In Your Pants with Dr. Susie G - Motion is Lotion With Dr. Breann Fox

Episode Date: May 24, 2018

In today's episode, Dr. Breann has one helluva story to share with you. Dr. Breann is a fellow pelvic health therapist and a visceral manipulation practitioner. After enduring several significant pelvic traumas in her early 20's, Dr. Breann constantly dealt with pelvic pain, painful intercourse, and urinary woes. All of which she was told she would have to live with for the rest of her life. Dr. Breann discusses the importance of recognizing how physical and emotional trauma can manifest in a variety of protective mechanisms. She reminds us that "motion is lotion, everything needs to move." With pelvic floor dysfunction, the issues are not always coming from the tissues and understanding the primary drivers are key for recovery. Mental and physiological flexibility is necessary to move through traumatic experiences in life. Sometimes it's mustering the courage to travel the road less traveled. It's not always an easy one, but well worth it.

You're listening to In Your Pants with Dr. Susie G, the physiotherapist for your private, helping you get in the know down below. Hey guys, it's Dr. Susie G and welcome to another In Your Pants episode where we destigmatize sexual stigmas and cultural taboos so that you can have a happy dance in your pants and live a healthy, freeing life. So not many of you know this, but I've had my fair share of health issues. The worst was probably the swallowing issues. So about six years ago, I had some terrible swallowing terrors.

And just to make a long story short, there were times when I would swallow and literally feel like I was choking. It scared the shit out of me. I didn't do much about it until I had my very first Baral visceral manipulation course. and seriously, as the instructor was quote, manipulating my stomach, I had something quite magical happen. I fricking cried in front of 50 students, like a baby, no joke, full on bawling, crying. But what I didn't know at the time was that I had a lot of emotional repressed feelings that manifested in my body. And during the release, I actually had an emotional release.

and since that time it's changed my life forever which is why I've been studying and continue to study visceral manipulation with them and if you'd like to read more of my story I have a blog post that I can link to the show notes when we're done but guys this episode isn't about me so I want to make sure I don't take the spotlight away from my guests so without further ado it brings me great pleasure to introduce the wonderful Brianne Fox to the show. Brianne is a fellow pelvic health therapist and a visceral manipulation practitioner. After enduring a long and very traumatic C-section birth in 2014 with her son, she soon realized that the tools she utilized in the clinic had a missing link. This is when she found visceral and neural manipulation through the Baral Institute.

Her continued coursework has not only changed her life personally, but also professionally. As Brianne says, the gentle, integrated, and cohesive manual therapy techniques of Herman & Wallace and Baral Institute are beautiful and life-changing. Brianne, welcome to the show, girl. I'm so glad to have this chat with you, especially about a topic that is so very near and dear to my heart. Yes, thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I'm stoked to be here. Well, thank you. I know how busy you are. You've got a lot going on on your plate, so we won't beat around the bush, so to say, no pun intended, guys.

but let's start by asking, you know, to share your story with us. You've got quite the courageous and inspiring story and I'm so thankful to have you share it with us today. Sure. I'm actually grateful to be able to share it. So thank you for having me on the show. I feel like the more people we can share our stories with, just like your swallowing story. And then like my pelvis story, I'm about to share. People can really resonate with what we have to say and realize that there is help out there. So thank you. So yeah, kind of a long story. So I'm going to make it as short as possible. But back in college in 2001, I was a soccer player and it was end of my senior season and we had finals coming up. And so my roommate and I were in our apartment. We're

studying for finals and we're like, Hey, you know what? Let's go grab some food. Mind you, it was like snowing out and just, you know, wet everywhere. And so we figured it'd be a great idea to go grab some food. So we go out and we get in the car. And as we are coming up to the very first stop sign, right side, right outside of our apartment, we hit black ice and she ends up hitting the car, sitting at the stop sign. And thankfully we weren't going too fast because we literally had just pulled out, but the car's kind of sitting at an angle and I, she's freaked out, of course. And I said, just hang tight. Let me get out and see what the damage is. And so I'm actually standing outside the car on the passenger side in between the trunk of the

car we hit and then our car. And all of a sudden I see and hear this other car coming down the hill. And so the only thing I could think to do, if I was even thinking, I don't even know, but I pressed myself up from both vehicles. And as that car hit her car, the one coming down the hill, I got smashed between the two cars, but thankfully I had raised myself up. So really ultimately hit my pelvis rather than my abdominal contents, which I mean, who knows how that might've been fatal, you know? And so, um, thankfully as the, the ER doc said, you're very muscular, um, having just come off a season of college athletics. Uh, so apparently quote unquote, that kind of saved me, if you will. Um, so that was, that was crazy. And, you know, back then I studying actually

