…and Wellness
When I was 15 I started investing quite a lot of time into what I wanted to be when I grew up. It’s so silly, now, the pressure of knowing what you want to do with your life. As if we’re even a third of the person we’ve just started growing into. As if there’s a single right path. As if all of those paths require higher education. As if your life and career aren’t dynamic, changing as you do.
If we’re honest about acknowledging the factors at hand, I was always interested in some form of medicine for 2 main reasons. 1) The human body absolutely fascinated me, and 2) I got a lot of praise from adults every time I mentioned it as a potential career path (and absolutely none at all for my alternative desire of studying art).
Side note: I’m very glad I didn’t study art (read Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert if you’re not yet convinced it’s almost definitely a bad idea) and I happen to absolutely love the career I built for myself in rehabilitation.
But alas, at 15 I was an overachiever and determined to sort myself out. I’d spent years in and out of physical therapy clinics due to knee injuries and surgeries so it was an easy mark to set my sights on. You can’t pick a career you don’t know about after all, and I didn’t want to work with computers like my parents (jokes on me, huh?).
The summer before my junior year of high school (with a very fresh driver’s license) I started shadowing different physical therapy clinics in my area. The one that changed it all was a "car accident clinic” in Connecticut which featured a Doctor of Medicine, Doctor of Physical Therapy, Doctor of Chiropractic, and Massage Therapist all in the same space. Patients would schedule for a “circuit” and move through all of the providers in one single session. Plus regular access to psychologists and nutritionists as appropriate.
I had never seen anything like it but as soon as I did, a light bulb flickered on and it all made sense. The whole person. Treat the whole person. We’re not treating a neck injury, but rather a person with a neck injury. Emphasis on the whole will enable us to better serve the part.
I built ROOTS with these ideas in mind. Before starting my doctorate, I had a pretty good idea of what kind of physical therapist I wanted to be.
I knew I wanted to be a safe space to teach people about the bodies they live in, to help them navigate healthcare decisions, and to help resolve/prevent pain and dysfunction as able. I knew I believed in a multi-faceted, holistic model of health and wellness. And I knew that, if I was lucky, I wanted to be able to build a community space for that work. I’ve always had a strong idea of what I wanted to do - honestly, I just didn’t expect to be in a position to pursue it so soon.
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ROOTS is on a journey to becoming a health & wellness clinic. But like, what is wellness anyways? So many of these terms become buzz words: holistic, wellness, etc., and quickly lose meaning.
Wellness is defined (according to me) as:
complete care of an individual with regard to their body, mind, and spirit in pursuit of an improved overall health including but not limited to personal habits and lifestyle.
Holistic is defined (according to me) as:
characterized by treatment of parts in relation to the whole with the understanding that each part is inherently interconnected and inseparable from the whole.
I am a specialist in a small (and yet pretty large) system of the body. I can’t be or study everything; but what I can do is seek providers with a deep understanding of their field with an intention and attention to serve their clients in a whole-istic manner.
In the past month, I’ve added 3 new providers to the available services here at ROOTS: massage therapy, nutrition, and Ayurvedic medicine. This space is committed to holistic health & wellness and I will continue to echo and empower any provider who embodies the principles I’ve build my practice on.
