Trauma survivors find comfort in Yoga

Hannah Gapinski rolls over in bed and slams the snooze button on her alarm. It’s Saturday and much too early for most 18-year-olds. But she drudges out of bed and slips on some comfy black leggings, a hot pink tank top and oversized Millersville University sweatshirt. She hops in her car and heads to a strip mall outside of Lancaster, Pa. Parking outside of The Training Löfte, she pops her trunk and grabs her yoga mat and block. Once inside, she meets up with her yoga instructor, a woman in her mid-40s, and the two begin opening stretches.

“My boyfriend of nearly two years killed himself almost a year ago in November,” Gapinski says. “It was so sudden and so traumatic. I haven’t healed from it yet, and it affects me every day and heightens my anxiety. I’ve been trying to find things to help cope, and yoga seems to do that.”

Yoga therapy for victims of trauma is becoming more accepted in the medical community as a way to deal with issues such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), anxiety, depression and substance abuse.  It’s been especially useful to soldiers returning home from Afghanistan and Iraq. Last Thursday, Sept. 26, was Suicide Stand-Down day for the Army. With the Army reporting 211 suicides for 2012, and the majority of them suffering from PTSD,  more and more doctors are turning to alternative treatments for mental illness.

But soldiers aren’t the only ones facing PTSD and other trauma-related symptoms.  According to government statistics, 7.8 percent of Americans will experience PTSD in their lifetime. Anyone who has faced trauma, from sexual abuse victims to people in car accidents, are using yoga as a way to find comfort in their own body.

For Kayla Phillips, a yoga instructor at Lil Omm yoga studio in Washington D.C., yoga was a saving grace during her teen years. Practicing since she was 14 years old, Phillips became a yoga instructor the summer after her freshman year in college. Since then, she’s worked with a diverse student body from teens to battered women living in shelters. For those in the shelter, Phillips says, finding a way to be comfortable and happy in their own body was the focus of the yoga.

“I wasn’t there to be their therapist,” Phillips, 21, says. “I was there to give them what I could. Yoga allows you a tool to take care of yourself. For these women, it gave them back their sense of power.”

By working with yoga and meditation, Phillips says she’s improved her mental health as well. She says yoga and its emphasis on positivity has helped her regain confidence with her body image and have increased calmness and tranquility. The blonde-haired blue-eyed beauty lights up when she talks about yoga’s effect on her, especially its focus on positivity and overall health.

The government reports that 60.7% of men and 51.2% of women reported at least one traumatic event in their lifetime. Traditional yoga has been a savior for some. Gapinski has experienced anxiety since the passing of her high school sweetheart last fall. The sudden loss left Gapinski so anxious that she was unable to drive alone or even sleep in her room alone at night.  After trying yoga under the encouragement of her younger sister, Gapinski says she feels calmer and more in touch with her body.

“We know that yoga alone cannot combat these deeply traumatic events in peoples’ lives, but we do know that yoga can provide a sense of tranquility amidst the storm of their current situation.” says Carrie Mumah, an instructor at Yoga Activist, an organization providing yoga outreach.

To help those with more severe symptoms than simply stress, such as PTSD, yoga is being incorporated into traditional talk therapy. While statistics supporting yoga’s benefit for trauma victims are hard to come by, the Phoenix Rising Center in Vermont did a study that showed over four years, participants of an eight-week group program have typically experienced a 54 percent reduction in stress and anxiety symptoms. Dr. Jeanne Piette, a counselor at American University’s Counseling Center and specialist in PTSD, says that she personally has seen yoga being used by trauma sufferers and it has helped many. One of the most important aspects, she says, is the way yoga can help bring someone suffering from flashbacks or hyper-arousal back to the present and give them ways to help the physiological side effects like irritability or paranoia.

“Going through a traumatic experience can manifest into a lot of different problems like depression, anxiety, PTSD or substance abuse.” Piette says. “The body can feel like an unsafe place to some. Yoga therapy allows someone to get in touch with their body again in a safe space.”

