I have heard a few horror stories over the last couple of years about some clients' experiences with other therapists. I am not in the business of slagging off therapists but honestly some of the stuff you hear would make your hair stand on end and it really pisses me off.
Complementary therapies are to date ungoverned (although this is soon going to change) and we largely have to rely on the ethics of the therapist and the monitoring of the associations of which they are members.
So when a therapist acts in an unprofessional manner, it can have an effect on all of our reputations. It's hard enough to get some people to take the benefits of our therapies seriously without people claiming to have the ability to "cure" or to inform clients that if they don't return for regular treatments they will become very ill.

Now I know that there are plenty of therapists out there who will feel outraged by this and I know that in a lot of cases several sessions or indeed regular sessions may be required for certain conditions and I must stress that I am not talking about these situations.

What I am talking about is using scare tactics to turn vulnerable people into a meal ticket.
As a therapist I know it can be scary to let go of a regular client when they no longer need your services or to refer that client to someone else who will be better able to help them but that's what must be done.
At the end of the day we are in the business of health and the clients' needs must come first.
So I have put together some tips to help you to avoid the wrong therapist:

1.Check their area of expertise:

Most therapists will specialise in treating certain conditions or offering a particular type of service. For example, I am a kinesiologist who specialises in emotional and nutritional problems. I have a friend who is also a kinesiologist and she only works with pain and structural problems.

2. Check their qualifications:

Although this is rarely an issue, be sure that they have the appropriate qualifications to carry out a the therapy.

3. Check that they are fully insured to carry out that therapy:

Most therapists won't mind showing you a copy of their insurance.

4. The cheapest is not always the best:

Nor is the most expensive!!!! The best thing to help you decide who is the right therapist for you, is their reputation, ask around and find out what other people's experiences were.

They say a satisfied customer will only tell one person about great service but a disappointed customer will tell ten people about bad service. ( this is so true, none of my family shop in Sasha anymore because a manager was rude to my sister around 10 years ago!!!!!)

So, if you are getting negative feedback then run like the wind to a good therapist, like me

The Terminator

I am back !

I know what you're thinking,

was she gone? I hadn't noticed.

Tut tut!
I was involved in other projects and doing other courses with thanks to Westmeath County Enterprise Board (what would I do without them, eh... I might have a day off).
As my mother would say "Sarah, darling you are the most qualified person to do nothing"
This is not strictly true as I am qualified to give a manual handling course thanks to a short stint in Harry Corry (seriously, don't ask) oh and the whole kinesiology thing obviously and the heimlich manouver etc.
Anyhow, I am just in from the pub and if I learned one thing from Michele Neylon its not to blog whilst under the influence.
So I will bid you adieu, bon nuit, oiche mhaith

(Hey mam, I'm multilingual )

By the way Ms Sheridan (my number one fan), this one's for you.

hasta la vista, baby

Bless me father for I haven't blogged

I did question my commitment to blogging and it has been 7 days since my last blog, but there is good reason for this.
Wait for it.
I have been busy (hurray)
And what have I been busy with?
Allergies, and not just my own (peanuts,hazelnuts, wheat, sesame seed, my list is endless)
Its that time of year when we have booked our holidays and we head back to the gym to try to achieve the bikini body and we want all the help we can.
We tell ourselves that its not the chocolate on the biscuit that's causing our weight gain but the wheat in the biscuit.
Well the good news is, we could be right.
According to Nutritional expert Patrick Holford, a person who has a wheat allergy could lose 8 to 10lbs in a week on eliminating it from their diet. One reason for this is because we tend to retain water when we eat a food that doesn't agree with us
So the reverse is then true, if we develop a food allergy then it can cause us to gain weight. I have seen this first hand, after giving up cigarettes (using only flower essences) I started to gain a little weight. I wanted to control my weight gain so I started a diet. The diet I chose was Patrick Holford's low GL diet and I loved it because it meant I could eat lots of my favourite foods like fresh fruits, nuts, berries, beans etc.

After 6 weeks I had gained 10lbs, my skin broke out, I was constantly bloated and all the fruit sugars had kick started my candida.

I should point out that the Low GL diet is a very good and healthy way of eating BUT It didn't work for me.
WHY?... because it turns out I have allergies to most of the Rose family (which includes blackberries, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries), nuts (peanuts, hazelnuts) and some legumes, all of which I was eating every day.
This is a fact, if I eat peanuts I will gain a temporary 5lbs within 48 hours.
If I were to eat peanuts every day i'm sure this 5lbs would be maintained.

I hear the same story in my clinic every day.

"I eat healthily and excercise regularily and yet I am gaining weight, could it be a Food Allergy?"

The simple answer is yes

So if you are doing all the right things and are still gaining weight consider having an allergy test.
In fact, why not get me to do it. I come highly recommended.
Check out my Testimonials

Is this the winning formula?