science, I'm a fit athlete. So I'm just like, Hey, I'm good to go. Yeah. I got some bruises. Let me work through this and I'll be good. Well, about a year later, um, unfortunately I experienced a sexual assault and, um, I was drugged and then taken advantage of. And, um, that really kind of changed my life in a lot of ways. And at the time you kind of think like, whoa, why is this happening to me? Like, why did it, what did I do was what did I say something? Did I dress a certain way? Um, so you go through a lot of emotional kind of pain and confusion. Um, at least I did. And it kind of felt, um, like a failure felt like there was something I did wrong, you know? And so you just kind of put a lot of guilt, a lot of blame on yourself. And, um, what I didn't realize

was that that emotional connection to that physical trauma would last me a really long time until I too found visceral therapy. And I'll talk more about that in a little bit, but, um, I went through, you know, the emotional pain and confusion, and then also started having a lot of physical pain. So a lot of pelvic issues, a lot of SI joint dysfunction. I had pain with intercourse. So just a lot of different things that at the time I wasn't in PT school, I had no idea that there was any kind of help for this. But what I did know was there was counseling. So I ended up after a little while, I went to counseling, went through EMDR. Counselor was great. I felt like, oh, this is awesome. I'm good. I can talk about it. I can tell people my story. I want to share it

and I'm just, I'm good. I've gotten through this. And, um, lo and behold, that wasn't the case. So like you said, in 2014, I was blessed with my son who's almost three and the pregnancy went really well. Uh, I had really no problems with the pregnancy. I mean, you know, you go through your things, but, um, all in all, it was pretty good, but the labor and delivery. Yeah, not so much. So everybody's got their labor and delivery story. And I don't want to, I'm just going to tell mine because it is part of my story, but, um, I got induced at two o'clock on my due date because I had a history of blood clots and I'm considered AMA at the time. Cause I'm over 35. So that advanced maternal age. They always want you to go pretty close to your due date for risks and

things like that. So I go in, I get induced. The doctor tells me your body is like at zero everything. So this is going to be a long road. And I said, cool, let's do this, you know, ready for it, ready to meet my son. And so in that I had said, yeah, I'm not going to start with an epidural. We'll see where it goes. Well, I fell asleep. And when I woke up, I was no longer able to control my emotional pain, I guess. I wasn't able to breathe through the contractions and I was really struggling to keep control. At which time I asked for an epidural and unfortunately it didn't work. So I went through the highs and lows of the contractions and feeling everything and my body started to go into convulsions. And I pretty much had convulsions

on and off, but more on than off from about the 12 hour mark until the 32nd hour mark when they finally took me in for an emergency C-section. So there was a lot of points throughout that, that I don't remember much. I don't really remember much from the actual C-section other than since the epidural didn't work and the drugs they had given me had kind of worn off that I literally could feel everything. So pelvic trauma relived, you know, my body now. And again, now I can talk about it at the time. I had no idea this was going to affect me in this way. But basically what I say is that my body, my pelvis, my emotions relived another pelvic trauma and my body just shut down. And so I don't remember them putting Cordell, my son on my breast afterwards.

I don't remember a lot of it. My husband and my mom were there. So they tell me a lot of this story, but I really, there's bits and pieces that I smile about. And then the other parts are kind of missing if you will, because my, I was just shut down. And, um, So it's like you blacked out. Totally, totally blacked out in a sense. Um, I remember looking at the anesthesiologist and saying is he almost done and he looked at me and he goes no sweetheart he's not even close and then I don't remember much after that so um yeah so you know and then us moms the first thing we do when we get home is we have to feed our children and take care of them and life is no longer about

us it's all about our children and our babies and especially I feel like new moms that haven't been through that process before but again every birth every delivery is a little different Um, so a couple months out, I started realizing that I had major pelvic pain. Anytime I would try to like bounce on a ball, holding him, you know, to rock him or driving over a speed bump. That's when I really kind of knew like, Hmm, something isn't right here. And so that's when I found this manipulation and somebody had told me that cause I couldn't fix myself. Here I am a urogyne therapist and why, why am I having this pelvic pain? Why, why is intercourse uncomfortable for me? Why, why, why? Right. And, um, so it wasn't until I found the Brawl Institute and

visceral therapy that I found that my emotions were connected to that physical pain and there was help. And so that's why I'm excited to share my story is because you don't have to live like this, you know? Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. So tell everyone in your words, you know, what visceral manipulation is and how does this differ from maybe other hands-on techniques that they might have experienced, like, you know, deep tissue massage or our Vigo or, you know, our general physical therapy. Sure. Body work. Sure. So I could talk about this for days, right? I'm sure you could too. But what we know is that motion is a sign of life. And one thing I'll always tell my patients is motion is lotion. So we need to move. Everything needs to move in

