Introductory Note from Sally Klemm: When Richard Melton, sixty-four years of age, first came to me as a client, I learned he was an avid reader and a writer. Still, I was amazed and gratified to receive, some months after our work had concluded, his commentary on the experience and the results he had achieved. As Richard so eloquently describes, through awareness and attention he bridged the gulf that divides good static structure and joyous dynamic function.

Richard’s Report

Up until an accident at age twenty-eight caused my fourth and fifth lumbar to go into subluxation about fifteen degrees, I was very active in sports. I loved running, swimming, body surfing, and snorkeling, so I was always trim and sinewy. The accident gave me a significant scoliosis, both from side to side and front to back, in addition to a twist in my spine. Two back surgeons told me that the only thing that would relieve my severe sciatica would be to have a surgery that could fuse the last four vertebrae together. Two other back specialists referred as ‘second opinions’ by my health insurance plan both said there was absolutely nothing wrong with me, and that I was faking it. I didn’t trust the surgery track record of the time (mid 1970s) so I was left with the only other standard treatment available, which was ‘wham bam thank you ma’am’ weekly chiropractic, which was of no help at all.

After a year of constant, severe sciatic pain I heard about Rolfing Structural Integration (SI) and started the standard ten sessions. I could only afford the twenty-five dollar charge once per month so it took ten months for me to complete the series. With each session, one-tenth of the pain was released, until, at the end, there was no pain. The scoliosis was gone. I had gained three-quarters of an inch in height. And there were several other dramatic changes that straightened me up in terms of not fighting gravity. However, I was not given any hint from any of the doctors, the chiropractor, or my Rolfer about how to re-strengthen the atrophied muscles of the low back so that they would hold the vertebrae in place. As a result, my back would go out frequently, just from a sneeze, or picking up something, or even just getting out of bed too quickly. The low back would snap and I would be in agony for three or more days until the spasms relaxed.

This went on for many years, during a time in which I was getting almost no exercise, not even jogging, because it would make my low back ache. If I had to do any physical work, like maintaining my yard or picking up or carrying anything, I would always first put on a weight lifter’s belt and cinch it up tight. Without aerobic activities, I gained about fifteen pounds and lost almost all of my muscle tone. After about twenty years of this, the back slowly started to stabilize and I started walking daily for exercise; just a little at first, like once around the block. Over about five years, I slowly added distance and built up the speed until I was power walking about six blocks daily. Then I tentatively started doing a little jogging. I was so happy I could jog again that I bragged to a couple of friends who were soccer players. They said, “That’s great, why don’t you come play soccer with us?” I was stunned by the suggestion because I had been unable to run for so long and I didn’t know anything about soccer. Finally I said, “But I don’t know how to play soccer.” They offered to teach me, so we started meeting weekly to do drills, which usually ended with a pickup game with others who came out to practice at the same field. I always wore my weight lifter’s belt cinched tight, as a sort of exoskeleton, to give added protection for my low back, just in case. After a year or so of this training, at about age fifty-five, I joined a team on an over fifty, non-competitive, co-ed soccer league, playing on a small field. Then, the weekly soccer drills with my buddies shifted to weekly three-mile runs on the beach. About five years later I added playing weekly on the big soccer field in ‘over fifties,’ organized scrimmage games. By then I had lost all the excess weight that was gained when I had been inactive.

A few years ago I twisted my left ankle and it never seemed to heal completely. So I wore an ankle brace to play soccer. Then, my left knee started aching, so I started wearing a knee brace, in addition to the weight belt I was already wearing. I kept thinking the ankle and knee pains would go away, but they didn’t. They were slowly getting worse. Then my wife had an accident and decided to get some Rolfing SI, so I decided to go with her and get some too. We went to Sally Klemm in Honolulu. After only four sessions, the ankle and knee pains were gone and several other interesting things happened. A couple of times each session, Sally would have me walk across the room and ask me to notice various things. What I noticed was that the way I walked and the way I stood had changed. Before, my knees would sort of lock back with each step, and when standing my knees were locked back. Now, while walking or standing, my knees never completely straighten. Instead, there is a slight relaxed bend in the knees. She also had me notice that my jaw might move slightly from side to side with each step.

