E6: Colonics and Colon Hydro Therapy with Stephanie Kato

Stephanie Kato from Iyasu Colonics will be discussing the nitty-gritty of what Colon Hydrotherapy is and why it is so important in the healing process on this episode of the Heal podcast. I have been going to Stephanie for several years and she has helped me through some difficult times. For those of you who have not tried colonics or Colon Hydro Therapy, this is a discussion you do not want to miss. 

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Transcript

Mimi (00:01):

Hi, welcome to the Lyme Time with the Tick Chicks. Today, we have Stephanie Kato from Iyasu colonics in Los Angeles. She's a hydrotherapist and intuitive healer. Thank you so much, Stephanie, for coming on today. We are so lucky to have you. Yes, I know I've been going to Stephanie for several years now and she's helped me get through some difficult times. She has definitely seen me at my worst. But for those of you have not tried colonics or also called colon hydrotherapy, this is a discussion you do not want to miss. Stephanie will be discussing the nitty gritty of what colon hydrotherapy is and why it is so important to the healing process.

Stephanie (00:43):

Thank you so much for having me on. I really appreciate it.

Mimi (00:46):

Of course, we're excited to have you. And I just wanted to say to our audience that what makes Stephanie so different from other hydrotherapist is that she offers metaphysical colonics. So while she's performing the bioelectric lymphatic drainage and cranial sacral therapy at the same time altogether, and it's truly a unique experience because not only is she working on releasing toxins from your body through colonics, she's working on the emotional, spiritual, and mental healing of your body during the session. So we're excited to have you, Stephanie, thank you so much for sharing your practice with us. So we want to dive right in. Can you tell us, first of all, what colon hydrotherapy is and why it's important for the healing process?

Stephanie (01:35):

Yes, absolutely. So colon hydrotherapy is a gentle cleansing of the large intestine using purified water. Um, and what I'm going to do is I'm going to just quickly go through kind of the digestive system to explain, you know, why colon therapy is important. So when we eat a food, it starts to go through our what's called the alimentary canal and it's, uh, basically the body's job is to digest, absorb, assimilate the nutrients from that food. Once it gets to the colon, the colon job is to reabsorb water and any nutrients that the rest of the body wasn't able to pick up and minerals, and then it sends it through the colon to be eliminated, whatever else the body can't use. So a lot of people don't know this, but the colon itself is about five feet long, and this is why it's so important to eat well and to drink water because if the colon starts to reabsorb water, and there isn't a lot of water that maybe we've taken on and we're a little bit dehydrated that waste material has to travel five feet to get out. And a lot of times it can get stuck. It can be really dry. And this is where people start to have some digestive issues, constipation, et cetera. Why colon therapy is so important is when we use very gentle pressure to fill the colon with water, it helps to hydrate the colon and the water itself can soften and loosen up any hard material that might be stuck in the colon. And the water helps to loosen it up and then the body can release it. So with colon hydrotherapy, what we're doing is we're introducing clean water into the colon, fill it, hydrate it, and then your body can release any of the waste material that's stuck in there. And this is kind of an interesting thing to note is that a lot of people think, okay, well I'm having good regular bowel movements every day. I probably don't need a colonic, but I've had people that come in that are having three, like full, complete bowel movements every day. And when they're taking their colonic, they're actually releasing as if they're constipated. So that shows us that we don't get everything out. And that's why it's so important. The other reason is about 70% of our immune system is in our gut because it's full of immune cells. So for me, the cleaner your colon, the stronger your immune system, and when you're trying to heal any kind of physical dysfunction or disease or illness, the stronger your immune system, the stronger it can be to be able to help your body fight that.

Mimi (04:25):

Interesting. It's the amazes me, but so now when I go, you, you have added the lymph drainage part, which is not normal for other colonics that I have had, which is absolutely wonderful. But can you tell us why you've added that component to your colonics?

Stephanie (04:42):

Oh, absolutely. So the lymphatic system really works with the colon. Okay. Um, the lymphatic system is not a system that is known very well, but it is super important because its main job is really bodily fluid balance. Um, it is a subsystem of the cardiovascular system. So the blood, as it's flowing through the body fluid seeps out of that blood from the capillaries and that stays in the tissue. All right. And it's really important that the body has balance. So the lymphatic system comes in and it basically collects, uh, that fluid, excess fluid and returns it back to the bloodstream. The blood actually has the heart to pump the blood through the body, but the lymphatic system actually doesn't have the pump. So it does require us to move it, which I think is really fascinating. Um, it does move it, you know, on its own because there's different contractions and whatnot that the body uses, but whatever we can do to help move our lymps is super important. And I do believe, you know, if you think about, of modern conveniences and technology and whatnot, um, we're a lot more sedentary than we used to be back in the days when we had to actually, you know, like go catch our food and work our soil and, and all that. So, um, it's very important for us to do things like lymphatic drainage massage, which basically is a very gentle, rhythmic, light pressure massage because the lymphatic system lives right underneath the skin. And what I do is I help to move the lymph to get that lymph flowing. Um, there are certain reasons why our lymph may not be working as efficiently as possible. It could have to do with us not drinking enough water. So we're a bit dehydrated. We could be eating foods that are inflammatory to the system and that can congest us. So we do need to move our limbs two ways superficially with dry skin brushing and muscularly with exercise and deep breathing actually helps to move the lymph probably one of the best ways. So I've added that because when it comes to really making sure that our bodies are as healthy as possible, we have to address the lymphatic system. Everybody has some level of lymphatic congestion just because of the way that we live, you know, just as being human, we have certain stresses and, you know, we don't always drink enough water. We don't always eat perfectly. Right. So that's why it's important. And stimulating the lymphatic system, I noticed really helps people to be able to release more in their colonic because when you stimulate the lymphatic system, it stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, and that's what helps our body to relax. So the more that we can relax as we're receiving a colonic, I noticed that you know, that people are able to release more waste out of their, out of their body.

