Cranio Sacral Therapy
There are so many types of alternative therapies available to help heal our horses. Each month I will feature one in detail to help readers make an appropriate choice when looking for therapies to support traditional veterinary medicine. Always seek a veterinary opinion if your horse appears ill in any way.
What is CranioSacral Work?
CranioSacral Work combines sensitive and handson bodywork with meditative use of the inner eye and inner ear. Techniques are drawn from three traditions osteopathy energy work and Taoism. A supremely gentle approach it is a way of doing nondoing. It honors both the physiological understanding of how things happen and the intuitive perceptions of how things really are. Equine CranioSacral Work is very effective in the treatment of certain conditions of the horse. The technique seems to work very deeply in the body. The reason for this is because one is working directly with the central nervous system.
CranioSacral Work which originated from the work of osteopath Dr. William Sutherland DO in the early 1900s was originally called craniopathy and was derived from osteopathy. It was later called CranioSacral Therapy by Dr. John Upledger DO from the Upledger Institute and Visionary CranioSacral Work by Dr. Hugh Milne from The Milne Institute. Now the work is being taken over to the equine world with much success.
The Equine CranioSacral System The Core Link
The CranioSacral system of the horse is made up of several parts the bones of the cranium or the head the sacrum or tailbone and the spinal column. CranioSacral work traditionally specialized in the head spine and sacrum but it is not limited to those areas nor is it limited to the physical. All of the following are considered to make up the Core Link. The spinal column is protected by what is called the dural tube which encases the spinal column. The dural tube attaches at the foramen magnum meaning large window in Latin. This window allows the spinal column to exit the skull through the large opening in the occipital bone which forms the base of the skull. The dural tube then attaches to cervical vertebra 2 or C2 and freefloats through the length of the spinal column until it attaches again at the second sacral segment of the sacrum thus attaching the head to the hind end or the occiput to the sacrum.
Cerebral Spinal Fluid CSF is produced in four ventricles a series of
