Gabrielle (The Hot Yoga Doctor)

Hi Tim

Stop being so hard on yourself: I know it was meant as self-deprecating humour but … I bet you they clapped because it was a good class. There are millions of teachers in the thousands of subjects available. Some of them are highly qualified and are not good teachers. Some of them are teachers without any qualifications. Qualifications do not a teacher make. They can help. There are excellent, great, good, bad and indifferent for anything you care to mention.

There are no minimum standards to teach yoga in Australia and only a few states where it is necessary in the US. You have to ask yourself if the regulations imposed are to truly make a better standard or if it is a money making operation. In my varied experiences with those yoga alliance organisations, there are a lot of times where it is only about the money. I could give specific examples but choose not to.

I do know that one of the functions of these yoga organisations is to formalise and record attendance at further education courses taken by its members. Further education is indeed a noble pursuit. As in most organised associations most people interested in attending other courses would do this regardless of incentive and don’t need to formally belong in order to better themselves.

Regulations, laws, rules etc are usually to force the minority to adhere to codes that the majority of people would without question.

So teach, enjoy it, learn more and enjoy sharing your own evolution and understanding.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Guillermo

So, can you tell me what you’re feeling in your head, neck and shoulders in your backbend? Are your arms locked out? Are they locked out in half moon and when you come up from the left side what do you do to get ready for backbend?

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hello Kim

Thanks for chiming in Paul.

Kim, you are on the right track. Electrolytes are the key.

I agree with Paul in that cutting the number of training sessions is not instrumental. At the risk of countering the other part of Paul’s post which (whether intended or not) which only mentions the importance of hydration and does not mention the importance of electrolytes at all, I would like to make it very clear so that anybody who reads this thread is under no misconception at all.

Water consumption (for the sake of hydration) must in all cases be balanced with electrolyte consumption. Recommendations of that to follow.

Drinking ample water and no electrolyte supplementation is a risky proposition, especially in the early days of practice where salt losses through sweat are the highest.

Electrolytes – which are found in normal unadulterated sea salt – are the ‘fuel’ for muscle health, for proper kidney function and just about any other function in the body.

Too little salt – which also happens when too much water is taken – causes imbalances. Look up hyponatremia to understand the problem. Just a few signs of hyponatremia include muscle cramps and weakness. You may have heard that if you are prone to painful cramps in the middle of the night then you should have some salt by your bedside.

If you’ve ever had a cramp and then popped a little salt on the tongue the cramp will – in 99% of the time – disappear IMMEDIATELY.

Don’t be concerned about too much sea salt and hypernatremia – a condition of too much sodium – because it only happens in the very rarest of occasion and often in a hospital environment associated with particular metabolic disorders. However NEVER have too much table salt, in fact you should NEVER have table salt at all. It has only sodium and chloride and causes imbalance rather than nourish the body.

Keep up the sea salt intake. It is said that for regular use 1/2 tsp per day is a good ‘dose’. A wonderful thing you can try Kim is to put a little sprinkle of sea salt in your water (even at yoga) and a few drops of lemon juice. So refreshing. It feels like an elixir that gives you back energy, stamina. Tell me how it goes.

Your cramps will disappear. I can tell you from personal experience that it doesn’t take long at all.

I hope that helps.

Thanks for your contributions, both of you.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Joan

Actually what makes the eyes sting is salt. There are different rates of losing salt. Mostly, the majority of people lose salt in higher amounts in the first 2 weeks of their practice (or when they return after a break) which makes the eyes sting (for many and not all). This usually settles after acclimatization. Some people will always have salty sweat while most loss settles to a non-stinging level.

There are minuscule levels of toxins in sweat. The fact that one loses toxins in sweat is a myth. But because of the repetition of this tidbit, many millions believe this happens.

That’s great news about the deodorant!

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Joan

While I have a sec, have you tried using the forum search facility. Try typing in ‘wipe sweat’ and ‘wiping sweat’ and see what comes up.

How do you wear your hair?

I have seen your post about Rabbit. I hope to get around to it in the right place of course!

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Uh uhh Guillermo

Not too tough. Just not enough hours in the day! Stay tuned 😆

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi John

My understanding of hernias would be that firstly if you have a hernia then no strengthening of the muscles around it is going to repair it. It indicates an underlying weakness and regardless of activity would need to be repaired.

I would love it if someone would post who has personally had a hernia and has repaired it through exercise. If that’s possible then I want to know about it (from the person is best rather than as a third party anecdote if possible).

I don’t think it helps you at all to try to work out WHICH pose may have done the damage. It presupposes that it was actually the yoga that did it when in fact you would never know.

The hernia has developed due to a weakness in the peritoneum or supporting connective tissue in the area. This happens.

