National Volunteer Week: Thank you to our volunteers!

Volunteering is the ultimate exercise in democracy.  You vote in elections once a year, but when you volunteer, you vote every day about the kind of community you want to live in.  -- Author Unknown

 

 

In the 4 years since our volunteer program began, we have had the privilege of working with an incredibly dedicated and enthusiastic network of volunteer allies.

In addition to assisting with our outreach work at community events and helping to operate our Sexual Health Resource Centre, volunteers have been very active behind the scenes in our library, entering data, making buttons and helping with many other administrative tasks.

 

And of course our volunteer Board of Directors are a vital source of support and guidance for our organization.

 

The support we receive from our volunteers is crucial to our ability to provide the level and range of services that we do in the Calgary community.

 

 

We are very proud to have such a diverse and highly dedicated team backing us up at every turn.

 

From all of us at CSHC, thank you to our fantastic volunteers!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. --Margaret Mead

And be sure to watch this short video by Volunteer Canada in celebration of National Volunteer Week. It is truly inspiring to think about the huge impact that volunteers make in all of our lives every day!

Quick Notes on Herbs for Grief and Fear

This winter, when a student of mine died in a fire, I put together these notes for my class.

I offer them now, rough and quick as they are, for all in Boston who are feeling grief and fear in the wake of today's explosions.

Please remember that plants are allies in healing but are not substitutes for psychotherapy or for ceremony in the process of healing the mind and heart -- as you move through deeper dimensions of pain and trauma you will need skilled support.

Be careful and conscious in the way you manage the influx of media information.   It is good to be well informed, and having accurate information is important to establish a sense of safety.  But also be aware that repeated exposure to the same traumatic stories and images has a cumulative effect.

Above all be kind and gentle to each other and yourselves.

And also remember the deep healing to be had just by being present to the beauty of the living world, human and wild.


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As I am writing this, Cedar and Douglas Fir are drying in the kitchen for incense, their scents filling the apartment, and there is ocean water on the table in front of me to take in some of the grief moving through.  

RESPONDING TO IMMEDIATE TRAUMA

Bleeding Heart -- Dicentra formosa when given during a time of acute crisis will help to calm shakiness and fear.  I give 2-5 drops of the tincture generally.   Once the body has settled out of immediate shock and panic, the medicine works differently -- helping to bring the tears you have been holding back flowing to the surface.  A beautiful gift, but one to be received when you are in a place where its safe and right to let the tears flow.

Pasque Flower --Anemone pulsatilla, Anemone patens, Anemone tuberosa, etc. will help someone when intense grief or terror come on suddenly, as if brought in by an ill wind.  Think of the downy hairs on the flowers and leaves as a signature for being that kind of soft, warm blanket.   Contraindicated when there is a strong, forceful pulse or a lot of redness is the face.   2-5 drops.

Ghost Pipe -- Monotropa uniflora -- When pain, physical or emotional, is so intense as to overwhelm a person completely, Ghost Pipe helps to regulate sensory gating so that the pain is processed differently - the person will still be aware of the pain, but will feel, as one of my clients said, "as if everything I was worried about was taken outside of me and put in front of me where I could see it and work with it."   I initially give 3 drops, but some people less sensitive to the medicine will require 30.

Skullcap, as a smoke, a tea, or a tincture can be administered liberally to help bring calm in an intense situation.

Wood Betony (Stachys betonica) helps to anchor a person in the physical body after a traumatic event.

NOURISHING AND SETTLING THE HEART

In Chinese medicine, a person's emotional self is connected with a spirit called Shen, and the heart is sometimes envisioned as a clay vessel that stores the Shen.  When the vessel is shaken, the Shen becomes scattered and disturbed -- which is marked by insomnia, restlessness, irritability, emotional upheaval, and decreased attention span.

