Health & Wellbeing
Be mindful.. and give yourself space Mindfulness has become a bit of a buzz word, it’s everywhere. You can take part in online mindful baking classes, mindful art, mindful dance, mindful colouring and the list goes on. As a Yoga Instructor, when some years ago I first heard the term ‘mindfulness’ as a separate entity to yoga I was intrigued to know what exactly mindfulness was and how did it differ from the principal core of the tradition of yoga. I decided to do a bit of research to find out more. I bought books, attended workshops and courses. I learned of many great people whose work have much to do with this new found phenomenon, two of them being Jon Kabit-Zin and Thich Nhat Hanh. Jon Kabat-Zin is founder of the programme MBSR, mindfulness based stress reduction. This
programme has helped thousands of people recognise and cope with stress related problems. It is widely used and recommended by doctors and health professionals. Thich Nhat Hanh is a Buddest monk and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, author of many remarkable, empowering books on peaceful practices that are so simple to read, yet contain great wisdom. While these and many others are
to be congratulated for bringing mindfulness to our ‘attention’ I soon realised ‘mindfulness’ was not a new concept or a new way of doing things. It had been an integral part of my yoga. Mindfulness has been about for as long as we have. We all know that when we have time to slow down, we can appreciate everything around us more easily. We can hear the birds singing, we can recognise that a friend might not be as jolly
as normal, we can start to think about ourselves and what makes us happy or sad, what we enjoy or don’t. The problem is we are often just to busy to pause and pay attention with full awareness. We jump from one busy task to the next, whether that be work, school, housework or gardening the list goes on. We are so busy doing, we forget to just be. It’s a wonderful thing that mindfulness has become a buzz word and that we can be reminded to slow down and pay attention, try Mindful yoga, Mindful cooking, Mindful walking, give yourself some space to pause and just be. Finola Brennan The Cedar Tree Blandford the-cedar-tree.co.uk 07780 952 395
Tech allowing grandmother to speak By Miranda Robertson A family from Gillingham say they are so grateful for pioneering technology, which will allow them to hear their mother’s voice after motor neurone disease started to rob her of her speech. The grandmother of seven, 71, who wants to remain anonymous, has been ‘banking’ her voice as it becomes harder and harder to speak due to the disease. Her husband, 65, said: “For the whole family this will be a great comfort to them all to be able to hear her voice when she can longer speak.” Over the last couple of years, Dorset HealthCare’s speech and language therapy team has trialled a ‘voice banking’ service, funded by the East Dorset and New Forest branch of the Motor Neurone Disease Association. 50
A member of the voice banking team in action
Staff help patients ‘bank’ their voice, which then gets fed into software so they can communicate in their old, familiar tones. The woman’s husband said: “My wife was diagnosed in November, but her symptoms started just over a year ago. It was frightening to start with but we go from day to day now. “She is still at the stage
where she can walk and we make the service permanent. try to get out for a walk Dorset is one of the few every day. All food has to be areas in the country to offer pureed and speech is very this service. hard for her – it’s a big On average, 50 to 60 people effort. We’re still coming to are diagnosed with MND terms with it. Rose from each year in Dorset. More Weldmar comes here once a than 80 per cent of them will month and she is excellent.” develop communication The pioneering technology to problems, with many losing help people retain their voice their voices altogether. despite the ravages of motor A short film outlining how neurone is now being made the voice banking service available permanently in works, and the positive Dorset. MND patients can impact it had for some local record hundreds of words people with MND, can be and phrases to communicate seen at bit.ly/3rOcug0 in the event of losing their To find out more, go to: voice as the illness dorsethealthcare.nhs.uk/adul progresses. t-speech-and-languageThe service has proved such therapy a hit, used PODIATRY CLINIC by more ST EDMUNDS than 40 Burton Street, Marnhull DT10 1PS people, the Julie Anne Smith DPodM MCPod trust has NEW hcpc registered Podiatrist now CLINIC T. 01258 821297 provided E. stedmundspodiatry@gmail.com funding to