our bodies, not just our muscles, not just our bones and our joints, but our viscera needs to move too. It has a communication system with our brain and that is movement that stimulates that. So if we're not getting that right movement within the connective tissue that surrounds our organs or within the organ itself, then it's possible that we no longer have that communication and then it kind of gets lost. It gets put to the side, right? And so then a lot of things can happen from that. And one thing that can, or quite a few things actually that can decrease motion is disease processes, inflammation, trauma, medications. You think of all the times that we just take some medication because we're not feeling well, that can all play a role in how

our organs function. Surgery, even though we oftentimes elect for surgery or we know it's meant to help, our body doesn't realize that. It thinks of it as a trauma. And so that can lead to some decrease in motion. Some other things are infections, food, food sensitivities and intolerances. That's a huge thing. And so what visceral manipulation does is it's a very gentle, specific manual force that's placed within the connective tissue in the body that encourages normal mobility and tone and improves that motion of the viscera. And so we as trained visceral therapists have a way to assess to find out where the greatest restrictions are. And so I might have pelvic pain, but my restriction might be coming from higher up.

It might be coming from pneumonia that I had as a child and I have some lung restrictions or maybe from my C-section scar. Maybe my C-section scar is adhered and now I have a change in that connective tissue or I'll call it like a tug-of-war in which case... I like that. The tug-of-war, you know, like one side pulling on the other. Yeah, so, you know, any changes like that can really affect that motion. And again, motion is a sign of life and we need it.

So, you know, to fully answer the question, I can't really speak for necessarily all of the other hands-on techniques because there's so many out there. But what I can say for visceral therapy in comparison is that we look for the primary driver. So we're trying, what I mean by that is we're trying to find the main cause of that symptom. And so oftentimes we're just given that symptom like, hey, you have pain. Okay. Take this. That'll decrease your pain or your hips not moving a certain way. Well, let's do this and we'll get it to move. Well, what if that hip movement as actually has a line of tension going up in the body or over in the body? So if you don't really ultimately

help the cause or the primary driver, then the secondary or tertiary issue isn't going to fully be better and it might return. And so that's how it's really different is we're really trying to focus on the why. Right. You're getting to the root cause of what's going on versus just throwing spaghetti at a brick wall and seeing what sticks, right? That's awesome. Maybe one noodle, maybe two, depending if it's wet or dry, you know, but, um, so tell me, you know, I've, I wrote a blog post about this too. And I named it like voodoo therapy, you know, visceral manipulation. Is it voodoo therapy because as a visceral practitioner too, you know, we go through something of a protocol called quote, and I have little bunny ears here floating, but listening, right. And

we're listening to the body's tissues and we're listening to ultimately what that person's body needs regardless of what they're saying. Right. So can you talk a little bit about, you know, is this voodoo therapy? What is this listening? How does, I mean, how does it work? And what would you say to someone that's saying, oh, this is all bullshit. Right. Essentially, because we get that a lot. I was just going to say there's so many other practitioners, so many lay people that just they really it's I think it's a lack of understanding what it is. So hopefully I can help clear that space a little bit in this podcast. But it's absolutely not voodoo therapy. So if you think about our system, our body, our musculoskeletal system is in place, the bones and the muscular system are there to protect our vascular system, our visceral system, and our neural system.

So let's just use a car accident, for example. So let's say that, let's use mine, for example. Why not? So let's say I press up and I get basically a car on each side and just smash right in the middle. So if my pelvis wasn't there to protect me, maybe I would have ruptured my uterus or maybe had an ovarian issue afterwards. So that musculoskeletal system is in place to protect those other more vital systems

because I'm not going to get in a car accident and my lungs are going to fly out of my body. My ribs are going to protect that from occurring. So what happens, especially, and I'm going to kind of specifically talk about a trauma, but what happens is that the, um, the visceral neural and vascular systems, that doesn't mean because they don't fly out of your body or they don't rupture that they don't have some kind of trauma when a trauma actually occurs. So what I mean by that is when I got smashed between the two cars, that force didn't just stop at my bones. That force went through my pelvis and it could potentially change the way that I'm structured internally, the way that my connective tissue responded to it. I might have tightened up on

the right side and had some of my ligaments that are attached to my bladder and uterus tighten up, but on the left, they didn't because of the way the forces went. And so then long-term, maybe that tightness on the right side now leads to a hip dysfunction or my SIJ dysfunction. And so what happens, and I think why people kind of think it's voodoo is that they kind of wonder, like, how do you feel that there's a restriction there? Yeah, I get that a lot. Like, how could you feel that? And it's true. Totally. I just hold you upside down and check it out. But I think what happens is um we we are able to we're taught and it's it really does take a very intuitive therapist