Schizandra and Reishi are both used traditionally to settle and nourish the Shen, and I find they combine together wonderfully to support the emotional heart through difficult times.  Both also support the liver, aiding with the processing of difficult emotions.    Both are also adaptogens, helping the body to regulate its response to continual stress.  I will give both liberally, though some caution is advisable when giving Schizandra to people who are on dose dependent medications that are processed through the liver.

Hawthorn helps to nourish, cool, and repair the heart and blood vessels.  Its berries feed the heart, its leaf and flower bring lightness and relaxation to the cardiovascular system, and its thorns provide protection.   I tend to use the berries and flowers together in equal proportions in a tincture or an infusion which I will give liberally -- and if I am harvesting the medicine myself I will add a few thorns.  Thorns can also be carried as talismans for protection.   The flowers make a beautiful bath.    Use caution with internal use with anyone on beta blockers, as Hawthorn may potentiate them. 

Motherwort calms and protects the heart, especially when there is anxiety driven by unsettled emotion.   It combines really beautifully with Passionflower when emotional anxiety is driving circular thinking and creating insomnia.

MOVING GRIEF

Aromatic plants help to move emotions and energies -- hence their use as smudges and ceremonial incense around the world.

Our own Western Red Cedar has been one of my closest allies in moving through grief this past week.  Walking in the forest, I feel its boughs bending to brush away my sadness.  I have been burning Cedar as a smudge as well.   Other evergreens bring similar medicine.

Monarda spp. are used in the Muskogee Creek tradition to clear the ways in which death hangs over and clings onto the living.   I have been taking baths with Monarda this week.

Sweet smelling aromatic plants like Sweetgrass and Cottonwood and Rose help to remind the heart and the spirit of the sweetness and beauty of the world after intense tragedy.   They can also open the heart to bring tears and pain to the surface so they can move out.   But it is important to have a space of emotional safety and support when working with them in these ways.

BRINGING BACK JOY

The bark of the Mimosa tree -- Albizia julibrisin - known as "collective happiness bark" in China -- helps to restore the ability to feel joy after the heart has been broken.  30-60 drops/day

Gentle joy tonics include Linen blossoms -- Tilia spp.,  Lavender, and Lemonbalm.   They bring a soft lifting of worry and a subtle return of brightness to the heart.

Black Magic

"Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right." -- Ani DiFranco

Any discussion about magic ("the art and science of creating change in conformity with Will," as Crowley defined it)  is a discussion about power and the ways we wield it -- a discussion that cannot be separated from the social, political, cultural, and economic realities people inhabit.

The popular conception of "white magic," guided by the ethic "do what tho wilt, an' it harm none" feeds and is fed by the illusions of privilege that obscure the fact that that the lives we live are lived at others' expense.   In a society where the messier aspects of securing survival are shunted off to armed forces that do their work out of sight and far away, rougher edged magics are not as relevant in the lives of those who have social and economic capital as they are to those who live at the edges and in the shadows.    But magic has long been a means by which people have done what they need to do feed and heal and clothe and house and protect themselves and their communities.    The magic that has historically been the magic of the poor and the oppressed is labeled "black magic" by those who do not need it to survive and would rather not face the realities it entails.

Victor Anderson famously said "White magic is poetry, black magic is whatever works."

White magic is reverent and celebratory.  It is the right hand magic that gives thanks for the blessing and abundance that rain down from the universe.

Black magic is done with urgency, when children are starving and need food,  when someone is coming to harm your family, when someone is halfway through death's door and a witch needs to tear through the veil to pull her back into this world.     It is the left handed magic that takes what is needed and does not apologize for that need.

But ultimately, there is no white magic or black magic, there is only magic, wild and transgressive and resisting description.   To heal and to hex, to bless and to curse, are not just  identical powers that flow from the same source, they are the same action seen from different points of view.

Magic is neutral.  Its application is not.   Its our right and responsibility to wield it with precision and intention, knowing and choosing the blessings and the curses we enact as we do.   

