Dogwood Studio is excited to announce a new collaboration between Plum Spring Clinic in Chapel Hill, NC and Certified Yoga Therapist SAM Sather, MS, BSN, e-RYT, C-IAYT, C-IYSI. We had the pleasure of interviewing Plum Spring Clinic’s Kathleen Williams and she discussed how yoga therapy effectively fits into Plum Spring Clinic’s vision and offered services. Private yoga therapy sessions with SAM can be scheduled through Plum Spring.
What is Functional Medicine and Why is Plum Spring Clinic Different?
Plum Spring Clinic differs from traditional medicine in that it has a functional medicine approach. Our bodies consist of many processes that work in symbiosis, such as digestive, immune, and nervous systems. When these systems work as intended, we are healthy. However, when something goes wrong in one or more of these systems, we experience symptoms. Traditional medicine focuses on each of these systems separately, so we visit a specialist for each symptom, and treatment is focused on removing the symptoms. Functional medicine looks at the systems as related to the whole person and symptoms as a signal that something in the body is not functioning as it should. Since symptoms are understood as signals, the focus is not on removing symptoms but using them as a guide to get to the root cause of the problem. Functional medicine practitioners work with the patient to learn where the problem exists, and then nurture and restore the person to full function and health. For example, traditional medicine might treat nausea with a pill to reduce the nausea, but functional medicine will focus on the whole person and may discover that nausea is a symptom of trauma related to chronic stress.
Why Would Someone Choose Plum Spring Clinic?
Someone with a chronic condition may choose Plum Spring Clinic. We are born knowing to trust the signals from our bodies and know when something is not right. People with chronic conditions may become frustrated with traditional medicine when they go to doctors with symptoms that are disruptive to experiencing a quality life and are told…we can’t find anything wrong… but they know something is interfering with their health. Plum Spring Clinic uses a functional medicine approach to find the root cause and nurture you back to health rather than prescribe medication to only treat the symptoms. Plum Spring Clinic practitioners know that the signals should be listened to and understand your frustration with other approaches.
What is Stress Resilience Coaching?
Unresolved trauma may lodge itself into the nervous system and is frequently the root cause of illnesses. Trauma goes beyond experiencing a specific event and can encompass constant stress or pressure due to a demanding career, concerns over the pandemic, etc. Plum Spring Clinic is different in its approach due to practitioner’s respect and sensitivity for trauma or traumatic stress build up that can exist in any of us. Stress resilience helps people understand and become aware of what is going on in their bodies when they experience chronic stress and nurture the calm state.
What is Somatic Experiencing?
Where the trauma and stress reside in the body in not accessible to the person who is experiencing it. This is why many people have failed talk therapy. Plum Spring Clinic practitioners guide you to find where the trauma is hiding without using talk therapy. Somatic Experiencing acknowledges that the roots of the trauma stress live in the body (soma). It is vital to meet the stress where it lives and return to where it originated to re-write the experience. The past can return to the past rather than affect the current experience of health.
People have a need to feel safe in connection with one another. Unfortunately, many have experienced traumatic or unsafe relationships. Traditional therapists keep a professional distance, but Plum Spring practitioners understand the importance of a closer, safe, and trusted relationship.
How Does Yoga Therapy Fit Into the Plum Spring Clinic Approach to Functional Medicine?
Yoga therapy is designed to help empower individuals to progress toward greater health and well-being. An individual meets with a yoga therapist with experience in designing a customized yoga practice for individuals with one or more health challenges that includes yoga postures, meditation and breathing techniques. Each session is designed based on the individual’s abilities, goals, and needs to help progress toward improved health and well-being. Yoga helps participants find their calm state, which is especially helpful for stress resilience and understanding the trauma held inward that is causing illness. Participants can experience a reconnection between the body and mind, which frequently become disconnected when under negative stress. Yoga fits into the functional medicine approach of working with and nurturing the whole body through the connectedness. Living in the moment during a yoga session, known as mindfulness, helps reduce negative stress.
What About the Cost?
Cost of services is a concern for most of us. Plum Spring Clinic does not accept health insurance as payment because it would interfere with the ability to spend as much time and focus as is needed to help. While it may be difficult to think about spending more money on adding some of Plum Spring Clinic services like stress resilience coaching and yoga therapy to your expenses, how much is getting back to health really worth? Having illness that interferes with daily life is costly to productivity at work, relationships, and personal goals. Once health equilibrium is restored, costs will decline as maintenance of health is less time consuming and costly.
