COURTESY OF ROBIN CARNES
WARRIOR
POSES
Not all yoga helps. Some forms
of yoga are used by special forces,
for instance, to build muscle power
and flexibility. But yoga teachers
working with wounded troops have
developed trauma-sensitive forms
of yoga, including a technique
called iRest. This adaptation uses
meditation techniques in a soft
and secure setting to reactivate the
parasympathetic nervous system
by drawing the patient’s attention and consciousness inward,
rather than focusing on stress and
the terrors that dwell outside, said
yoga teacher Robin Carnes.
For instance, Carnes has
learned that when she is giving a class to troops with hypervigilance, like Martz, she should
first open all the closet doors
and drawers, so that her patients
don’t spend all their time fretting
about what might be inside.
In 2006 Carnes, a veteran yoga
practitioner and teacher, began
working with wounded troops at
Walter Reed National Military
Medical Center, now located outside Washington, D.C. There, she
was an instructor in a Pentagonfunded program to examine the
feasibility of using iRest yoga nidra as an adjunct treatment for
PTSD symptoms. After the study
HUFFINGTON
01.13.13
was completed, she was hired as
the yoga and iRest instructor for
a Pentagon-funded multidisciplinary treatment program for
patients with acute PTSD and
TBI. She later established an organization called Warriors at Ease
to train and certify teachers to use
the techniques with the military.
Drawing from traditional yoga,
trauma-sensitive yoga teaches
patients to firmly plant their feet
and activate their leg muscles in
poses that drain energy and tension from the neck and shoulders,
where they naturally gather, causing headaches and neck pain.
“The goal here is to move ten-
Robin Carnes,
a yoga
instructor,
used iRest
yoga as a
treatment for
PTSD for the
Pentagon.