"WiseGuyz" program featured on CTV News in response to rape culture

Our WiseGuyz program coordinator Blake Spence was interviewed by CTV News in the wake of the response to Rehtaeh Parsons' suicide. Blake discusses the concept of "rape culture" in our society and how our WiseGuyz program is working with young men to change it.

Blake explains the importance of a program like WiseGuyz:

"There is a lot of work out there that has been focused on women’s reproductive health. There are lots of programs for young women available. But there aren’t the same number of programs for young men.

 

We wanted to fill that gap, and so the WiseGuyz program is a program for Grade 9 guys — 14- and 15-year-old guys — that teaches them what a healthy relationship is, all about sexual health, consent, what’s considered sexual assault. And how to have a healthy relationship now and in the future."

Here's the full clip from CTV News:


http://www.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=902932&binId=1.810401&playlistPageNum=1

To learn more about our WiseGuyz program - which works with junior and senior high boys to better understand healthy sexuality, consent, healthy relationships and more - check this blog post.

FAIR: Families Achieving Inclusive Relationships

In 2011, we began an important community development project to reach immigrant populations.

The FAIR (Families Achieving Inclusive Relationships) Project offers support and information to help parents talk to their children about their family values and how they are connected to healthy relationships and healthy bodies.

Topics include:

• how to talk openly about relationships and values
• understanding choices young people face when their family values are different from those of their friends
• the challenges of raising children in a Canadian culture and how to talk to your children about those differences

A resource booklet has been developed and community workshops are offered, such as the following FREE session with Alberta Health Services:


Families Achieving Inclusive Relationships

Tuesday April 9, 2013
Sign in:    5:45 pm
Session:   6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Alberta Children’s Hospital
Room B2-2000

 
Register online: http://fcrc.albertahealthservices.ca/ces.php

(Registration no later than April 2, 2013. Courses with low registration will be cancelled one week prior to the session.)

 

Our WiseGuyz Program: Learn all about it!

On April 10th, our WiseGuyz Program will be presented at the Calgary Domestic Violence Committee (CDVC) “Lunch & Learn” session Helping Guys Be Wise. Our WiseGuyz Program Coordinator, Blake Spence, will highlight his work with the WiseGuyz program and illustrate strategies to engage young men in the program.

Our WiseGuyz Program began in February 2010 with a focus to engage young men in a sexual health program that would address their specific needs. 

WiseGuyz is a ground-breaking 14 week program that provides targets education, skills development and support to young men to help them achieve sexual well-being and healthy relationships. The program employs a comprehensive approach to sexual health that recognizes that sexuality and male gender norms influence young men's attitudes, actions, relationships and their sexual experiences.

The program curriculum addresses a range of topics including:

• anatomy, birth control and STIs
• gender and masculinity
• human rights and personal values
• effective communication
• decision-making

Participants also analyze the highly sexualized pop cultural landscape that surrounds them in an effort to develop critical thinking skills about mass media.

(Read more on how the program got started.)

The program is currently running in three public Junior High Schools. It has been featured on CBC Radio One and as a cover story in the Globe and Mail.

 
CDVC Lunch & Learn:
Wednesday, April 10th, 2013
12:00-1:30pm
Sheriff King
2003-16th St. S.E.

No Cost

Register with CDVC at
http://www.endviolence.ca/view-event/187_cdvc_bbl_helping_guys_be_wise/

 

7 Problems With the "Obesity Epidemic"

Here are 7 reasons why I cringe every time I hear someone talking about "the obesity epidemic"

1. "Obesity" is not contagious.

Consciously or unconsciously, when most of us hear the word epidemic we think of a virus rapidly spreading through a population.   And consciously or unconsciously we tend to think of its "carriers" as a threat.   Speaking of "obesity" as an epidemic thus further stigmatizes fat people who are already having to deal with discrimination in a society that privileges thinness

2. "Obesity" is not a disease.

