As part of Lilian’s visit to see me in the UK in July 2022, we started exploring her therapy techniques by applying them to me over a couple of sessions, during the time she was here in person. All sessions were performed while symptomatic in a very “off” state between doses of medicine, so that Lilian could see and monitor any effects on my symptoms without being masked by drugs in my system.

After learning about my symptoms, which is mainly a lack of access to free movement, pain/dystonia in my right neck and shoulder, stiff limbs, and a pain in my stomach, Lilian asked me to close my eyes, take a breath deep and started to talk in her comforting, calming “therapy” voice.

Lilian used a technique where you investigate your symptoms very carefully and in depth as if you saw yourself from the inside, and to give the symptom 100% bandwidth in your attention. Lilian gets you to describe the symptom, and most people do it using a visual metaphor. A rope, a ring, a ball. It is just to have a common language so she can follow your story, but the visualization seems very vivid and real. From the words you use to tell the story of your symptom, she can hear if you are using healthy or unhealthy descriptions. She balances and guides the narrative, and lets you find the story behind the installation of the bodymemory.

Through these explorations. we discovered that many of my bodymemories are all hidden in the same area of my body, and that is why I have movement issues.

The first session ended up in me addressing the very tiring process of recovery. Seven years of improving and reducing medication seems like a long and endless job. So the therapy allowed me to just let go of the self-imposed pressure always to push forward to healing. I actually felt a lot better for days during her stay from having someone to work with and not pursuing the healing on my own anymore.

Lilian often uses your most salient symptoms to reach the underlying trauma, and we tried to go in that direction while she was visiting me in person in the UK. In these first sessions, we addressed my most debilitating symptom, the dystonia (major pain and stiffness) in my right neck and shoulder.

As my pain during dystonia is so high, reaching into this symptom using Lilian’s visualization techniques, ended up in a metaphor that was unresolvable, as too many things were interconnected. If we explored one problem area, pain and discomfort in another area of my would surface or become more salient. So, it was too intense to work with this pain and it seems as if it was connected to more pain and tension in my whole body. Most people do not have this problem, according to Lilian, and it is unusual for things to be so interconnected.

In the visualization, we ended up with finding a guardian, a representation, or aspect, of part of myself, that protected this whole process. He had for so many years fought to protect the shoulder/neck area from causing more pain, and from inflammation, including forcing the rest of the body to hold still.

We worked with the idea of getting this guardian or protector to trust the process and give him time to rest, to sleep and even go on vacation. This part of the visualization represented the analogy that I have consciously and subconsciously worked so hard to protect myself from more pain, and to prevent it further traumatizing me, that I had inadvertently made the situation worse.

By not facing the pain and root causes head on, I had exhausted myself, and had become trapped in a holding pattern. By visualizing talking directly to this guardian/protector part, telling him about what we now knew about the situation, comforting him, and staying with him while he slept for a very long time, he eventually trusted us long enough to decide to go on vacation. He is still on vacation, and hasn’t felt the need to return in subsequent sessions.

The symbolism of this session was that it was time to stop protecting the pain, but to face it and get to the bottom of its root causes, and to trust in Lilian’s process. This thought gave me peace of mind, and much needed relief, enough to sit with the pain. The process of healing is started and will proceed in its own pace.

This dreamlike visualization work is so vivid and somehow maybe a universal way to communicate with our unconscious and subconscious minds.

She also supported this with Rosen technique of hands-on bodywork therapy, where the relaxation of my muscles was supported by mild pressures on the tense muscles. It is a shame it is not possible in zoom calls, as I found it really deeply relaxing and calming for body and mind.

Next time, we instead looked at small traumas, for me to build trust in the process.

Whatever strange detail or picture I mentioned, Lilian was always there to support the process and facilitate a more healthy variation of the picture to help the process toward a positive completion.

The third time in person we hit a well defined and understandable bodymemory.

We have had many follow up sessions via zoom since the visit, and I will continue to report on these to give a clearer picture of how Lilian’s style of therapy works to reduce symptoms.