A few taps and my cynicism was gone
I feel thoroughly stupid as I sit in the reception of the Neal's Yard Remedies Therapy Rooms in London. This is because Body Stress Release (BSR), the treatment for which I am waiting, seems plain dotty. I have been told that all it involves is being tapped until the stresses and strains in my body have been tapped away.
Apparently. one woman left feeling so relaxed that she went home and slept for 12 hours. But as an alternative therapy cynic, I find this all rather dubious - surely this is just a chance for the stress releasers to make a quick buck?
BSR was created 22 years ago by Ewald and Gail Meggersee, a South African couple desperate to find a treatment for the constant pain Ewald suffered after falling out of a tree as a child.
For years, he suffered from severe cramping and shooting pains in his lower back and legs, and once, he woke up temporarily paralysed from the waist down. He found only temporary relief from chiropractic treatments.
Whilst trying to discover something that would reverse his condition, they stumbled across research by Dr Richard Van Rumpt, a retired American chiropractor who had explored an approach to pain relief that differed from conventional chiropractic manipulation.
Van Rumpt talked of "listening" to the body - using it as a "biofeedback monitor" that would tell a practitioner what was wrong and then heal itself.
The Meggersees built on this method and cam up with BSR, which seemed to rid Ewald of his pain.
"Muscles adopt a deffence mechanism when they have gone into tension, so when you apply just a little bit of pressure to one of them, you're going to get a reaction. Normally, it manifests itself as the temporary shortening of one leg," explains Peter Van Minnen, one of only 12 BSR practitioners in Britain. "So, to start with, I will tap the various muscle groups - if there is tension in any of them, I will know, because a leg will shorten."
Van Minnen taps at the stressed areas to release tension. He says that light pressure is enough to remind your body to heal. "You have to trust your body - it knows best and will mend itself when reminded." Unlike conventional bodywork, the pressure applied is very light and you do not have to take off any clothes. It is also relatively quick, taking about 20 minutes at most.
Twenty minutes is all it took to rid me of both my scepticism and a couple of ailments. Before the treatment, I had severe breathlessness, but after a few taps on my diaphragm, it had gone; my lower back pain, a consequence of sitting hunched over my desk all week, had also disappeared by the end of the treatment. I then had to drink two strong coffees to stop me from going home and sleeping for 12 hours.
Bryony Gordon