@Kristin: I do understand that the idea of ‘pushing the abdominal muscles’ into the floor is a flawed approach. Largely because it can be misinterpreted. It is ambiguous. As such a better description is required. One can still hold the core muscles engaged while creating some pressure on the floor. You are correct though, if you can focus on back muscle use your results will be better.

However, 80/20 breathing is IMHO a concept that is highly flawed and misleading. Firstly no matter how hard you try you will never, ever empty the lungs. The maximal emptying you can have NEVER creates a vacuum. There will always be liters of air left in there because that is part of the physiological mechanism.

To breathe effectively one needs to discard any sense of formula or calculation. One cannot decide to breathe and stop exhaling at a particular percentage. Physiological capacity changes with different poses due to physical constraints. One would be better to breathe deeply to the extent the pose allows (depending on physical, mental, emotional resources) and couple that with either abdomino-diaphragmatic breath or chest breathing or a combination of the 2. This is a pose-dependent scenario that should, if one is sufficiently mindful, be totally automatic. It helps to tune into the differences in different poses and how the breathing adapts to the constraints, to make those distinctions. In that way you can let go of certain muscles and tensions in particular positions/poses and breathe to your best ability.

If that needs more explanation then ask, and indeed another place to get that info is from my free video that is about breathing.

John, while the hernia is a concern there will be poses you need to be careful with (usually the entry to a couple of them). Have you a sense of which poses you would need to monitor intra-abdominal pressure?

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Okey dokey Kate! That’s great. Indeed I see what you asked. I mentioned hydrating sources because you mentioned nothing about water. We all do different things and eating is indeed an intimate choice 🙂 There are few that could argue about the advantages of incorporating more fruit and vegetables into one’s diet. My concern was similar to yours (and remember we are not in a live conversation’ sometimes they last weeks and they are how shall we say, a little sporadic). My concern was this: what can one do to sustain oneself for a vigorous class when one presumably has had nothing to eat since the evening before and if one is likely not to have a meal until about 18 or so hours since the last main meal. Anyway, question answered! Eat earlier after class or eat first thing before based on your needs for nourishment. The only thing you would want to make sure is that you feel good doing the yoga. Yoga with hunger pangs … yikes. Been there 😆

I wish you a fun return to your yoga and decades of enjoyment of what you love 😉

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Kate

Welcome! Firstly you need to let us know at what time you consider ‘early morning’. I would like to know that before commenting any further on your breakfast options 😉

How many classes have you done so far?

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Amelia

Yep, Sara has outed me! I MUST have a space between the head and knees otherwise I literally roll onto and sometimes past the back of my head. It’s not a big gap at all. You roll down and place the top of the head (as Sara said) then when you lift the hips you don’t ‘walk those knees up’. Just leave that bit out. The knee walking thing for you will actually cause you to roll further and you risk really bad damage! Don’t do it.

Please come back and tell us if you have received this message. We had a family bereavement and I was not able to get to your post at the time (then it slipped through the cracks). Humble apologies.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Beverly

That seems like a plan! Keep me posted. I am pleased you are looking towards different explanations. Often the problem is not how it ‘shows’ up.

Depending on one’s needs it appears that psyllium is good for both constipation and diarrhoea. I would be interested to hear from others to find out how it compares taking psyllium 3 times per day and just taking it once. Does it make a positive difference?

Compliance is always a factor, isn’t it?

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Beverly

Thanks for buying the book! :cheese:

The first thing that occurs to me is that you could possibly need to consider stopping the Metamucil, after all it would be better to try just getting your fiber through your food. It is just artificially flavored and colored psyllium husks. Here’s the list of ingredients. If you’re taking the sugar free one then it has aspartame.
Sucrose, Psyllium Husk, Citric Acid, Natural and Artificial Orange Flavor, FD&C Yellow No. 6.

You could be taking too much fiber now. So cut back on the packaged stuff and maybe phase it out altogether. The body gets used to using psyllium so if you become constipated by removing it completely then phase it out over 3 days.

FYI although it’s less tasty, you can buy psyllium for a fraction of the cost and simply add it to water or food. I just checked Amazon and the branded stuff is 1.5 times the price of the plain husks/powder.

The next thing that occurs to me is that it might not be the greens at all. It could be that you’re eating more fruit than you normally do.

See how that works to maybe for a few days just eat a salad that has the exact same amount of greens that you would put in your smoothies.

And for a few days try your smoothies without any greens at all and have an all-fruit smoothie. (I think an all green smoothie no fruit may be a little harder to take but do it if you think you would like to.)

So, there you go. It could be the fiber. It could be the fruit. It could be the greens.

Tell me how you get on

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