intuitive mind some people have to work a little harder for that than others um but we're really taught to listen to the body and that's what we're doing is with our gentle placement on different aspects of the body the head the shoulders um the tummy wherever we're at for whatever listening or assessment we're doing, we are ultimately waiting for the body to say, Ooh, I need to protect over here. So that very gentle stress that we add in the body response by trying to protect something else. And so, or whatever that greatest restriction is. Um, and so in that we can kind of follow that line and the, it's kind of like hot and cold, hot and cold. The closer I get to the, let's say primary driver, the body's going to draw me in, draw me in, draw me in. And that's what we learn

with our hands is to listen for that. And at that time, then we really have to know our anatomy, right? How deep does this draw me in? Does it curve? Does it go flat? What anatomical structures are here? That's super important for us to know. We really have to have that intact so that we can say, what system is this that really is needing our help right now? So, right. That's, that's amazing. I'm glad that you explained it in that way. It's, it's pretty much beautiful that way you said it, but you know, in terms of my story and you had a lot with the emotions that were related to your physical health, can you touch bases a little bit about how our emotions can manifest as physical symptoms and how visceral therapy can help to relieve some of those?

Absolutely. I feel like I sat front row in that chair quite a bit. And I still get treated. I still get treated pretty much monthly when I can, or at least every other month, because I think that there's, we constantly need, I don't want to use the word correction, but we constantly need kind of re-stimulation, wake ourselves up and allow our bodies to kind of resettle and, and function from a higher landmark, if you will. But yeah, to answer the emotional aspect. So what happens in a, in any kind of trauma now that could be, you know, your cat died and you had a close relationship with your cat or a family member or a car accident or a sexual assault, it could be anything.

It could be literally you're in a dark alley and somebody comes around this corner and it just scares you enough to create some kind of emotional trauma. And that can manifest in the weakest area of your body typically. So if I've experienced that trauma, so let's say the car accident and then within a year the sexual assault and my pelvis from the car accident was already kind of my weaker link at that time, then my emotions from that sexual assault are going to basically be stored in my pelvis because the brain doesn't necessarily want to deal with it in that moment. The brain saying, no, thank you. I got to move on. I need to wake up tomorrow and I need to go to work and I need

to make this phone call and I need to do whatever. And so it's going to store it. And that's where then we get that attachment or that link from our limbic system, which is our emotional system down into or up into, um, wherever it's kind of sitting. And then that's basically, it just lies there. But then over time, because there's basically more stuff in that area, we can start to have a dysfunction. Maybe now my left pelvis is more full or it has these emotions in it. So I start to walk different and I start to move around those emotions differently, that can then create a somatic dysfunction. So maybe then I start to have left hip pain or pubic symphysis pain or something. And ultimately it's linked from that initial trauma. And so that emotional piece is

the driver. The hip pain or the pubic symphysis pain is simply just the secondary tertiary from wear and tear over time if you will right and they're both feeding into each other at this point right into the nervous system and somatic issues versus emotional issues emotional somatic it's a bi-directional highway in a sense 100 yeah so in my journey you know i as a pt myself obviously and then as a urogyne pt like why do i have hip pain why do i have pelvic pain that i can't fix. Right. And so until I learned through the Burrell Institute that that emotional piece can be connected, which I'm pretty sure when I went to visceral manipulation one for my first time and I had my, when you're, when you have an emotional assessment, you usually go flying off

your feet one direction or the other. And I'm pretty sure all of the classmates were like, whoa, what's wrong with this girl? You know? But, um, and the, and the instructor pretty much had to catch me. And so that, but that was like weird for me because I didn't know why am I flying off my feet? And why did I, you literally put your hand on my head and I started crying. So kind of like your story where it was like, you had this emotional release while they're working on your abdomen and you're like, oh my gosh, well, mine was similar, but I'm standing in this class with 30 other people I don't know. And the instructor simply put his hand on my head and now I may have tears in my eyes. Like what is going on? And you can't control it. You know, you're like,

thinking to yourself like you're losing your mind and when people tell people these stories they're like are you insane like they look at you like you have five heads but it's it's the truth i mean you just can't make this shit up you totally can't and totally regardless if the research is there or not i mean this is my own personal experience and for whatever reason that is whatever you want to believe i mean it's ultimately what people want to believe right Yeah. But as far as going back to voodoo, it's not voodoo therapy. We're working on a whole different area of the system. We're working on that connective tissue, no matter how deep or how superficial it is, to help people heal. And that's what's so brilliant about this work.

