Yoga for V Pain Classes! AWESOME

I will be teaching a dedicated Yoga for V pain class this fall in Oakland and I am so excited!!! It's been a long time coming, but I finally found a good venue at good time and a decent price. Live locally? Check it out!

Why will this class be so totally awesome?

1. Discretion! I am renting a studio, not operating under their umbrella, so the class title won't be on their schedule anywhere. The studio is on the third floor of the building and the main ground floor entrance leads to another business as well (a women's clothing store) so people won't know why you're walking into 1635 Broadway. Maybe you just want an awesome new dress or are taking some other yoga class, amirite?
2. EVERYONE will have some kind of v pain, so you can ask all your v pain questions in a safe, confidential space.
3. It's a series! We'll have five classes to dive not only into anatomy but also a variety of yogic approaches that you can both practice at home or use to modify other classes you take.
4. It's a series Part 2! That means it will be the same group of women each time. You don't have to be brave enough to meet new people every time, just the once. It'll be like a book club for your vagina...
5. Come as you are! V health is so glaringly overlooked in yoga classes that it doesn't matter if you are a newbie or a seasoned practitioner, you will learn something new and awesome.
6. Come as you are Part 2! It doesn't matter if you have a diagnosis or not. Show up and we can help point you to resources you may be lacking.
7. Beautiful space! We will be at Barefoot Movement, all hardwood floors and high ceilings and original windows. There are mats to borrow (no charge) if you don't have one, and plenty of props to use for what a colleague of mine's 3 year old daughter calls "cozy yoga." You'll see why...
8. Convenient time! 7pm Fridays, but not all in a row so it won't mess up your social calendar...
9. Free street parking after 6pm, across the street from the 19th St BART station, and close to many bus lines.
10. Finally meet some other women dealing with this crap and have a good laugh and a good cry and eat some chocolate already!

You can learn more at my website faithcornwall.com, or head directly to my MeetUp group to sign up. $75 for 5 classes (that's $15/class, on the low side of average for the Bay Area.) Handouts will keep you caught up if you miss one!

Be there or be square!

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PS Did this post get your brain gears crankin'?

Feel free to start a conversation below (it's okay, you can be anonymous)!

Happy First Birthday!

Holy cow! We did it!

I have been writing the YatraYoni blog for one whole year!!! - and then some. My first post was July 24th, 2014.

What a roller coaster.

I've done sooooo much. I went to a blogging conference, and the International Pelvic Pain Society 2014 Annual Fall Meeting. I joined a nascent network of SF Bay Area health professionals who want to provide integrative care for their pelvic pain patients. I started a MeetUp group for pelvic pain yoga classes. I got an awesome accountability buddy. I have done yoga trainings on holistic ayurvedic post-partum care, restorative yoga, yoga and trauma, and in a couple of days I am doing a five day training on yoga and the pelvic floor with Leslie Howard. I won a scholarship to Marie Forleo's B-School. I applied for a sex educator training that will take place next spring. Frustrated with the lack of clear and understandable language to describe what I write about, I even coined new phrases: the straightforward term "v pain" and it's sister "v health." 

Along the way I have met and "met" via phone so many awesome women: Sarah Kennedy (sexuality coach serving women with pelvic pain and low libido,) Professor Devavani Chatterjea (researches the link between immunology and vulvodynia,) Melissa Jones (Mormon sexologist, sex coach, and progressive sex toy store owner,) Tianna Meritage-Reiter (pelvic PT and yoga teacher,) and Sarah Mueller (lube maven and progressive sex toy store employee - look for her interview in the coming weeks!) I have also found other awesome v pain bloggers, like Danielle Lavieri at daniellelavieri.com, Sarah4Hope at whensexhurtsthereishope.com, and Jackie at thatsexualhealing.wordpress.com.

The past year has been a learning tornado. In the process of looking for things to help other women, I have found so many things to help myself: practices like Womb Yoga with Uma Dinsmore-Tuli and The Art of Feminine Presence, products like Commandos, Dear Kate's, & Thinx, and newly on my horizons is hormonal education via Alissa Vitti's WomanCode and floliving.com.

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I remember how I felt about all of this last May and June. The nugget of an idea for a website was there, but I was reluctant to pursue it. In the months between the ten year anniversary of the start of my symptoms and the ten year anniversary of my diagnosis, I wanted so much for other women to not go what I have gone through, and yet was still deeply hesitant and scared about opening up and coming out of the v pain closet, held in by the fear of being perceived by others as "broken" or "less than."

