Hello! My name is Heather Alison Cook and I own Yarrow and You Therapeutic Bodywork LLC located in downtown historic Aurora, Oregon.

I specialize in Therapeutic Massage, Myofascial/Structural bodywork, Craniosacral Therapy, Cupping, and Hot Stone massage. My office is inside the Happy and Healthy Life Clinic owned by Dr. Robin Schaefer, a Doctor of Chiropractic and Licensed Acupuncturist. Please visit my site, yarrowandyou.com to learn more about what each of the techniques I listed above are and how they might help you. I would be happy to discuss them with you in person or over the phone as well. I aim to tailor each treatment, whether it’s your first time or your 50th. I love to help create and hold space for people’s healing journey. Your healing journey starts when you give Yourself time to heal, however, that may look to you, and getting bodywork is often a beautiful part of the journey as it can often take things to the next level.

How the breath can affect the bodywork you receive and how I might encourage you to use your breath while working on certain areas of the body.

Maybe you have received a massage before and you fell asleep because you were so relaxed. That’s great! And depending on what the goal of the session is I would encourage that too. However, most of the time that I do Myofascial/Structural Bodywork, I will be asking you questions about the area of your body that we are working on and usually encourage you to breathe into certain areas. Why? Why would I bother you during a bodywork session like this? Well, my intention is not to bother you but to help increase breath to your body so that your body can do its own healing. I do believe that we can heal ourselves. I am certainly not healing you, your innate ultra-intelligent body is doing its own healing. I am just there to facilitate the process. Let’s learn more about how this can work.

Have you heard of the parasympathetic nervous system? It is often referred to as the “rest and digest”

part of the autonomic nervous system. The autonomic nervous system has two parts to it, the parasympathetic and sympathetic. You can try to remember that the parasympathetic response is when you feel relaxed and soothed when your stomach gurgles and you can digest things, assimilate them, and rest so your body can recharge. Sounds good right? Sounds like we all may want to encourage this part of ourselves, especially in our hyper-stimulated world. The sympathetic response on the other hand is the “flight, flight or freeze” part of the autonomic nervous system. Obviously, it gets our bodies ready to protect ourselves. Blood leaves our digestion system and goes to our extremities, our pupils dilate, the adrenals pump out adrenaline, and our breathing rate gets quicker. When our body feels stress this part of the nervous system is triggered (so many of life’s stresses can keep this side of our nervous system on all of the time) making it difficult for our bodies to heal.

What’s the diaphragm and why is it important? It’s, the dome-shaped muscle tucked under the bottom of the ribcage.

The vagus nerve runs through the diaphragm via a hole/hiatus made just for it and the esophagus goes through it where it goes on to innervate most of the organs of the abdomen.The diaphragm is our breathing muscle. I know… so many of us think it’s our lungs that do that! And they do, but the diaphragm muscle pushes the air up, expanding the lungs and it pushes the air out allowing air out of the lungs. Many other muscles, such as the intercostals (the ones between the ribs) and the abdominals do assist in breathing but the diaphragm is the main muscle for breathing. The cool thing about this vagus nerve is that we can consciously stimulate it, using our breath and our main muscle for breathing, the diaphragm. If we focus and breathe deeply especially allowing the outbreath to be longer than the inhale we can stimulate the vagus nerve, allowing relaxation, digestion and healing to occur. The vagus nerve stimulates the parasympathetic/rest and digest part of our nervous system. This will allow tension to be released especially in muscles and fascia.

The vagus nerve controls the parasympathetic response, remember the one that helps us calm down, rest, and digest?

The parasympathetic and sympathetic are like a see-saw; when one is up the other is down and vice, versa. So we clearly want to be inducing the rest and digest during a bodywork treatment, right? We want the stresses of our daily lives to melt into the background and be with our resting, calm bodies because this is the only state in which we can heal. It’s true, our body will have such a hard time healing if it thinks it is in danger. This is one reason why I encourage deep breathing, especially when we are opening up tight areas in the muscles or fascia. Deep breathing on its own, just sitting anywhere, and doing some deep breathing, focusing on the outbreath will stimulate the vagus nerve and induce that parasympathetic response, allowing for tension to leave your body. 

So let’s get you on the table and breathing deeply! Please book a session at Yarrow and You Therapeutic Bodywork LLC.

I am more than happy to discuss any of this with you and how bodywork may help you. Take some You time! Self-care, in my opinion, is one of the best ways to recharge and refuel in order to heal and to give back to our families, friends, and community. See you on the table!