Right, right. So how has it changed, you know, learning visceral manipulation techniques? How has it changed the way that you now approach pelvic floor ailments and dysfunctions in your own practice? Well, it has significantly, um, I would say so before I knew Baral Institute and went through the visceral training, I probably had to go internal. So whether that be vaginal or rectal, depending female, male, or sometimes, you know, females, we go rectal as well. Um, I probably went internal, I would say 90 to 95% of the time. Um, you know, you get somebody in the, in the clinic with a diagnosis of pelvic floor dysfunction, well, then you're going to treat the pelvic floor and you do that. You can do it externally, obviously. And my practice would

have external techniques within it, but I still went in internally to treat and to work on fascia, to work on the muscular system and those things to assess the patient, to assess their strength and their endurance and their symmetries and everything. And what I've realized with the training is, it may not be coming from there. So again, we go back to secondary or tertiary, their pelvic floor dysfunction might not be from the pelvic floor. And so with my assessments through Baral Institute's training is I'm able to detect that primary driver. And so I would honestly say maybe 85% of the time, I don't have to go internally at all because the driver's not coming from inside the pelvic cavity. And so it's changed it in many ways. One, from my standpoint,

it's changed it in a sense of my patients get better, they get better quicker, and they don't return typically because I'm finding that primary driver and I'm releasing that. And that's ultimately the cause of their pelvic floor dysfunction. From their standpoint, one, they're getting better, they're getting better quicker, and they like that. But two, then they don't have to have internal work done, which may or may not be something they really want to have, but they want to get better. So it has changed a ton in that sense that I'm just able to integrate into the body better and I can find that primary driver and the patients really see benefit from this type of work. But the collaboration of the two is just amazing.

yeah it's and and i can attest to that as well and it's pretty phenomenal and you're more efficient as a practitioner that way it's just introducing this type of work and finding the primary driver driver like you're saying okay so my next question is um you know you mentioned having a son and and sharing your such an intimate story with us about your labor and delivery i see a handful of women also with, you know, post-baby ailments, although some might be common, but a lot of them are not normal, even though some sadly have been told that they have to live with it, quote, unquote, for the rest of their life. Can you share your experience with us with, you know, why it's not normal, quote, and why you, quote, unquote, don't have to live this way for the rest

of your life? Absolutely. Absolutely. So same, I mean, even with you, and it's not just post-baby, But obviously, we're going to talk about that is, you know, you with your swallowing and other people with their ailments is you don't have to live this way. And I think that's ultimately what needs to be shared with everyone is that no matter what you're dealing with, what ailment you might have, you don't have to live that way because there is help. There's different types of alternative therapies that are integrative and can help you through your healing journey. So I just want to put that little plug in there. But to answer your question on post-baby ailments, basically, you know, when we're pregnant, we go through, our bodies go through so many changes. Our ribs change, the angle of them changes.

We have more pressure through our pelvic floor and our pelvic cavity. Our viscera, our organs kind of get pushed up and out of the way as the baby gets bigger. Our diaphragm changes. Our weight changes. I mean, everybody knows that, right? The pressure that goes through our spine and the pressure that goes through our musculoskeletal system as our posture changes because we're basically growing forward and that changes everything. So as those normal, I'll call those normal changes or expected changes through pregnancy occur, our body internally and externally endures a lot of changes. And it's not like, oh, I had my son and 48 hours later, boom, poof, everything's right back to where it should be.

you know, they make it seem that way. Right. They're like, yeah, you're done. You're good. Six weeks postpartum you're set. That's exactly it. And we have that conversation so often. I mean, I even remember, and I love my OBGYN, um, down in Phoenix, but I even remember going in, I think I was like six days post, well, six or seven days post part of, and I was kind of squatted down sitting on the footrest of the table in the examining room. And when he walked in, I stood up from that position. He was like, did you just stand up? I said, yeah. And he's like, from that position, you know, he was like shocked. He's like, no one can ever do that. And I was like, I don't know. You're just like, try to move and try to function. But that doesn't

mean it felt good. You know what I mean? And then yes, at that six week mark there, there from a medical standpoint, okay, you don't have this problem. You don't have that problem. Perfect. You can resume all activity, you know, start slow. You can have sex again. feel free to have lots of sex again just don't get pregnant right away and what are you doing for birth control and go ahead and exercise and now that you're a mom and your baby's out you shouldn't you know bounce your body right back to the way it was in two months and that's just let's get real that's not gonna happen um and those of us that can fit back into our pants two three months out that's great that's awesome if that's what you want but your body still has

