Warrior pose: Yoga catching on as therapy for veterans' PTSD

Army Lt. Col. John Thurman lost 26 co-workers in the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the Pentagon. He endured severe smoke inhalation while trapped in the construction for 25 minutes. He spent one week among the hospital recovering.

Among the months after the attacks, Thurman found he had post-traumatic stress disorder. Thurman's PTSD meant he wasn't sleeping months when attack, in spite of the over the counter drug he was taking. Brilliant pulmonary function hadn't returned to full capacity.

But when Thurman started doing yoga, it "made an extraordinary difference in my permission to deal with the stress and my injury from that day."

He fell so deeply in love with his time toward the mat — with yoga's traditional asanas, or poses, and breathing — that in 2013 he attended teacher training. He left his job for the Pentagon and is now teaching yoga full time, including with the Pentagon Athletic Center, where his classes are packed.

This past weekend, Thurman and 17 yoga teachers from five states gathered at Yoga Heights in Washington for yoga for PTSD and trauma training. The studio's workshops were specifically designed to heal and help veterans plagued by both the emotional and physical wounds of war.

Of a given 2.3 million American veterans who returned from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, more often twenty percent suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, which often includes anxiety, depression and hypervigilance, which translates to mean they feel most of the time on the guard.

Professionals say treatment for PTSD with painkillers, antidepressants and psychotherapy almost always have mixed results. The Veterans Health Administration has launched four pilot programs — including one in Richmond, Va. — offering yoga, acupuncture, Qigong, guided imagery and equine therapies, a part of effort for decrease the dependence of a huge number on opiate painkillers.

Although doctors say the highly addictive drugs should help within the shorter Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome term, they additionally might be harmful and commonly require another round of prescription pills to counteract side effects, which can certainly include insomnia, constipation, bone pain, anxiety and depression.

The other choice therapy programs mark a dramatic departure among the treatment offered to troops returning from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Sessions for the D.C. studio had titles for instance "The Nerves down and Using Yoga just like a Therapeutic Methodology," "Understanding Veteran and Military Culture" and "Why Yoga for Trauma?"

Being on yoga mats and bolsters, teachers who attended also learned all about the culture of veterans — they really work great being a team — and exactly what their your needs may very well be from your practice.

"If you're able to buy the vet to snooze in the night and have PTSD, then you are already thus far along in the recovery process," said Rob Schware, executive director of the Contribute Yoga Foundation, a nonprofit group that worked with Mindful Yoga Therapy to host the training.

Jess Pierno's job before she opened Yoga Heights with Amy Rizzotto, also a yoga teacher, was in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, where she started a lunchtime weekly yoga and meditation class for anyone who worked in the shed.

"The yoga instructors who complete this training will do equipped to teach students who've experienced trauma by learning how to mindfully adapt an average yoga class setting and sequence to be more welcoming, comfortable and beneficial," Pierno said. "Yoga is a very important healing tool."

In the past, the ancient Indian practice was more typically connected with blissed-out yogis add an ashram, not former service members hunting for inner peace.

But yoga continues to be increasingly embraced from the Department of Veterans Affairs plus the military wanting to wean veterans off addictive painkillers and provide them alternative treatments for pain.

Suzanne Manafort, who runs Mindful Yoga Therapy, said 49 VA offices are making use of her program.

Yoga practices are created to help calm the nervous system, she confirmed.



In Milwaukee, just for example, VA developed an expanded yoga program for veterans in January. Warrior Stance is naturally a free wellness program for those veterans. One session drew 25 veterans, double the contact information expected, work place told local media.

Inside a recent study published in the Journal of Traumatic Stress, researchers say they found scientific support that yoga can decrease stress and help move people from the negative and traumatic thoughts. The study was also the very first of their kind to supply scientific support when it comes to the benefits to yoga's breathing techniques for PTSD patients.

Thurman said he hopes VA as well as having the Defense Department will boost their programs and offer even more yoga to veterans.

"Everybody can use more yoga," he said.