NYC Bodyworks / Rolf Structural Integration — Local services in New York

I saw Susan for 10 sessions of her Structural Integration series. Before I go into details from the sessions, I'll give my health background to make sense of my experience. I'm a software engineer, which means that I'm sitting at a computer for a minimum of eight hours a day. I've been coding for over two decades, and over the course of this I've built up a lot of bad postural habits and eventually chronic back pain. However, I also make my health a priority, so I've been seeing a Physical Therapist for the last two years. He's helped correct a lot of my pains, but two issues have eluded us. One is a recurring numbness in my jaw that sometimes becomes a pain that travels from my jaw all the way down my shoulder and arm into my fingertips. The other is a calf pain I get whenever I push myself too hard on a run. That pain always lasts for weeks when I trigger it. Running is the core of my exercise routine, so when I get that pain it wreaks havoc on my health. Even walking is excruciating. As a result I've been running very slowly for the past five years or so, and it's sapped much of the joy out of running. Susan figured out my calf pain was due to imbalances in how I walked and ran. Two weeks ago, I ran the fastest 4 miles that I've paced in over seven years and it felt incredible. She also helped me figure out that I was pinching a nerve in my neck as a result of how I was holding my head, and with that information my neck numbness and arm pain have completely gone away. The Structural Integration series would have been well worth the time, money, and energy to just fix those two issues, but I walked away from those sessions with so much more. In terms of the proverb, "Give someone a fish and you feed them for a day, but teach someone to fish and you feed them for a lifetime", Susan is the living embodiment of teaching someone to fish. After our sessions, I'm empowered to find balance in my body on my own. She's helped me understand my connection to the ground through my feet and up my entire body in a way I've never imagined was possible. Beside reducing my pains, it's benefited my life in some unexpected ways. For example, I used to have to slow down to take a sharp 90 degree corner while running, but now I've found myself cornering with confidence at my normal pace, just because I know how to trust my connection to the ground much more deeply. I have a new flexibility in my hips and core, and can engage them for a wider range of motion than before. When learning to swing a baseball bat or golf club, I've always heard the advice to swing with my hips. It made sense that using my core to swing that way would give more power, but it never occured to me that I could be getting more out of my hips in my everyday l ife too. After our sessions, just walking around, I can feel my core lightly engaging to subtly rotate my hips and put more purpose behind the way my legs move. Finally, with her guidance, I've gotten better at listening to my body and knowing when to take a break from pushing myself. What I've realized is that some of my pain was the result of pushing too hard into "good posture" and a balance between being able to relax my muscles and align my body is really the key. I couldn't recommend Susan more strongly. Anyone who's committed to learning more about their body and improving their relationships with their own health and mobility will get a tremendous amount out of sessions with her. I would encourage you to come with an open mind though. Sessions with Susan will only reap maximum benefits if you're also willing to discover a different relationship with how you move. While other doctors have given me homework based on what they considered was best, Susan and I worked together to find the right solutions for me, and they've worked...

I worked with Susan for several months and cannot recommend her enough. She is a compassionate, thoughtful and engaged practitioner who clearly cares about the wellbeing of her clients. I had previously tried many different modalities of treatment with little take away in how to actually manage my pain effectively. But I found my Rolfing work with Susan to be beneficial to not only my body, but also mind and spirit. I was treated as a whole person rather than a medical subject or list of symptoms (an experience I have encountered too often in clinical settings). I felt cared for, listened to, and that my treatment was tailored specifically to my lifestyle, needs, and goals. Susan worked with me to reframe my perspective on my pain and come up with different strategies to manage and reduce my day-to-day pain. I 100% would work with Susan again and definitely recommend her to anyone who struggles with chronic musculoskeletal pain who has not found the...

As a professional dancer, past injuries in addition to the wear and tear over many years have left a few imbalances in my body, and while studies in various somatic practices have been enormously helpful occasional bodywork is necessary to keep myself balanced. I had my first Structural Integration session with Susan and am amazed at the immediately noticeable difference in my body. Not only did I have less muscular tension afterwards, it has also been easier for me to access a clearer sense of my alignment during various activities and even while just sitting.

Susan has a very keen eye and sense of an individual’s body. She addressed all my areas of concern, but also noticed another area in my chest that might be helpful to work on that I hadn’t mentioned. The sense of openness and ease after the session made me much more aware of how much excess tension I was holding in that area and has made it easier not to fall back into those...