OVERVIEW
Craniosacral therapy is a gentle hands-on treatment that may provide relief from a variety of symptoms including headaches, neck pain, anxiety and nausea among many others concussion related issues.
The therapist uses a light touch to examine membranes and movement of fluids in and around the central nervous system.
DISCUSSION POINTS
KEY RECAP
- It is very gentle, often very effective
- Resets “locked” bones and other systems in the skull, spinal fluid and nervous systems
- Excellent for headaches, nausea and anxiety related to head injury
- Excellent to pair with any vestibular (eye) therapies or for those having headache when reading or doing eye therapies
- Finding an experienced therapist is critical
- Can be expensive. Ask for packages. Consider using your medical account dollars. Sometimes insurance will cover if its under a Physical Therapist order.
OUR EXPERIENCE
After months of Physical Therapy and very little progress, we took Katherine to another OT/PT team for a second opinion. This team specialized in sensory issues for pediatrics which seem appropriate given her sensory issues post concussion. They had several insightful comments, but one in particular stuck with us, “Her skull feels locked.” We had no idea what that could mean.
Your skull is made of large puzzle pieces that are supposed to have some give and movement that allows a young child’s brain to grow and us older humans’ brain to be protected. A skull that moves a bit absorbs impacts and blows, it is a dampener, protecting the brain. It could be that Katherine’s skull locked up with the first concussion to the right temple, then the left temple concussion actually amplified the impact with a rock solid skull (like ringing a bell) instead of absorbing the blow like a wet blanket. At any point, it was “locked” now AND we had been tightening her braces along the way – so it was locked with NO way to gradually shift back!
This began our search for a craniosacral therapist. Carol explained with diagrams and a model what the therapy would be like. We booked 5 sessions, 48 hours apart. Each session was 50 minutes.
After the first session, Katherine said she felt very little during the session. She was comfortable, she could barely feel Carol’s touch. Immediately after her session, she had less light sensitivity and her headache was gone. About 3 hours later, she was in tears. In great pain! We called Carol, an advil took away the pain and Carol said it was unusual but likely just a lot of pressure and movement after the adjustment which she intentionally said she did a very small adjustment.
After her second adjustment we discussed that perhaps Katherine’s braces being tightened could have possibly held her locked skull in place and thus the pain from the adjustment. We decided not to tighten her braces again until the headaches were relieved – which seemed could be forever. In reality, Carol had Katherine’s headaches under control in 6 weeks.
OUR SUMMARY
- Katherine had about a 20 sessions.
- Her headache free periods stretched out longer and longer
- All of Katherine’s other therapies – vision, balance, PT reading etc improved greatly during this time
- After an initial 10 session spread over 3 to 4 day intervals, our maintenance period went to weekly and then bi-monthly sessions.
- Of all of our referrals, this has been the most successful treatment for concussion pain management
READ MORE INFORMATION FROM EXPERTS
You can read more here: https://www.massagemag.com/craniosacral-therapy-to-address-post-concussion-syndrome-125160/
You can watch about the technical aspects of this therapy at this video here: https://youtu.be/ez7FzcZtx-E