changes and it's still going through that healing process. So I think the big thing for those moms that are dealing with, let's say it's dyspareunia, which is painful intercourse. Let's say you have a bout of painful intercourse the first or second time. Okay. Don't freak out. That's probably fairly common, but if you're, you know, three, four sessions out, or you're a couple months out and you've been having intercourse and it's still not comfortable, it's still painful for you, come in and see someone, see if there's something that, um, you can have done. If there's, again, we talk about that tug of war, if there's maybe a tug of war going on and, and just, uh, a release of that will help your system to restore and heal

even better. Um, or maybe it's, um, maybe it's that you're breastfeeding and the way that you're sitting when you're breastfeeding is really hurting your back. Has anybody talked to you about how to breastfeed and what position to be in and how to lay and where to hold the baby? So you don't have to just say, oh, well, I'm breastfeeding and I might be for two years, so I'm just going to have back pain. It doesn't have to work like that. And so having that guidance from a pelvic health therapist is going to be helpful. But I think where moms get lost is like I said earlier, we just spend so much time on the baby and we lose us, you know? So we just kind of push it away, whether it be our own, what we've been told in the past, or maybe

even, you know, we talk to a medical provider and they make it seem like it's no big deal and it's normal. So maybe those moms are being told like, oh, it's normal. You've had a baby. So that's just the way you're going to have to deal with it. And that's not the case. I think the worst thing that I see is somebody who has a pelvic organ prolapse where one of their organs is starting to come down towards the vaginal opening. And you're basically told like, well, you can have surgery or you can deal with it. And that's the extent of it. And that's not true. There's conservative therapy. And especially with those pelvic and visceral therapists that put those two together where we can help those lines of tension and help your body restore. I'll use

that word again, because that's ultimately what we're trying to do is allow your body to heal itself back to where it should be. Our bodies are stinking smart. They know what they're doing. Sometimes they just need a little jumpstart, you know, get the battery on there and boom, get it jumpstarted. So, um, you know, I kind of went up and down in that, but I just, I'm so passionate about this cause it really frustrates me that there isn't enough, I'll say education out there or that moms are kind of pushed to the side and told like, well, you, you pee yourself when you leak or, I mean, you pee yourself when you jump. So you're just, you've had three kids, like that's just the way it is. Yeah. Just deal with it. You don't have to deal with it. So

there is help, you know, and, and it's funny when I attend these different workout sessions that I go to and I'm just a fly on the wall and I hear people saying like, oh, I don't run anymore because basically I can't find a diaper big enough to hold all my urine when I go for a run. And I'm like, what? Do you give them your car? Of course I do. I don't just like walk over and hand it to them. I have like a little conversation, but absolutely. I mean, it really, you know, what I tell all my patients, mom or not a mom is when you're at coffee, the next time with a bunch of your girlfriends, just bring up that you're, you're going through this therapy. You don't have to give them all your dish. They don't need to know all of your stuff unless you want to

share it, of course, but just tell them like, Oh, I'm in therapy to help me not pee my pants or whatever, because I guarantee you five out of the six moms or friends sitting there with you also have a problem that maybe they have no idea there's help for. Right. Right. Absolutely. Common, but not normal. Common, but not normal. Very, very much so. And you don't have to live that way that you, just because you've had a child or just because you've had a car accident, doesn't mean that that's the way you're going to have to be forever. So take home message, right? Love it. I love it. That's a very, very strong message. And if you take anything out of this

whole conversation is that, you know, like, yeah, there's help. So, um, so moving a little bit away from, you know, when dealing with physical ailments, pain and dysfunction, I like to ask this question just to pick your brain, but you know, why isn't it just a quote tissue issue? You know, when we're dealing with physical ailments and dysfunctions, in your opinion? Yeah, well, I think it goes back to when we talk about how our limbic system or emotional system can be connected and how movement can be a part of that. Food can be a part of it. So food sensitivities can play a role in how we function. But I think ultimately when we go back to the emotional connection and when it stores into that weakest point, we're going to adapt over time to that change in that area, whether it be a shoulder, a pelvis, an ankle or whatever.

And so that emotional driver isn't a tissue issue. That emotional driver is a link that we may or may not realize is there that can basically drive that car into a brick wall. We'll talk about spaghetti in a brick wall again. But, um, and so the, the tissue, maybe it's a secondary tertiary thing, but the driver again is, is that emotional link, um, from what's stored from that trauma that's happened. Um, and again, trauma can be literally like the death of a pet or your best friend moved away when you were six. And that was literally your go-to per, I mean, it could be anything I've seen it all.