The idea that high body weight or high percentages of body fat correlate to poor health are based on just that -- correlation.    Most studies that suggest a link between a high BMI or high body fat percentage fail to account for confounding factors such as behavioural patterns around diet, exercise, and yo-yo dieting.   When those factors are taken into account, differences in mortality between "overweight" or "obese" people and people whose body weights or health percentages are considered "healthy" begin to disappear.   People at the extreme high end of the spectrum for BMI or body fat do have higher mortality rates -- but the same is true for people at the extreme low end of either spectrum.    A disease is a physiological disorder that causes impairments in biological function.  Hence obesity is not a disease. 

3. BMI, the primary measurement of "obesity" is a virtually meaningless indicator.

The much vaunted "Body Mass Index,"  used to "measure" obesity by many physicians, and increasingly, educators and public health workers, is a crude ratio of weight to height that does nothing to take into account even obvious factors like bone density and muscle mass, not to mention the wide diversity of body types that exist around the world.   Its definitions of "overweight" and "underweight" are also pegged to already dubious assumptions about the "proper" weight of people of European descent that are even less applicable to people of non-European ancestry.

4. Public education campaigns about "obesity" tend to focus on giving people information about better food choices, while glossing over the real problem of malnutrition in North America rooted in a broken food system that denies many people access to good food.

 There is a real public health crisis in North America related to food -- malnutrition, which can express itself in weight gain, in weight loss, and in chronic disease.   At issue is the accessibility of food that provides people with their nutritional needs.   The nutrient poor "Standard American Diet" is the result not of poor education about nutrition, but of the fact that a carbohydrate and sugar rich diet is the most affordable diet for many people  a) because of agricultural subsidies for corn, wheat, and sugar and b) because carbohydrates and sugars are sources of quick energy that can more easily satisfy cravings when people haven't had enough to eat.   The problem isn't that people don't know that Kale is healthier than Kraft Dinner.   The problem is that people are trying to feed their families on wages too low to pay the escalating costs of food, housing, transportation, clothing, and medical care.    As a brilliant post at the Fat Nutritionist blog points out:

"You want people to eat better? Give them enough money, a place for cooking and storage, and access to a decent variety of food. "

5. The pathologization of fatness tends to lead health care practitioners to pay less attention to other causes of health problems in fat people.

Over the years I have had many doctors simply chalk chronic health problems I was dealing with up to weight while ignoring other factors.   The expectation that fat people will be less healthy tends to lead many healthcare practitioners to accept a lower quality of life as normal for fat people.   As I have dealt with many of my own chronic health issues, addressing them through diet and exercise, I have lost weight.   But some problems doctors previously chalked up to weight have remained.   And the underlying problem was not that I was fat, the underlying problem was that shaming about my body had made me believe my health was hopeless.   If instead of just telling me I was too fat my doctors had encouraged me to see how I could make changes in my life that would make me feel better regardless of my weight, I probably would have started making those changes at least 10 years earlier than I did.    And I also would have sought guidance from health care practitioners earlier and more often I had expected something other than shaming.

6.  Defining weight or body fat as the problem tends to encourage people to take drastic measures to lose weight rather than focusing on health.

There are lots of ways to lose weight -- and most of them are taxing on the body and difficult to sustain.   Pressuring people to lose weight makes them more likely to focus on whatever will bring off the pounds rather than on finding sustainable practices to integrate into their lives that can make them healthier in the long run.

7.  The campaign against "obesity" is rooted in a puritanical ethic.

Anti-obesity campaigns judge, criticize, and shame people not only based on their body size, but also based on the often erroneous assumption that fat people lack discipline and just need to say "no" to immediate gratification in order to lose weight.   The underlying ideology is one of denying pleasure in order to achieve virtue -- a repressive ideology that cuts people off further from their bodies.  And its in truly learning to find comfort and pleasure in their own bodies that people can best find their way to health.

There are dozens of other reasons I could give, but these are just a few thoughts to further questioning and discussion  . .