December 2008

Sheila Shea, Director
4427 East 5th Street
Tucson, AZ 85711
520-325-9686
[email protected]
www.intestinalhealthinstitute.com
Colon Hydrotherapy, Nutritional Consulting, Educational Trainings
Sheila's Blog (or Glog - Gut Log)

Hi Everyone,

Welcome to the holiday season. I have lots of little goodies embedded in the newsletter today. Insights and discounts on colonics, my brother Mike coming again in 2009 to teach, and cleansing on all planes, physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. Tune in and have a very joyous holiday season, one in which you evolve to your highest expression and potential.

Holiday Special - The Economic Colonic!
How about a colonic for $49.95 each during the holidays lasting until January 21 of 2009? From the time you receive this newsletter until January 21 of the New Year, I am offering a colon hydrotherapy session for $49.95 for those who mention this newsletter. What better holiday gift to yourself or for another? What better way to bring in the New Year! You have the option of rejuvenating before, during and after the holidays, or maybe cleaning up after any holiday excess, or going into the New Year clean, light, and on the letting go and giving side of the equation rather than on the side of consumption, accumulation and excess.

We have a new ballgame going. Up to this point, it has been an adventure of accumulating, consuming and excess. What does the new paradigm call for? The new paradigm calls for an investment in our personal health, in releasing, letting go of old non-life supportive ways and moving toward cooperation, sharing and conservation. Stay the course with your health. Look at the holidays as a way to look with new eyes on your behavior. Make the rough spots, smooth; the heavy spots, light; the toxic spots, clean; the depressed spots, creative; the fatigue spots, energetic. Invest in your health. Gift certificates are available. Call (520) 325-9686 or email me at [email protected].

The Giant Gas Machine
This is one of the biggest changes in my practice in the past year, the volume of gas that some clients have. It does not make any difference how old you are or what your weight is. It cuts across all lines. For some individuals all that comes out during the session is pure gas. Sometimes, it is difficult to get that gas out when one is laying on their back. We shift to their left side, called Left Sims position, and use a slightly higher inflow pressure. And what bubbles out, nothing but big bubbles, a continuous stream on the outflow.

Some people are amazed when this happens. They were not aware of the volume of gas that they had. They did not feel it. However, many of them complain of bloat and describe an 'empty feeling' after the colonic.

What causes the gas? Excessive gas is caused by an overgrowth of bacteria and fungi that feed on complex carbohydrates or complex sugars in the GI tract. Complex carbs are foods from beans, grains, potatoes and all starchy roots, white sugar and milk. People forget that milk is a complex sugar. All the breads, bagels, chips, pizzas and the list goes on has become the energy food of the microorganisms because your own enzymes are not digesting the complex sugars.

What to do?

Reduce or stop eating altogether the foods from the complex carbohydrate category. That's certainly a challenge over holidays that celebrate complex sugar. BTW, sugar weakens the immune system. Then you get the flu during or after the holidays and wonder why. Complex sugar.

Take a probiotic formula, which will build up the good bacteria in your gut.

I recommend following the information given in Breaking the Vicious Cycle by Elaine Gottschall.
I also recommend Gut and Psychology Syndrome by Natasha Campbell-McBride MD.

I have both at the office.

What would T. Boone Pickens say? He does say that electricity will not fuel the big 18-wheeler transport trucks. The big 18-wheelers need 'natural gas.' Hmmm, is it possible our internal gas may be an alternative energy fuel?

Your Health Trip to Tucson
I realize that I have a generally empty guest bedroom and bath on the 2nd floor of my home. I know that a number of you would like to a health vacation in a warmer climate and an opportunity to juice, exercise, take colonics, meditate, read, rest and maybe imbibe some of the art scene and environment of the Sonoran Desert.

My home is within walking distance of the Rillito River Park with miles of paths for cycling and walking. I have a new bicycle in the garage! The sun shines nearly every day. The Racquet Club is 10 minutes away with swimming, spa facilities, tennis, classes and much more. Many yoga schools are within 10-20 minutes of the house.

My guest bedroom and bath is available to rent. If you want to spend some time here, give me a call or email and we can work out any terms so that your stay is what you need and want and is reasonably priced.


At the Office

In the next few paragraphs, I go over the oneness of our health. The physical, emotional, mental and spiritual are one even though you might not feel or recognize it within yourself. The next few paragraphs deal with the 'within yourself' in all these dimensions, with suggestions for doing, listening and watching. These will be valuable tools to guide you through the holiday season.

A Report from the Inside!
What are people doing at the Intestinal Health Institute in the holiday season? I am always pleased by what my clients are doing and their sincerity in healing, in prevention, and in improving their health.

One 22-year old began the Arise & Shine 28-day Cleanse before Thanksgiving and will finish after Christmas. The first week is 3 meals and 2 shakes, the second week is 2 meals and 3 shakes, the third week is 1 meal and 4 shakes and the fourth week is fasting with 5 shakes daily. Other herbs and flora accompany the cleanse. After the fourth week, the cleanse calls for another week and a half repeating the first week of 3 meals. The diet is vegan. That is pure strength. Her cleansings during the colonics are awesome. She does not report any hunger. She mentioned the first week was the hardest and that now she is on a roll! (She did call last night and mentioned she hit the wall at work with fatigue and hunger and had a second meal during the one meal week. But she is keeping on, keeping on.)

