Call in the Surgery Coach
by Cait Johnson

Ah, surgery: it surely rates right up there on the list of Scary Things We Would Really Rather Avoid. Many of us perceive hospitals as cold and uncaring places, and the mysteries that go on inside them as rites mysterious and arcane as any cult’s. When you’re lying on a gurney waiting to be wheeled into the O.R. you can feel pretty darned alone. We’re scared of the unfamiliar, scared of terminology we don’t understand, scared of pain, and scared that the surgery won’t go well. All that fear translates into stress—and we all know how bad that is for us—so what we end up with is the perfect recipe for a difficult and debilitating surgery, with a side of painkillers. “But it doesn’t have to be that way,” says Nurit Nardi, RCST, MA, LMT. Nurit Nardi is a surgery coach, which may summon images of folks with stopwatches in hand and whistles around their necks, but surgery coaching is actually the latest in complementary care services. As Nurit explains, “There are things you can do before your operation that will help you to relax, to be more in control, and to have the best possible experience. And I should know.” Nurit, who had breast cancer, is living proof that her pre-surgery healing and relaxing techniques really work.

“I was studying with Dr. Catherine Shainberg, the great imagery teacher, when I was diagnosed,” she shares. “She gave me a simple imagery exercise to do before my needle biopsy and I did it every day. My doctor had warned me that the procedure would be very painful—they had to insert needles into my breast until they found the tumor—but the surgeon found the tumor on the first try.” Nurit was also receiving regular massages from a neighborhood acupuncturist. “Both things together—the imagery and the massage—were incredibly helpful. My surgery went smoothly, I recovered in record time, and needed much less pain medication than expected.” Nurit herself is an integrative mind-body therapist, a licensed massage therapist and a registered biodynamic craniosacral therapist, a graduate of the School of Images in NYC, and has an MA in Transpersonal Psychology. She realized that the combination was a winning one. “I know how to guide people to find healing images inside themselves and I know the healing power of therapeutic touch,” she says. “I thought, why don’t I put all of this together? I could help patients have better healing experiences.” Nurit started volunteering with people before their operations and the results were impressive. Soon her surgery coaching practice in New York City was thriving.

Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised: anything that helps us to reduce stress and feel stronger and more positive has to be a good thing. And the latest research at Harvard and UC Davis shows that pre-surgery coaching results in improved outcomes, shorter hospital stays, and fewer meds. “It’s been proved that surgery coaching is beneficial,” says Nurit. “But most people don’t know it’s even available. Once they experience it, though, they want to tell their friends and loved ones.”

But what does “finding healing images inside yourself” mean, exactly? When I asked Nurit to give me an example, we focused on the joint pain that has been my unwanted visitor off and on ever since I had Lyme disease. She encouraged me to imagine an octopus with tentacles reaching out far beyond my aching hips and knees, tentacles that can move and undulate effortlessly in every direction. The image was oddly liberating. “Imagery connects to the body,” says Nurit. “It helps us to organize our consciousness differently, so we have a different experience.” All I know is, whenever I focus on the freely moving tentacles, I feel more relaxed, less tense and stiff.

Nurit has recently established a practice in the Hudson Valley, where hospitals and surgeons are really waking up to the benefits of complementary therapies. “It’s all about empowerment, and even transformation,” she says. Take Rachel, for example, who was scheduled for an eight-hour operation to remove a brain tumor. Anybody would have been frightened, and Rachel was no exception. She says, “I was really scared. But Nurit immediately gave me imagery exercises to practice and helped me prepare for this complex and scary intervention. She was extremely supportive, loving, and knowledgeable and guided me with wisdom and confidence. She gave me lots of helpful tools. As a result, I went into surgery feeling relaxed and strong. The surgery, though long and complex, went very well. My doctors were amazed at my speedy recovery.”

Nurit keeps her package prices affordable and, health care costs being what they are, anything that will help us to save money with a shorter hospital stay and fewer prescriptions is a good thing. But there’s more to surgery coaching than that. While surgery is not a transformational path that most of us would voluntarily choose, if we are faced with surgery, why not treat it as a learning experience? As Rachel tells us, “Working with Nurit gave me lots of insights. I think that this kind of preparation is essential, and Nurit’s understanding of how the mind and body interconnect made my experience a life-changing event.”

“Healing is about easing stress, about integration and empowerment from within,” says Nurit. “We all have the answers for our own healing within us. I just help people to find them.” If I ever have to have surgery, I’d want her on my team.

Nurit Nardi will be giving a workshop about the benefits of surgery coaching at the Living Seed Yoga Studio in New Paltz on Saturday, March 6 from 1 to 2:30 pm. To contact her, go to www.nuritnardi.com or call her at 845-255-1948.