This is day 7 of my Australian Bush Flower combination and there have been some interesting developments.
It appears the Grey Spider flower (see day 3 and a whole lotta wee ) has unearthed an unacknowledged fear..... Poverty
Seriously, I have a huge fear of not having enough money to get by, it sends me into a state of panic just thinking about it, I get a tightness in my chest and shortness of breath. This fear stems from my childhood when my dad was made redundant during the eighties. I remember feeling my mother's fear as the bills arrived and began to mount up . She would have to lean out the window to catch her breath as the stress would cause her chest to tighten.
So, what has that got to do with these remedies?
Let me explain:
This has been a very quiet week for me business wise. Unusually quiet, I have just run a new ad and normally the phone would be hopping but its oh so quiet.
Realistically this won't affect business for a couple of weeks (I am not one of those therapists who claim to have a huge waiting list,I wish, I am available for appointments 35 hours a week and have never filled all my appointments in the almost two years that I am doing it, Where do those therapists get their clients from? answers on a post card... ) so I should remain calm, right?
WRONG, I start to panic, I check the diary and see that I have no appointments booked in after the first week in june. My chest starts to tighten as I frantically search for suitable employment on the FAS website all the while willing the phone to ring.
Thankfully it does (hello Mam...)
So back to the remedies, I didn't understand this combination at first and wasn't sure how they would work together but all of this became clear in the last few days.
This combination is to change my attitudes, fears and feelings around money.

Sunshine Wattle: for the expectation of a grim future, hard times and life is a struggle
The positive outcome is being open to a bright future

Boab: for enmeshment in negative family patterns or beliefs
The positive outcome is personal freedom by releasing family held beliefs or negative patterns

Grey Spider Flower: to restore faith and calm

Bluebell: is for people who are closed to receiving, who have a subconcious fear that there is just not enough.
The positive outcome is belief in abundance and universal trust

Slender Rice Flower: is for comparison to others (I have been admiring all the lovely 4x4s that are being driven around Mullingar and thinking I could have one too if I was in steady full time employment)

The other 2 essences don't seem to be relevant to this particular issue.

Does this mean that my financial sabotages have been cleared?
Well, if tomorrow's lotto winner is from the midlands, then it could well be.

Is there anybody out there?

Its day five of my current combination of remedies and sadly there are no signicant changes or effects to report.
Its great to see that I am getting comments on my posts, even if some of them are off the point and from family members but isn't that what blogging is about.
What's the point in doing it if no one is reading it or commenting?
I know I said that this blog was about my experiences with flower essences but there has to be more.
There was nothing really to report yesterday and there isn't much to report today.
So its also about my blogging journey. Right now I know very little about it, in fact I know very little about the world wide web.
I have a little knowledge of Html and I manage to look after my own website (mostly its trial and error).
Can I commit to updating regularly or will I get bored after a while?
How can I get more people to visit and comment?
And will I come out of it all with my reputation intact?
There is a certain amount of personal exposure involved in blogging and as the type of girl who wears her heart on her sleeve, I fear I may be putting myself in a very vulnerable position.
But I am also a girl who likes to dive headfirst into the unknown see Hello World

My current plan for getting more people to visit is by good old fashioned bribery and then hopefully word of mouth.
If all else fails I'll spread a rumour about my blog, have you ever noticed how quickly and how far bad news or gossip seems to spread?

Day 3 and a whole lotta wee

This is day three of my essence combination and the Grey Spider flower is kicking in. This is an essence for terror, panic and deep rooted fears. Grey Spider Flower works on the base chakra. This chakra governs the kidneys and the adrenals which might explain the symptoms I have been having today.
I have had to make frequent trips to the loo, fear is related to the kidneys. I have also had a dry mouth and the feeling of a lump in my throat. As I used to suffer from anxiety, I recognise this as Globulus Hystericus. I did feel panicky today so I'd say my adrenals are affected in some way. Last night I was dreaming about flying to Australia (I have always wanted to go but am not a good flyer, I'm not afraid of flying, i'm afraid of crashing and dying, I guess its working on these fears) the plane lost control but landed safely.
Is all of this connected, what's your opinion?

Help, Is adding a stat counter in bad taste?

As you can all see at the top right hand side of this page I have added a quite noticeable stat counter. There are varying opinions on stat counters and I have been told by one person in particular that

"stat counters are not good internet taste"

However, as a child of the eighties and having spent most of my teens with a shaggy perm, good taste is not important to me (if you don't believe me check out my profile under music).
I would also like to point out that I could have cheated by starting the counter at a higher number to make myself look more popular and interesting (I am, honestly).
My reasons for this are simple, I want to challenge 2 things GOAL SETTING and POSITIVE THINKING. My goal is to have that number at 5,000 by Christmas.
This seems an enormous task considering how low it is now so I could do with some help.
If I haven't bored you to tears and you find what I have to say even slightly interesting, then please tell someone else about my blog.
Thanks