Um, I've heard it all. So, uh, what we don't realize is that when that trauma occurs, then we get layers basically. So everything starts to layer up. So I, I like to use, um, kind of a glass analogy, like a cup of water. So I've, if I have one, one cup full of water and the other cups only maybe a quarter full of water and I bring in a water bottle, if I pour it into the cup that only has a quarter full of water, I know I'm gonna be able to put that bottle in there. No problem. I don't really have to think about it. But when I add a whole bottle of water to the full cup, I'm going to

expect that it overflows. So at any point, as we create layers and layers of different things throughout our life, that cup continues to get more full, more full, more full. And then at some point, our body, our nervous system, our brain just can't handle anymore. And that's when it overflows and says, Hey, I have pain. I have dysfunction. I need help here. So I think there's just a lot more than it's just a tissue, you know? Right. Right. Yeah. And I love that. I love that analogy because you're right. It's an accumulation of things that happen throughout one's lifetime. And, you know, it's, it's kind of like a Lorimer, but Lorimer mostly in Butler, David Butler, who are pain scientists and study pain in humans, but they kind of made this analogy

about baking a cake, you know, like you can't understand a cake without looking with just looking at the flour, uh, and the eggs, right. You have to look at all the ingredients and how the ingredients act with one another to create this cake. And similar goes to understanding pain. You know, you have to understand the whole person and that includes all of their systems, not just a brain cell or not just a muscle or not just their genitals, but looking at what compromises them as a whole human being, um, beliefs, values, what they've been told, what they haven't been told, um, things they do, people they see, you know, so forth and so on. So, and that, what I don't, I think people don't understand is that it actually changes

structurally what's going on in your nervous system, in your brain and within your body. And like you're mentioning, you know, there's, these are compensations. You do very well to adapt, but at certain point, the body just is no longer whispering to you. It's now it's screaming at you, right? You're overflowing. You're overflowing, right? Now you have to clean it up. Where's the mop? That's where we come in, right? That is. Yeah. And I think, I think what happens is the more layers they get, the more full they get, the more overwhelmed they get. And so then you bring in those, you know, depression, anxiety, um, you bring in all these other things that kind of add to it. And then from there, if that person doesn't know where to go,

they don't know that, you know, kind of alternative integrative therapies exist and can help. Maybe they turn to pharmaceuticals. And so then that's going to just add to the mix. It's going to kind of just mask what's happening. Again, you're not getting to that driver. So back to your cake thing, maybe you only have a few ingredients, but you need to have all the ingredients for that cake to really be made. So it's tough, but it can be a vicious battle until somewhere that cycle gets broken. And I think that's where we come in is oftentimes is to just educate one and then two to kind of break that cycle by just connecting with the body. And so the body wants to be heard. and when we connect with it then it can say oh thank you i've been needing to do this for a while

so yeah yeah the body does want to be heard absolutely i love it i love it um so my last question for you is for women who are dealing well it's not a question it's actually advice that you would give but for women who are dealing with postpartum issues and it could be any issues too it doesn't have to be postpartum but i'll leave that up to you what top three pieces of advice would you give them to help them along their healing journey? Absolutely. So I think one of the biggest things is that, and what I hear in the clinic often is the woman will tell me that, you know, they've literally told their doctor six or seven different times of their pain or of their symptom, and they just get kind of pushed aside or told it's normal or told it'll

go away as they get farther into their postpartum process. And, um, you know, the baby's only four months old. So give it some time, your body will heal and time does heal, but, um, it doesn't always do what we need depending on what's going on. So I think the biggest thing with that is that when I hear women say that I'm just proud of them, because usually the ones that are in my clinic are the ones that kept fighting for themselves, knowing that something wasn't right. And knowing that there hopefully was help, or at least they were holding on to hope in that. And then they finally found a physician or a friend or someone who knew of therapy that could help. And so I just say fight for yourself. If you're not being heard, find someone who will listen. You know, Susie's

here for you, Dr. Gronski, I'm here. So just fight for yourself. Know that you don't have to live this way. Um, and there is help out there. So that's my number one. Um, my number two is don't be shy. Um, you know, there's usually that whole stigma about down there, you know, which you Susie do a pretty fantastic job at, uh, bringing out to the surface and helping people kind of deal with that and in your candid ways. Um, but don't be shy. Uh, don't fear telling somebody that you're leaking. Don't fear telling them that you have pain down there when you're intimate with your spouse. Those fears will keep you basically in that realm for much longer until it finally gets to a point where it's such a problem that you, you can't do anything but talk about it. Right.

