Yoga practices are so varied and adaptable that there is something helpful for everyone. I picked up a stack of books at my local library the other day. Yoga Therapy for Arthritis, Yoga for Diabetes, Yoga for Osteoporosis, Yoga for Grief and Loss, Yoga Therapy for Parkinson’s Disease, and Yoga for Cancer.
Most of these books were published within the past decade. They reflect a burgeoning of the evidence base for accessible yoga that supports people living with various challenging and sometimes debilitating or life-threatening conditions.
Over the coming weeks, I’ll blog about these books, starting with Yoga Therapy for Arthritis: A Whole-Person Approach to Movement and Lifestyle by Dr. Steffany Moonaz and Erin Byron.
A common condition
Arthritis affects people of all ages. One in four adults have arthritis and 80 per cent of the population over 65 are affected. Defined as inflammation of the joints, arthritis includes over 100 different conditions.
Some of the most common ones that fall under the umbrella of arthritis are osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, lyme disease, psoriatic arthritis, gout, fibromyalgia, and autoimmune diseases.
For someone who has arthritis, the condition is often debilitating. The pain and inflammation affects mobility, strength, joint tissue, skin (as in psoriatic arthritis), organs, energy, and mood.
Because a person’s activities and participation in life can be altered, arthritis can impact relationships, work, mental health, and other psycho-social-spiritual aspects of life.
An essential guide
Yoga Therapy for Arthritis is an essential guide for people living with arthritis and those who treat them. This includes doctors and therapists interested in helping patients manage symptoms through yoga’s holistic lens.
Yoga teachers and yoga therapists will learn from the authors about what it’s like to live with arthritis and how to adapt yoga practices to accommodate and improve arthritis symptoms.
Those who suffer from joint inflammation and autoimmune conditions can use the book to manage symptoms with more confidence and equanimity.
About the authors
The book came out of research at Johns Hopkins Arthritis Center, beginning in the early 2000s. There, Dr. Moonaz developed controlled studies of yoga for arthritis patients.
Co-author Erin Byron is a registered psychotherapist and yoga therapist with a deep knowledge of yoga philosophy and the mental health impacts of arthritis.
The five layers of arthritis
The authors emphasize that yoga is accessible to everyone. They also point out that it’s a mistake to limit yoga to a sequence of movements. People with arthritis benefit, sometimes even more so, from yoga’s breath control, meditation, chanting, deep relaxation, philosophy, and the awareness of body, breath, and mind that comes from a mindful yoga practice.
Moonaz and Byron compare the bio-psycho-social model of health care to yoga’s pañcamaya koshas. The two frameworks are different ways of speaking about similar things.
Pañcamaya koshas translates as the five “sheaths” or layers of human experience:
- Physical body
- Energy
- Mental health and the five senses
- Knowledge and wisdom
- Spirit
What’s inside
The book is structured on these five layers, or pañcamaya koshas, beginning with the physical body right through to the spiritual body.
The authors emphasize the sense of spirit in our liveliness, connectedness, and well-being. But yoga is not a religion. It’s open to everyone.
Part 1 focuses on living with arthritis, particularly the physical and energetic aspects of the condition.
Part 2, called “Thriving with Arthritis,” goes into the psychological factors of the disease, the wisdom to be gained, and questions around what’s important and how we contribute while managing the symptoms of arthritis.
Part 3 is dedicated to therapeutic practices. An appendix illustrates adaptations and modifications of common yoga postures for people with arthritis.
These practices include movement, breath, and meditation. Some reflective questions in the book can help people hone in a practice suited to their needs.
Yoga teachers and therapists especially will find these pages valuable. People living with arthritis can go through these pages to develop their own home practice.
First person stories are shared in the book, offering a good sense of what it’s like to practice yoga with arthritis. One member of Dr. Moonaz’s study group reflected that:
“Mindfulness allows us to notice what is happening in our current experience on all kosha levels. It prevents us from being taken by surprise with a severe flare and overwhelming fatigue, because we have begun to notice the whisper that precedes the scream.”
Yoga as a mind-body practice encompasses everything from alleviating physical pain to managing stress and fatigue, from developing acceptance to contemplating life’s meaning and purpose. People living with arthritis grapple with all of these things. How useful it is to find a guide in Yoga Therapy for Arthritis.