Roberta Y.

The most important words I can say today are simply “Thank you.”First a thank you to my Sister-in-Law, Linda.Without her I wouldn’t be here.For months and months she tried to get me to come here.Then she herself came as a patient.When she came home and I saw her improvement, I couldn’t wait to come here.In fact, I built up such anxiety about coming. I couldn’t get here fast enough. I didn’t know what the Program was really about except for the literature.When I got here, I expected to have more pain.I hoped it would be “good pain” from the stretching and exercising.And it was.

Here at the Center, I learned about my body, and the first thing I learned to forget was all those MRIs and all the other pictures and tests that I’ve been going through for 10 or 12 years.    I had all this faith in the medical profession, which I don’t have anymore. I made a list of the 27 doctors I’ve gone to all those years.I’m sending each of those doctors the brochure of this Center.

Being a patient here has been sort of a college.I’ve had a lot of experience at a college level, both teaching and studying, but this has probably been the best college of my life. This place has taught me so much.It has helped me learn what I’m all about physically, about the mind-body connection, and that in the long run it’s mainly ME that can help ME.Besides learning to walk better, I learned how to breathe.Unfortunately, except for this place, there is no one out there to teach you all that; not a doctor that will tell you what you can do.They send you to somebody else, another doctor or maybe a therapist.But you’ve got to know what is going on in your own body.Coming here and knowing logically what’s going on in my own body--I can’t wait to share this knowledge with other people, both doctors and friends.

Here I also learned about medications, and over the years I probably took one of everything in every category.No more! I stopped them, especially after I attended the lecture by your Physician Assistant Susan Compton.They are all so different.And I tasted of every one of them, because of the doctors who thought they were doing the right thing.But they didn’t help. Prescription forms should be strictly limited. Sometimes the worst instruments the medical profession has are a pen and prescription pad.Pain medications rarely work, at least over the long run.

So, after thanking my Sister-in-Law, I want to thank everybody in this Center for their attention and their knowledge.I’ve never seen people with so much knowledge and hands-on caring . . . watching and correcting me when I needed it.I can’t wait to go back home and put all this into practice.So thank you, thank you all.