And so I just say from the beginning, know that, um, that area of the body is still part of our body. It still needs to function. It still has jobs to do. Um, and just because there's so much taboo around it, it doesn't mean that you can't talk about it. So don't, don't shy away from talking about it. And, um, and then lastly, I think, and this is a big one for postpartum moms, it's really hard. And if I, we don't plan to have a second, but if we were to have a second, um, or I would have to really put this, I would really have to listen to what I'm saying here. because it's super difficult, but we really, as moms, we put every ounce of our being into our children. And so I think, don't forget about you. The, if you're healthy, you can take care of your

child. If you're in a good place in life, if you're grounded, you're stable, you can take care of your child in your house and, you know, be a wife and every be a working mom or a stay at home, whatever it is that you need to do. You can do it with a little bit more grace and a little bit more confidence if you're grounded and stable. So just make sure that you take care of you. And I tell my patients, even if that's like 10 minutes a day while you're driving or you go for a walk at night once the family's kind of all settled in and it's a 20-minute walk and you do some diaphragmatic breathing and you just kind of take that time to unwind and be with you, whatever it is that you need, but don't forget about you. And I think that's super important.

That's some awesome advice. And I love that little tidbit about the self-care piece, like taking care of you. I had a patient who we were trying to brainstorm. She had two kids, new mom with her second kid. And she was like, I just don't know what I can do for myself. And I said, well, what can you gift yourself that you're already doing on a fairly daily basis or every other day? She goes, oh, actually, I would like to shave. I want to shave. I'm going have to shave once a week, you know, and she goes every other bath, I'm going to shave my legs and feel human. I know. Isn't that great? And I said, there you go, girl. I'm like, shave your legs, you know, put that lather that soap on and enjoy your time and be mindful while you're doing it.

And then she loved it. That was her little self-care routine. She gifted that to herself. So it could be anything like you're saying. Absolutely. Anything. And don't, don't shame yourself. You know, if you're, if you're take care of yourself as to have a treat once or twice a week, don't shame yourself for it. Like just have it and say, yeah, I had it and move on. Right. Right. But I think there's so much guilt and there's so much, you know, you're supposed to look a certain way and be a certain way. And you're supposed to be a mom and you're supposed to be happy and healthy with yourself. So whatever that entails, you do it, you know? Right. Exactly. Exactly. Cause the rest of that stuff is like, where does it come from when you

really think about those beliefs and values that you know who said that that's how a mom is supposed to act or be or do right like where is this coming from again it's another construct it's another ingrained belief whether it came from you know our moms or our grandmothers or you know the stroller club or whatever right i mean be real not superficial and and it's it's your body your life you know so yeah definitely i love it i love it you're awesome i bet we can talk like you said for hours about this stuff but the human attention span is less than a goldfish's which i think is about eight seconds so perfect so we've been talking to ourselves for a while now right exactly so um it's been fun having you on the show and i'm again so very thankful for for you sharing

uh your personal healing journey with with us and the rest of the world i mean you seriously are the best. And a little birdie tells me that you've opened up your own practice. So tell us how that's going and how can listeners connect with you? Yeah. So I'm super excited to say yes to that. So my husband and my son and I, we just relocated from Phoenix, Arizona to Boise, Idaho two months ago. And so it's been a little bit of a whirlwind. Like you said at the beginning, I got a lot going on, but I'm super excited. I opened my doors about three weeks ago here in Boise. And it's called Renew Manual Physical Therapy. And I just treat, it's just me. I'm cash pay and I share space with a cranial sacral therapist. And I just, I'm loving it. The

energy in there is awesome. It's just this cute little quaint place. And it's where I get to do what I love and be a teammate to my patients and help them on their healing journey. So So how they can contact me is my email is bfox, so b-f-o-x, at renewmanualpt.com. And my website, which is still under construction, we're nearing the end. It is www. It's always a work in progress. Oh, sorry. Absolutely a work in progress.

So I didn't realize how much was involved with it until I got head deep. And now I'm like, oh, my gosh, there's so much to do. It'll get better, I promise. Totally. Thank you. Yes. I, yeah. And you're an inspiration, you and a few other people. So thank you. But so once it's up and running, I would imagine by the end of the year at the latest, it'll be www.renewmanualpt.com. And so you can find me at either of those, or you can call me 208-949-8640. So any of those ways you can contact me. Wonderful. And for all the listeners, we'll definitely have Brianne's posts or links to her website, her email, and her phone number in the podcast show notes when the show airs. So, Brianne, again, thank you so much for being a breath of fresh air for all of us and to share that visceral manipulation isn't voodoo and, again, sharing such an intimate story with us.

We really appreciate it. I appreciate it. And I wish you all the best in your endeavors and lots of success. I know you will be your fantastic practitioner. So keep changing lives, my friend. Yeah. Thanks for having me. I so appreciate it.

Bye, you guys. Take care. Thanks for listening to today's episode. Be sure to head on over to drcg.com where you can get more information, show notes, and related articles on today's topic. also if you like what you're hearing head on over to itunes subscribe to the podcast and leave us a rating and review we'd love to hear feedback thanks again maybe one noodle maybe two depending if it's wet or dry you know but um