About SAM Sather, MS, BSN, e-RYT, C-IAYT, C-IYSI
Testimonial
“SAM is an inspiration to us all in her teaching of mindful movement, yoga therapy and meditation practices. She draws from her own medical background and training to provide her students the knowledge of how to stay healthy and address one’s own unique physical challenges. In experiencing several shoulder and back injuries, the time with SAM in private practice as well as small group sessions has enabled me to recover more quickly from injuries and even prevent them going forward. Her approach to yoga is a functional one where she assists each of us in developing a yoga practice to address one’s own unique needs. She’s regularly in training with top leaders in the health industry and does a wonderful job of incorporating what she learns into what she brings into the classroom. We’re grateful for SAM’s presence in our lives!”
- Yoga Participant
SAM Sather, MS, BSN, e-RYT, C-IAYT, C-IYSI
Sandra “S.A.M.” Sather is a Certified Yoga Therapist (C-IAYT). She is also an experienced registered yoga instructor (eRYT) with many other certifications and trainings, for example Certified Integrative Yoga for Seniors (C-IYSI), Functional Movement, Mindfulness, Yoga for Cancer, Vinyasa Flow Yoga, and Yin Yoga. SAM is a fascia enthusiast related to movement therapy for improvements in posture, chronic pain, and prevention of injury.
SAM has a Bachelor of Science in Nursing in 1983 and later obtained her Master of Science in Education in 2007. Out of nursing school, SAM moved from New York state to North Carolina. Soon after arriving in NC, she co-owned a local gym where SAM provided personal training to a variety of populations including seniors, athletes, to individuals living with disabilities. This was the start of combining nursing and wellness together to serve others. SAM changed her nursing focus to clinical research in the mid-1990’s and in 2002 opened her second business with her partner Chuck called Clinical Pathways, a small clinical consulting and training firm. Meanwhile, she shifted her wellness focus to Yoga in the 1990’s and in 2000’s yoga therapy. SAM opened her home studio, Dogwood Yoga Studio in 2017 to serve individuals and small groups in Yoga Therapy. Now in 2021, Sam is excited about the collaboration with Plum Spring Clinic to support a team supporting the increased wellness of individuals.
SAM and her partner Chuck live in Chapel Hill, NC, USA. She has two delightful grown children, Rob & Sarah.
What is Yoga Therapy?
The mission of yoga therapy is to adapt the practices of yoga to an individual’s health needs. Yoga therapy is designed to help empower the individual to progress toward greater health and well-being.
Yoga therapy integrates traditional yogic concepts and techniques with Western medical and psychological knowledge. Whereas traditional Yoga is primarily concerned with personal transcendence on the part of a "normal" or healthy individual, Yoga therapy aims at the holistic treatment of various kinds of psychological or somatic dysfunctions ranging from back problems to emotional distress. Both approaches, however, share an understanding of the human being as an integrated body-mind system, which can function optimally only when there is a state of dynamic balance.
In yoga therapy, an individual meets with a yoga therapist with experience in designing a customized yoga practice for individuals with one or more health challenges that includes such things as yoga postures, meditation and breathing techniques to suit an individual’s desired needs. Each session is designed based on the individual’s abilities, goals and needs to help progress toward improved health and well-being.
According to the International Association of Yoga Therapists, “Yoga therapy is the professional application of the principles and practices of yoga to promote health and well-being within a therapeutic relationship that includes personalized assessment, goal setting, lifestyle management, and yoga practices for individuals or small groups.”
For more information, we recommend that you visit the International Association of Yoga Therapists’ website: https://yogatherapy.health/what-is-yoga-therapy/
Benefits of Yoga Therapy
In yoga therapy, the individual client’s needs are the focus rather than teaching yoga methodology. The yoga therapist, through the use of their trained skills, develops a plan with the client and the yoga session or sessions unfold from there. The yoga therapist understands why the client has come for the yoga therapy session and together with the client, a plan is developed to support the client’s needs.
No previous yoga experience is required. The individual learns to explore the connections between the mind and body, and may realize benefits in breathing, flexibility, balance, strength, and the ability to manage life circumstances.
Yoga therapy is done on a one-to-one basis or in a small group of individuals with like conditions and needs. Yoga techniques are used to support the individual’s improved awareness to promote less reactivity and obtain tools to support relief of symptoms and/or to improve one’s function in the activities of daily living.
Examples of conditions that benefit from yoga therapy:
Anxiety
Cancer
Chronic pain
Decreased functional movement
Depression
Fibromyalgia
Heart conditions
Hypertension
Joint Replacement
Sleep problems
Stress
Private therapeutic yoga sessions based on your goals and well-being history, offered in person with social distancing and cleaning protocols or live online sessions are offered.