QUESTIONS & ANSWERS ABOUT THEREPEUTIC TOUCH
Compiled by Carolyn Buchanan & Sue Frid
What types of treatment can be applied when administrating TT to help reduce extreme swelling in the arm or leg?
I will answer this question with the understanding that these are suggestions and that in the actual treatment, the field may dictate a somewhat different approach.
Swelling often presents itself in the field as congestion and a strong inward drawing of energy. The rhythm may be off and heat or cold can usually be felt energetically as well (this may differ from the actual temperature of the skin). A minor infection may be treated with localized Therapeutic Touch. The “extreme” swelling referred to in this question (without identifying cause), suggests that the entire field may be disrupted and thus a full TT treatment is the best approach.
As in all full TT treatments, two primary steps are important:
1. Grounding must be supported to both help dissipate congestion and to increase energy coming into the field.
2. Unruffling to increase energy flow through the entire field
Once the initial work to support flow through the entire field is addressed, localized TT can be started to decongest the area. Several different forms or combinations may be used:
a) One approach is siphoning off congestion by unruffling at the “energetic edge” of the congestion (which may be 4 to 12 inches or more from the skin) and visualizing the congested energy grounding into the Earth, or even a nearby plant. Asking the Earth and/or the plant to take the congestion is very helpful.
b) Using what I call “Contact TT” is usually very effective in decongesting an area of HOT swelling and can be used as long as the skin is not broken. The practitioner puts a hand on the skin and lets the heat of the swelling come into the surface tissue of the hand, takes the hand away and shakes it off. The contact may be for 1 to 3 seconds. This is repeated over and over again until the temperature of the skin drops to close to normal and the swelling diminishes; it can take 2 to 7 minutes for this to occur.
c) Using Kelly Travail’s (1) “sticky fingers” to draw congestion out is helpful. Rays of light at the end of the practitioner’s fingers are inserted into the field with the visualization that they attract the congestion which is drawn out and shaken off (the stickiness is turned off!).
d) Combing perpendicularly away from the skin to draw congestion out and then grounding it is also effective.
e) Pausing to center very deeply can shift the entire field greatly.
Returning to unruffling and grounding the entire field periodically is important. In addition, Heart Support is very important to increase the function of the circulatory system which is compromised where there is swelling, and to boost the immune system if infection is involved.
Once the localized congestion begins to dissipate, light downward unruffling and grounding is used to ensure flow through the area. Then gentle energizing of the area is important. Where there is energetic congestion, there is a deficit of useable energy and the field will try to pull more energy into it. An approach that I like to use is Spiro Sathi’s (2) “Ball of Light.” The practitioner builds a ball of light in a hand and offers it to the field at either the site of the problem or a nearby secondary or tertiary chakra. As the energy is absorbed, the practitioner provides more until the area stops taking, and then gently unruffles to ensure that no energy has build up again.
The treatment finishes with full field unruffling and grounding, and the receiver is asked to rest for 20 minutes or more.
Notes
1. Kelly Travail is a member of the London, ON Hospital and Long-Distance Teams
2. Spiro Sathi was a Cypriot healer and the subject of 3 books by Kyriacos C. Markides. The first of the series mentions the Ball of Light. Markides, Kyriacos C. The Magus of Strovolos: The Extraordinary World of a Spiritual Healer. New York, London: Arkana/ Penguin, 1985.
BJ/January 2005