D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
April
2008
Becoming a Biped
For Rolfer Robert Pittman, "gravity is the therapist" in turning ex-quadrupeds into energetic beings connected with our environment.
Story and photos by Peggy Platonos
For many people, the term "Rolfing" conjures up images of merciless kneading of already sore muscles and PAIN. For Robert Pittman's clients, however, the term "Rolfing" conjures up something quite different.
"He gave me back my life!" Nancy Kelleher declares.
 |
At his Mimbres
Valley office, Robert Pittman walks beside client Nancy Kelleher, observing
and matching her strides and asking for feedback from her on her comfort
level. Kelleher was scarcely able to walk when she first consulted Pittman
in November, and now reports only occasional twinges of pain. |
In November, when she first consulted the Grant County practitioner, Kelleher was in trouble. "I could hardly walk," she recalls. "Every step was painful. I couldn't even ride my horse, and it had been my life's goal to do endurance riding."
Referred to Pittman by a local chiropractor, Kelleher says she can now walk again, with only occasional twinges of pain, and can ride her horses. But in addition, she says, "I have a totally new appreciation of my body. Robert is phenomenal. He listens. He gives you the space to remember things you've totally forgotten. He helps you understand that your problem is a combination of everything that's happened through your life."
"Rolfing is about change for the long-term," Pittman explains. "It's a process. It's not a Band-Aid. Rolfing is a systems-wide approach focusing on bringing the entire body structure into a state of ease and balance. The human body is still adapting to an upright stance. Our shift from being a quadruped to being a biped involved enormous adaptations in the body, particularly in the soft tissues of the body. Being a quadruped is a different thing altogether in terms of gravity."
The idea of taking gravity into account in working with the human body was a novel concept when first proposed by Dr. Ida P. Rolf back in the early decades of the 20th century. Pittman says of her: "She was a couple of generations ahead of her time, brilliant, tenacious. She argued that since the entire human body is embedded in the field of gravity, you have to take account of gravity in working with it. It was really a new paradigm, shifting away from seeing mankind as object to a new way of looking at us as energetic beings connected with our environment."
Interconnection is at the heart of the process Rolf originated and first referred to as Structural Dynamics, then later renamed Structural Integration — the process that her students eventually dubbed "Rolfing" in her honor. The term "Rolfing" is now a registered trademark.
"You're not the therapist," Pittman quotes Rolf as telling her students. "You're educators. Gravity is the therapist."
Though clients often seek relief from specific physical ailments when first consulting a Rolfer, the aim of the Rolfing process, Pittman insists, is always holistic in nature. "Usually people come to me because they're in pain, and they've heard of Rolfing and hope it can help," he says. "And usually I can help. But the overall effect is often broader than that. People start feeling better in ways in which they didn't realize there was any need for improvement."
Another of Pittman's clients, Dr. Suzanne Toupin, consulted him last fall with a "frozen" shoulder that was limiting her range of motion and causing her considerable pain. A chiropractor herself, Toupin says, "I had heard all these horror stories about Rolfing. I anticipated a lot of pain and discomfort. And that wasn't the case."
Toupin has experienced both chiropractic alignment and deep-tissue massage, and says Rolfing is quite different from either of those two forms of treatment. "In chiropractic, we're adjusting the spine. We're moving bones. In Rolfing, you're also working with the body to align it, but you're working with soft tissue, using movement, stretching, pushing, pulling. It's both gentle and intense. The aim is to align the body so the body can function at its optimum. It's hard to put into words exactly what Robert does because he does so many things. He's not just working on the area with the problem. He's working on the whole body. He's watching how you move, listening to how you feel."
In the Rolfing process, as in all body work, it's important to be aware of emotions as well as physical sensations, Toupin says. "I believe that past pain and emotional traumas are held in our bodies. And a lot of grief came up when Robert was working on my shoulder. It's really been helping me to heal on an emotional level as well as physically."
"Our minds and bodies are totally interconnected," Pittman agrees. "And the perception that these are different parts is just. . . well, a perception, an illusion. Releasing those blockages allows the body to flow back into a more relaxed and balanced position, so we can move more easily through gravity. Mostly, letting a blockage go starts with an awareness that it's there.
"I consider myself a facilitator of change," he continues. "I bring people to an awareness of how they are in their body, what their experience of themselves is. Most people haven't thought about it. Once people get a grasp of how they really feel in their body, then they can begin the process of changing those aspects that are either painful or limiting in some way."
"I think Rolfing helps you to place yourself in your body," comments Pittman client Susana Mincks, who went for her first Rolfing session two years ago as a result of a seriously painful shoulder, aggravated by the lifting she does in caring for her disabled husband. "Robert cured the pain, just with Rolfing. It was really amazing."
Even after the pain disappeared, Mincks has continued with regular Rolfing sessions, and new benefits keep popping up unexpectedly. "One thing we noticed in my last session was that the extreme sensitivity in my feet had gone away," she reports, almost gleefully. "I've always had very narrow feet, very hard to find shoes for. And they were always very sensitive to touch. I had developed a very bad attitude towards my feet."
With Pittman's assistance, her attitude toward her feet has changed. "He helped me to integrate my feet into the appreciation of my body. Now I think they're wonderful. They're not separate from my body. Without my feet, where would I be?" she asks rhetorically, and answers emphatically: "Stuck!"
Trying to describe what the physical experience of Rolfing is like, Mincks says, "I think of it sometimes — though Robert never would — as ironing out the kinks in my body. He applies different types of pressure all over the muscles and connections of your body. Any pain that I've experienced with Robert was what I would call 'good' pain — the kind you feel when someone rubs your stiff neck for you. It hurts, but you love it, because you know it's going to make you feel better. And Robert always wants to be alerted to anything that causes pain or discomfort, because his aim isn't to torture you."