Dr. Siddarth Shah, a specialist in yoga as a treatment for trauma survivors who worked with first responders in the 9/11 attacks, says that what makes yoga effective as a treatment for those suffering from trauma-related symptoms is the mind and body connection. When a person is stressed, his breath may become more shallow and speed up, a clear link from the mind to the body; what Shah says, however, is that the reverse is true as well.

“Using breathing techniques to slow down and calm the breath can transmit back to the brain that the body is relaxed so the mind will follow suit,” Shah says.

A physical activity can cause a mental change says Shah, as he sits in a black office chair in a meeting room. In his gray suit, Shah demonstrates chair yoga, doing the mountain pose, a common one done in studio yoga modifying it by placing his feet flat on the ground, sitting up straight in his chair, and pressing his palms together in front of his chest. It isn’t exactly what comes to mind when the word yoga is used, but Shah explains that despite apprehension, simple movements like this make the difference.

“A lot of skeptics who go into a class thinking that it isn’t going to do much will report back to me that they feel better at the end of a class,” Shah says. “Even things like laughter yoga help with illnesses such as depression because the act of laughing, even if forced, signals to the mind that the body is happy and it helps to sync the two.”

Finding ways to develop that connection between mind and body is what organizations, like Yoga Activist based in D.C., are trying to do. The group works with individuals through yoga outreach to show people that yoga is “a tool of self empowerment for people of all races, backgrounds and economic status.”

Mumah, an instructor and Communications Director for Yoga Activist, has worked with a variety of people practicing yoga for overall improved mental health. Mumah says that practicing yoga herself has helped to cope with her stress, anxiety and back pain, and that this is typical for a lot of people practicing yoga.

In an email interview she writes, “In one of my classes, a student told me afterwards that she was kidnapped and raped as a child. She told me that this was the first time that she had ever done yoga–and that it was the first time she felt comfortable in her own body since that traumatic event in her childhood.”

When working with victims such as this, Mumah says, the traditional yoga studio setting may not be what is best. Students may feel too vulnerable in a studio setting performing traditional poses, so often things like chair yoga are implemented to make the person comfortable.

“Many yoga outreach teachers say that they have to throw out all that they learned about teaching yoga in a studio when they teach in an outreach setting,” Mumah writes. “There are many special considerations, and they can be different for different communities and different social service organizations.”

Shah adds that even the stimulus in traditional yoga classes or studios can activate hyper-arousal in people suffering from PTSD. For example, he says, look to the example of a soldier returning from war who would probably feel too vulnerable laying on the ground in a dim yoga studio.

Which is why finding the individual treatment for an individual’s needs should be the primary factor when deciding whether yoga is the best way to treat a person suffering from trauma related mental illness, Piette stresses. For some people, she says, yoga helps if they aren’t ready to discuss their story. For others, it’s a good “adjunct” to traditional talk therapy. Yet to others, it may just not be their style. For those interested, Piette says that she hasn’t seen yoga do any harm.

“If you think about it what are the costs really? Sure there’s the money and time, but for people suffering from PTSD or any other trauma related injury, there is no reason not to give it a try.” Piette says. “It doesn’t have negative side effects, like you may worry about with traditional medications, and in fact some of the side effects of yoga seem to be positive.”

For Gapinski, yoga has been a way to begin addressing her traumatic experience. Recently she’s been seeing a counselor, seeking other additional ways to help with her anxiety, and is becoming more comfortable with herself and her experience. She says she’s found it opened her mind and helped her start to look in a spiritual direction.

“Everybody thinks yoga is just for some hippies or soccer moms trying to fit exercise into their schedule,” she says. “But in reality, yoga is a tool that can really help a person feel better while making them feel more comfortable with the situation. And that’s all anyone who’s dealing with trauma and stress really wants.”