is so important to any person with a profound disability.

Therefore, I don't believe that it is necessary to expect some seemingly 'miraculous' recovery. I will not however, close the door on that possibility either. During my limited experience with Body Electronics (and there have been tens of thousands of participants throughout the world) I just haven't seen this occur first hand. But there's a first time for everything.

It may be useful to point you to my testimonial page. In particular there is reference to some degree of healing of a person with paraplegia in the first article. I'm certain as you read the entire list of testimonials that you will learn the wonderful extent of regeneration possible with Body Electronics in a variety of injuries or illnesses. Why should this be any different for spinal cord injuries?

Pointholding for Spinal Cord Injury

When it comes to natural therapeutic methods and healing of people, there are so many variables that it is difficult to predict the pace of healing.

For spinal cord injuries in particular, it may be said that as compared with Body Electronics, Reflexology and Accupressure or similar complementary therapies, keep the bodymind in balance while helping in small increments to cause connections that will help long-term regeneration. While these have value in being gentle, Body Electronics pointholding offers a more 'big guns' approach.

With any true healing method, one moves gradually from a position of non-awareness (unconsciousness) to a position of awareness (consciousness), or even beyond this to a higher awareness. That is, for a person with numbness anywhere on their body, these areas gradually develop sensation and effective movement.

To this end, Body Electronics pointholding is done on areas which have sensation. This gradually expands the area of sensation or awareness. Once sensation returns progressively, other points can be used as normal to increase general body health and regenerate the site of injury completely.

During pointholding for spinal cord injury, the bodymind is gradually brought upscale, from unconsciousness to enthusiasm. The emotion of enthusiasm corresponds with more functional physical and mental states.

It must be stressed that Body Electronics is not a treatment, but a way of life which, with assistance of others produces self-healing. Healing is gradual and dependant upon individuals' understanding of the principles. The understanding comes with participation, as much as reading the theory. See also other pages of this site.

Spinal Cord Regeneration

Medical literature states generally that the spinal cord can not regenerate itself, as might nerves of the peripheral nervous system; quite right too, under normal circumstances.

Body Electronics however, sets up circumstances for healing which are not normal. The theory might be explained as follows:

The thing that maintains injury is the suppressed unconscious memory of its creation. This memory is physical, emotional and mental. Body Electronics enables us to access and transmute this painful memory towards perfection on all levels, healing the physical body simultaneously.

The injured body part regenerates or reconstructs according to its capacity to attune its vibratory rate (reasonance) to that of the perfected mental and emotional levels.

Healing of spinal cord and other central nervous tissue is made possible by natural laws related to concepts such as morphogenic reasonance. These laws and concepts are additional to mainstream medical, biological and naturopathic understanding.

Medical Research

Current Medical research of Hyperbaric Oxygenation for people with spinal cord injury reports a growing optimism. Hyperbaric oxygen treatments create a higher than normal concentration of oxygen to enter the person's body to promote healing.

Body Electronics also oxygenates the whole body, through both nutritional means (synergy of nutritional supplements) and the regeneration of nerve supply and circulation.

There has also been much attention given to Aggressive Physical Therapy lately, as a response to increased research and success stories. Wonderful! What if this and perhaps other natural therapies for spinal cord injury, where combined (given sensible planning) with an ongoing Body Electronics program? Imagine the possibilities!

It appears at least from a physical body perspective, that some medical research supports what is seen to occur with Body Electronics. From a holistic perspective however, there is room for qualitative and quantitative research of various aspects of Body Electronics, which are currently not understood by the medical, nor even the natural therapy disciplines.

Nevertheless, Body Electronics works well for dedicated people.

I would love to have proper scientific research done on the basis of Body Electronics pointholding: the Piezoelectric effect created by applied pressure, either directly or by reflex to tissues of the human body and the effect on crystal dissolusion/tissue regeneration. Any takers?

As part of this, I would like to have developed some way of measurement of the electric charge produced by such pressure. This would make pointholding more efficacious, understandable and acceptable to all. Also there would be positive 'spin-offs' for other health and medical disciplines, e.g. myofacial release, accupressure, reflexology; orthopedics, pain research, etc.

Although in 1995 Dr John Ray told me that there was no meter available at that time that would measure the pointholding charge, I am convinced that with further technological developments, there must be a way of doing this.

I have come across a database of research dedicated to helping people with spinal cord injuries. The "International Database on SCI" is expressly open-minded to include some natural therapies as well as new developments in medical surgery, etc. The body responsible for this initiative is the Institute of Spinal Cord Injury Iceland.

The Co-ordinator of the above database Dr. Laurance Johnston, has published a wonderful book called "Alternative Medicine and Spinal Cord Injury, Beyond the Banks of the Mainstream" ¹.

Having said that, Body Electronics is an 'Art'. It is not really a science because it is based upon principles of life that we all share. Science-based research produces 'treatments'; whereas Body Electronics is a self-directed way of life.

So as an art, Body Electronics doesn't 'need' researching. It just works.

Cost

Not everyone who has been injured in this way has received a compensatory insurance or other payment following their injury. Many spinally injured people are living on government disability pensions and just cannot afford the seminar costs (even if the fee is at 'cost'), nor the cost of nutritional supplements.

Perhaps in the not-too-distant future a philanthropic fund could be set up to help people on disability stipends afford their nutritional supplements. This amounts to somewhere in the vicinity of AU$80 - $120 per week. By necessity, this would need to be regulated depending on circumstances and progress.

According to the Spinal Cord Society of Australia, there are between three and four hundred new spinal cord injuries each year in Australia. It is estimated that total costs of care amounts to AU$1 billion per year or 2% of total public health expenditure.²

It may be interesting to note that the savings of ongoing care for a person with spinal cord injury, brought about by increased physical ability, could be quite profound. The cost of education and nutritional supplements therefore, could be seen as a very small and good investment.

Current and future availability

Body Electronics is available now, although the few available practitioners makes travel necessary. Ongoing support needs to be available at a distance, hence this and other websites.

Pointholding sessions need to be organised for intensive periods of a couple of weeks or so at a time, to allow for people to travel and meet all at once.

Perhaps as progress in medical interest and research related to Body Electronics is made, gradually we may see programs developed that enable more involvement in Body Electronics.

Conclusion

Spinal cord injury poses many perplexing problems for many thousands of individuals every year.

I have outlined a viewpoint and a basic philosophy for the option of Body Electronics as a self-healing method.

I hope that this page will arouse at least a little interest for exploration into Body Electronics, for all people who are touched in some way by spinal cord injury.