She takes one colonic a week the first 2 weeks preceded by 3 colonics to clean out before the cleanse. Then, 2 colonics the third week and 3 colonics the 4th or last week.

One client just finished the 7-day Cleanse by Arise & Shine. By the end of the week, she lost 10 pounds, felt very energetic, and to me, she looked much younger. She said her abdomen felt much leaner and she was able to get into clothes she has not been able to wear in months. Her motivation was to lose weight after giving up cigarettes 4 months ago. I applaud her efforts.

One mother-daughter team came in on the Andreas Moritz liver flush. The flush goes 6 days. They received a colonic on the last day of the flush and then 3 days after the last day. Details of this cleanse are on the site.

Many over the holidays are using this time as an opportunity to get better, to heal, to become more peaceful through cleansing and fasting. There are other ways to go through the holidays than the sugar route.

Peace Is Possible. It Needs to Be Felt
In the former report, I wrote about the inside of our bodies, namely the intestines. Now, I am talking about going within to attain inner peace. Some people call it meditation. During these times of change, it behooves us to go within, to tap into that inner peace, inner joy and inner beauty. My spiritual teacher, Prem Rawat, provides a way to do just that.

For more information, local Tucsonans can listen to Words of Peace on our local cable stations, Sundays at 6:30pm on Comcast 73/Cox 98 or Mondays at 5:30pm on Comcast 72/Cox 120. There is simultaneous streaming online at www.wordsofpeace.org.

I encourage all of you throughout the holidays to tune into inner peace and reduce stress. Cultivate peace, move away from disharmony. Being at peace also allows your gut to work much better!

Getting Unstuck by Pema Chodron
Breaking Your Habitual Patterns & Encountering Naked Reality


I have mentioned the physical and spiritual so far. Now how do we deal with the emotional and mental bodies that seem to drive so many of us into uncomfortable places including bad health? I was complaining to a friend of mine about my anxiety and panic, and she suggested reading Pema Chodron's Getting Unstuck. I got a copy of the CD and listened to it at least 10 times. Now a year or so later, I am listening again and hearing a whole new message. That is the power of her work.

Pema is an American Buddhist nun who has authored several books and is resident teacher at Gampo Abbey monastery in Nova Scotia. Her teachers introduced her to the teachings on 'shenpa.' All I can say is that shenpa is that sticky quality of the mind that in myself I relate to as 'obsessive'. She goes into detail and you will love the readings. The 'obsessive' quality certainly drove my eating disorder for years. Now that the eating disorders have quieted down, my emotional and mental shenpa speaks louder.
Join her to learn more about:
  • Ways to unravel patterns of self-denigration and develop a fundamental maitri (loving-kindness) toward yourself
  • How to cultivate acceptance of your irritability, insecurities and other simply human traits
  • Recognizing, refraining, relaxing and resolving: the 4 R's of working with shenpa and more


Office Space Available for Holistic Practitioner

I have a beautifully appointed office and private room available for someone in the holistic field. If you are a body worker, acupuncturist, therapist and so forth and need a great space, give me a call at (520) 325-9686 or send an email.



Continuing Education

Michael Shea PhD returns in 2009 to teach the Introduction to Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy, Primary Respiration
This 4-day course introduces students to the skills necessary to begin to work with 'Primary Respiration', a therapeutic tidal-like movement in the fluids of the body named by Dr. Sutherland, the founder of Cranial Osteopathy. Working with this movement requires a still heart, deep perception and listening skills.

Mike will be in Tucson, AZ teaching from April 30-May 3, 2009. This introduction will be the preparation for the full training of Foundations of Biodynamic Cranial Sacral work. Location will be the Randolph Park Hotel and Suites again, very centrally located. We look forward to a wonderful workshop again with Mike!

Download the flyer for full information and registration. See you in Tucson in April of 2009!

Arvigo Mayan Abdominal Massage, Entry Level
www.arvigomassage.com
In January of 2006, I took the entry-level training in Mayan Abdominal Massage from Lorraine Paquette in Phoenix AZ. It was an outstanding experience and she is an excellent teacher. I am always looking for ways to make my colonic massage better for my clients.

Lorraine just sent me an email in which she said she would be offering the same entry-level course in TUCSON on March 5-7, 2009. It is called the Self Care Workshop in Maya Abdominal Massage. I am giving you an early heads up on this excellent work and teaching. If you wish to contact Lorraine, she can be reached at (602)689-4274 or at [email protected].

More details will follow as we get closer to the date. BTW, this is for all people - because this is for self-care!

Ann Baldwin
www.mind-body-science.com
I recently met Ann Baldwin at a wonderful networking breakfast in Tucson called Tucson Integrative Health Practitioners (TIHP). I missed sending out her 2 flyers on workshops that she gives that help with stress reduction. However, she emailed, "I am also interested in intestines - I have published some scientific papers on how noise stress produces intestinal inflammation in rats. The references are in the CV section of my website."

Baldwin AL, Primeau RL, Johnson WE. Jan 2006. Effect of noise on the morphology of the intestinal mucosa in laboratory rats. J Am Assoc Lab Anim Sci, 45:74-82

Check out this website and read about her extraordinary background and classes.

Good health to all of you. Take care of yourselves. Be in touch. Sheila

Sheila Shea