Chronic left SI joint pain that won't budge is humbling, even when someone has done everything right: good body awareness, a strong yoga practice, excellent care before they ever reach your table. So Michael starts where he always starts, listening. This case study follows the right thoracolumbar junction, a diaphragm release, and an unexpected acute flare that became a breakthrough, tracing how curiosity and presence shifted a long-standing pain pattern. The deeper lesson: sometimes the care itself, not the technique, is what creates change.

I have been seeing more and more folks coming into the clinic with either a diagnosis of dysautonomia or a symptom set that fits the dysautonomia picture. Dysautonomia is not a “medical diagnosis”, it is a grouping of symptoms that indicates underlying autonomic nervous system disorder. The actual cause may remain a mystery but treatment can follow the specific presentation of each individual case. This is where our skills as bodyworkers can be supportive for those with these symptoms. 

We have had a bit of vagal system extravaganza at MMI lately. I have been inspired by some dissection stuff during my class with Gil Hedley to re-look at vagal system anatomy. Dissection is messy business, and while we saw the vagus in the wild, as Gil likes to say, it was difficult to get the impressions of it that I wanted.