But I ripped off the Band-Aid and did it anyway. And again, and again, and again. It is still not easy telling people about this website, but I do, and am reminded over and over why it is needed: people I just met are telling me "What's the name of that site again? My mom is having problems down there," or "I didn't know you knew about that - my younger sister is dealing with painful sex and is really having a hard time," or "I am dealing with this but live in Virginia - can you help me?" 

So I hand out my contact info and business cards and scribble down notes - books someone should read, the name of a doctor or PT in their area, whatever I think will help guide them along their journey. Usually I never hear back about whether someone found help, but I keep passing on information, knowing that just because there is silence doesn't mean nothing is happening.

* * *

I am so grateful to all of you who read and subscribe to this blog. You have been the kick in the pants that keeps me going, and knowing that I have to get my post done has propelled me along this learning journey at a speed much faster than I thought possible.

You will notice in the coming weeks changes on this site. All of this learning has made me realize that it is time to say goodbye to the name "YatraYoni" - beautiful though she may be, she is confusing to people, making v health seem difficult and strange rather than accessible and approachable. I love her and will hold her dear - I'm sure she will pop up elsewhere in my work in the future.

A new domain name means a new Facebook page, etc. I am cleaning up house, ditching things that haven't been so helpful over the past year, punching away at the things that are working, and putting plans in motion for new projects.

It has been lovely to take this time to reflect on how far I have come. There have been so many times over the past year that I have wanted to give up, throw in the towel, get a new hobby! Celebrating the positive and the progress is giving me fuel for the next year.

Thank you for your presence and your bravery.

Much love,

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PS Did this post get your brain gears crankin'?

Feel free to start a conversation below (it's okay, you can be anonymous)!

Good News in San Francisco!

Last week I had the pleasure of attending the first Integrative Care for Chronic Pelvic Pain Symposium in San Francisco. 

It was an evening event: dinner, presentations on successful examples of integrative care, and brainstorming on how to improve integrative care in the area, followed by networking.

This is a really exciting development! The attendees were mostly physical therapists, but there was also at least one gynecologist, sexologist, another yoga teacher (!!!yay!!!!), a homeopath, naturopath, and a specialty compounding pharmacist.

At the end we filled out forms saying how we would like to continue the group: how often we would like to meet and what topics we would like to learn about. 

I am pumped that this group is starting, and super excited that I get to be a part of it.

For those of you in the Bay Area, I now have more resources to refer you to, yay! 

I'll keep you posted on how this works out. Maybe it could be a model for other cities?

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In other news, I won't be posting this coming Friday or Monday as I will be at a yoga teacher training. It's on post-partum care, and I'm going because it's one of the few teacher trainings I could find about the female pelvis that isn't about pre-natal classes...eye roll.

Ah well, I'm building on what's out there. :)

Have a great weekend!

Support the Revolution! ChronicBabe 101 Book Coming Our Way

Hopefully you are already familiar with www.ChronicBabe.com, a website dedicated to helping young women with chronic illness build fabulous lives. I've re-posted and commented on some ChronicBabe posts in the past.

Founder Jenni Prokopy is putting together a book based on over ten years of running ChronicBabe, and she is using Kickstarter to fund it. Kickstarter is an "all-or-nothing" platform, so hop on over, even a buck will help: 

Donate to ChronicBabe Kickstarter Fund!

Like all Kickstarter projects, each donation level gets a 'reward,' a thank you for your contribution. Unlike other projects that require you to lay out big bucks to get a reward, Jenni's rewards start at yes, just a buck, so no excuse not to chip in!

Deadline is Friday March 27th, but you'll totally donate right now, right?

If you don't already get Jenni's weekly blog/vlog posts, sign up here.

 

VPAQ Reminder - Due March 1st!

Hey everyone! I wrote about this back in January but here is your timely reminder in case you missed it:

The VPAQ questionnaires are due next Monday March 1st! So hop on over and get yours done!

What is the VPAQ? The Vulvar Pain Assessment Questionnaire, conducted by Queen's University in Ontario. They are trying to get more information about vulvar pain, from the perspective of patients.

It's a lot of multiple choice questions, but you also get to respond to open-ended queries such as "What has seeking medical attention been like for you?"

It was sweet, sweet pleasure answering that one...I could finally unload all of the miserable details of the past ten years in a productive way.

So curl up with your computer and help others help you!

PS If you found me over the weekend thanks to my winning B-School video, WELCOME! I am so glad that you are here. As you may have guessed given the B-School application, I've got a lot going on in the background to grow this little website in the coming months. 

Contact me, even if it is just to say hi. It's fun to when a new subscriber becomes more than an email address and I get to hear a bit about you.

PPS As of this morning that little YouTube video had over 920 hits. Maybe by the time you receive this it will have reached 1,000?