Who I am

I have been in practice since 1989 as a chiropractor and since 1992 as a naturopath, but I remember wanting to be a physician from the time of my first memory.  Family lore is that I made a doll hospital out of a shoe rack and brought home all manner of injured creatures, some of them way past saving.  I spent my youth joining the family business: studying and performing in the dance world in NYC, but always felt the strong urge to address the suffering I saw so many places.

Art is still very much a part of my life: the art school skills I received at the H.S. of Music and Art (the “Fame” school) still help make art for activism these days. I sing in the Seattle Peace Chorus, a group that combines exalted and familiar music with social action, a sublime combination for the likes of me. I have two daughters, one thriving in Seattle, working three jobs, getting ready to go to graduate school in Psychology and one in California raising children in the most beautiful, gentle way imaginable.

Professionally, I have been entirely lucky to work in collaborative and integrative group practices for the majority  of my career.  First at Seattle Healing Arts for fifteen years, where a vital community of multidiscipline practitioners shared the clinical wisdom  of the combined 400 years of practice between all of us.

Now I am thrilled to have been invited to join two group practices In the Salish Islands: one on Orcas Island at the Healing Arts Center in Eastsound and one on Whidbey Island in Langley at the Soundview Center.  Again, enormous collective-power and clinical wisdom from a broad spectrum of training and disciplines describes both groups. The patient benefits and the practitioner gains skills and perspective with the  strength of the community.

I came to the art and science of natural medicine out of deep belief and confidence in what healing is possible when the patient and the doctor collaborate with the principles of human physiology.

In Washington state naturopaths are licensed for a wide scope of practice that includes the ability to order diagnostic testing using the best of both worlds: laboratory testing and imaging, virtually the same diagnostic testing as for M.D.’s, the best of technological medicine. Once arrived at a diagnosis, we can then integrate ancient and cutting edge evidence-based naturopathic treatment protocols by way of enhancement and utilization of physiological processes, the body’s ability to heal or slow aging… all out of whole systems thinking that ND’s are trained to use. One of my favorite naturopathic principles is the use of Least Force to counter the presenting symptom, then using methods of increasing force until restoration of vitality and the vibrant health that is possible is re-established.

My practice has evolved over thirty three years to be a combination of primary care medicine, with specialty in brain disorders, hormonal imbalances and mood disorders (as the endocrine and thinking/feeling systems are literally inextricable) and also physical medicine, using osteopathic and chiropractic techniques for musculoskeletal pain. Food medicine was my first love, and helped me regain my health as a young person. I always start there. Then I use bio identical hormones, herbals and orthomolecular (amino acids, high dose single nutrients), physical medicine, advanced restorative and anti-aging medicine and Neuroptimal  neurofeedback (link here to brainwork)

The brain/mind drives the hormones, they in turn affect the neurological and reproductive tracts and the immune and digestive systems. The nervous system orchestrating all of it emerges from the spine and is affected by one’s thoughts and experiences. The grand choreography of all this is often forgotten in the treatment of illness. I love to try and grasp the whole picture of a person, to find the  best point of inflection/intervention that is realistic for the individual.

Compartmentalized medical thinking misses the forest for the trees. The forest is inflammation. Thanks to modern research, we know how to shift the body processes away from the oxidative and inflammatory pathways  using the food you eat, the way you breathe, the chemistry that is created by what you eat, drink, think and do.

With the base of health in one’s chemistry, food medicine is where we start.  One’s diet has a vast influence on the level of inflammation in the body, and disorders of every system in the body have a basis in inflammation from depression to heart disease.  By shaping your food into an anti-inflammatory diet (easier than it sounds) we lessen inflammation that is the breeding ground for dysfunction and disease. 

My chiropractic practice has evolved to specialize in neck and head pain. Headaches, head injury, concussions  and chronic neck pain have been an area of interest that emerged from a dearth of available help for these common and debilitating conditions.  I use trigger point therapy, fascial release work, a variety of manipulation and adjusting techniques (from non-force to high velocity), postural training and ergonomics in the resolution of these.

Genomic medicine has been a recent advancement in our ability to shift conditions we used to think were ‘genetic’ and unchangeable. The Human Genome Project changed all that and has opened the door to the use of nontoxic therapies that address some of the deepest dysfunctions: chronic anxiety, food sensitivities, insomnia, metabolic imbalances. I use these a lot and sometimes request patients to get a 23andMe for the genome’s information.

Brainwork has been the jewel in my practice’s crown.  Neuroptimal is a Non-entrainment type of brain biofeedback that relies on another  naturopathic principle, the Viz Medicatrix Naturae (the healing power of Nature) and Non-dual psychology. In this view, there is always a whole and healthy person underneath the dysfunction.

This neurofeedback system is able to ‘speak’ to this part of us and remind it of its original healthier patterning, and then reset the habits of a brain that has accumulated layers of coping skills, some of which are outdated, cumbersome and sometimes quite damaging. These can lessen our ability to be fully alive, expressive and able to live as our best selves. It has been compared to clearing the windshield so you can see where you are actually going.

This way of working with the brain is non-invasive, causing no side effects. The patient’s best and deepest navigator determines the speed and direction of change. People just forget to be dysfunctional. It takes enormous (unconscious) energy to have insomnia, phobias, chronic anxiety or an inability to focus. This system introduces to your brain your own easier smoother way to move through the demands and opportunities of your life, in whatever phase. Habits like procrastination, emotional reactivity, road rage, substance dependence, hypervigilance all respond to this gentle and profound way of working with the brain. Autism and Asperger’s sensory integration issues are often lessened. Personally I stopped having catastrophic thinking, which has eased my days immeasurably.