Then I noticed that when I ran on the beach, the same thing was happening: my knees were no longer locking back with each stride, and if I paid attention I noticed my jaw moving slightly side to side with each stride.1 Also, I was no longer hitting down on my heel as hard as before. I was running more on the front part of the feet, and my feet were sort of rotating from along the outer sole to across the ball of the foot with each stride, and I was pushing off with my toes at the end of each stride instead of running flat-footed. I stopped wearing the ankle and knee braces. Then a couple of weeks later, it occurred to me that each part of the body is designed to flow with, and counter-balance all the other parts. So I decided to stop wearing the weight belt when I played soccer, thinking it was restricting that subtle balancing throughout the body. Now, at sixty-four, I am happily playing soccer twice a week, running the beach weekly, and I recently started running mountain trails, for the sheer joy of it, and all with no braces and no pains.

Sally’s Perspective

Despite having had a basic SI series years ago, Richard first came to me wearing a weight belt and knee and ankle braces, his manner taciturn until he described how he learned to play soccer, which brought with it a memorably radiant and joyous smile. Four sessions and only a few months later, he had both discarded the braces and recaptured “running . . . for the sheer joy of it.” How did that transformation happen?

Based on his history, it seems that when Richard finished his basic Rolfing series, though his pain was relieved and he had avoided surgery, he wasn’t integrated in a functional sense. In particular, nobody had taught him how to rehabilitate his back. While his basic series stacked him up well, he lacked internal support sufficient for vigorous movement. After twenty years of inactivity had stabilized him somewhat, this motivated fellow with good instincts knew that to get back in the game of life, he needed bodily support. He went for the best external support he could find, which was the weight belt. Though it allowed him to resume activity, it got him only so far; perhaps because the external support was not integrated, he injured other body areas – and then supported those externally, as well.

When I work with a client who received the basic series from another practitioner, though I want to respect and appreciate the basic structural order established in the past, I also want to offer the client something more than release from compensatory adaptations to past injury. In particular, I would like the client to experience dynamic function. Often, I want to see how much can happen in a single session tune-up. This was the case with Richard. During our first session, I worked to give him a sense of fascial continuity throughout his body, rather than a sense of segments on either side of braced joints. I used lots of movement cues, calling for movement through major joints while my fingers were in the fascia. My practice is to get clients off the table frequently and ask them to notice and describe any differences in sensation. Though Richard wasn’t used to this, he was willing to try it. He seemed pleased and satisfied enough with the single session that I thought we were finished with the intervention.

When Richard called some weeks later, having strained his back crawling under the house, I proposed an additional intervention consisting of three sessions. The first was axial first aid – in this case, biomechanical work to release articular restrictions at the sacroiliac junction and lumbar spine that brought him into my office. In the second, I addressed the old injuries, mobilizing Richard’s feet and lower legs, working through the fascial buildup around both fibulae, and attending to the injured left ankle and corresponding compensatory restriction around the right. Besides ‘rolling the bones’ of each foot, we re-patterned the articular action through toe and ankle hinges. The final session was much like the tune-up in its goal of continuity throughout the fascial system, but with a much greater demand on Richard’s somatic awareness, participation and engagement; e.g., initiating alternate psoas engagement while allowing response to transmit through the spine, shoulder girdle and mandible.

But the work was not over yet. The transformation took time, as well as Richard’s individual effort, made possible because he had noted the significance of the session walkabouts. He grasped how important it was for him not only to observe, but also to take his observations out into the world and apply them to his daily activities, to integrate the new sensory experience and make it one with his way of being in the world. When he did, he built for himself the internal support that allowed him to dispense with the exoskeleton, and his whole being became congruent with that joyous smile.

Endnote

1. From Sally Klemm: Clients who lock their knees often brace their mandibles. Teaching a client to release the mandible for an unencumbered stride yields rewards throughout the articular system.