Mimi (07:53):

That's so fascinating. It really is. And then you have a third element that you bring in, which is the cranial sacral therapy. And so how is that important in your practice?

Stephanie (08:06):

Right? So the cranial cyclical system, it's basically memories and fluid that surrounds the, um, brain and the spinal cord. Okay. And it helps to protect it, and that's what makes up our central nervous system. So again, just through, you know, natural living and stresses that we have, the body is very wise. And so it tries to compensate for some of these stresses that we have, because when we're stressed in our lives, what happens is it creates restrictions in the body. All right. And that affects our central nervous system. And so the, uh, cranial sacral therapy actually helps to balance the cerebral spinal fluid that goes around the spine and the brain. And it's really important. The cerebral spinal fluid is the lifeblood to the nervous system and the brain. And what we do is we just, we into it when we're doing a cranial sacral session, we start at the sacrum and we come up the spine and we end up in the head and we're actually working with the cranial rhythm. It's, um, an energy that actually happens within the body. And so we feel if there's restrictions there and we help to just gently open that up and get that moving so that we start to have some of that expanded cranial breath, similarly, like taking a deep breath, what it does for your lungs. And, um, it just helps to get that fluid moving, which is really important to avoid any stagnation. Um, I actually start my colonics with the cranial sacral therapy a little bit at the very beginning, just because I feel like it's so important. It's a really great and quick way that I can use to relax the body. And like I said earlier, the more that I can relax the body then the easier the body will have to be able to release, um, the waste material in the colonic.

Mimi (10:04):

Yeah. I really enjoy having those added to it when I have done a colonic with you. But can you also talk about how you use your intuitive healing with your colonics?

Stephanie (10:15):

Absolutely. So when I start my colon hydrotherapy sessions, I start with about 15 minutes of energy work. And I begin after I opened the session by checking to see five points in the abdomen to make sure we have energetic flow. So I work a lot in the energetic body because it's important for us to address any energetic blockages, because that affects the physical body. So I see if there's any energetic blockages in any of those five points. I address that by opening that up and getting that moving energetically. I do open balance and align the chakras or the energy centers of the body before we start because that has direct correlation to the physical body. And then I do a little bit of the cranial sacral therapy. Um, Ali, when you were talking earlier about me offering metaphysical colonics. So that is a style of healing that I created, and it's a way for people to be able to address physical dysfunction and issues by looking at the emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of themselves. Okay. Because we're not just one thing. So when we're, when we're dealing with physical issues, we don't want to just keep it on the physical. We want to look at the other areas of ourselves that might be contributing to that particular dysfunction or illness. So for example, the colon, and, and these are just kind of a brief, you know overall idea of what I'm talking about. But if we're looking at any colon issues that somebody might have, like constipation emotionally, the issue there would be fear mentally, the belief would be a need to control and spiritually the lesson is to be able to trust, to really trust and surrender that life loves us and provides for our needs. If we look at lymphatically, emotionally that can have to do with feelings around unworthiness, mentally, it could be a belief around a need to prove that we're worthy either by, you know, maybe over caretaking for other people, um, and not balancing out that with making sure that we have our needs met within ourselves and then spiritually it's balancing out and knowing that we are worthy simply because we exist. And then if we look at craniosacral, the emotion there could be feeling unlovable. Mentally could be the belief around needing to support or be supported a lot of times by other people. And spiritually, the lesson is really about self love, and it's about providing unconditional love and supportive self and trusting that life supports and loves me.

Mimi (13:01):

Oh, it's really, you know, we're big believers in all of that and the philosophy of really combining as many elements as possible to overall health and wellbeing and mental wellbeing. So I have a couple of questions here for you. How long does each session last, and then how often do you recommend people do a session with you? And then also, can you tell us what you've noticed specifically with Lyme patients, if anything?

Stephanie (13:31):

Okay. Um, so the sessions themselves are an hour. Like I said, for the first 15 minutes, I'm doing some energy work and cranial sacral therapy. The colon hydrotherapy session itself is 45 minutes. Um, lymphatic drainage massage is an hour and the cranial sacral therapy session is an hour. As far as how often for people to come back, I really work with teaching people to work with the wisdom of their body. Our body is very wise. And I think that just kind of the way that our particular society is set up, we're taught to get what we need outside of ourselves. And I actually teach people that everything that we need is within ourselves. So when somebody asks me that question, which invariably, they always ask me that I asked them to go and ask their body. And if they, if they can do it right there, you know, before they leave, so we can schedule another appointment. Usually people are able to tell themselves, Oh, okay. You know, when to come back or if they need to go home and kind of sit with themselves, if that's not something they're used to doing, um, generally speaking, let's say somebody is trying to heal something like constipation. They may want to come in weekly for a few times just because the colon is a muscular organ. And so a similar kind of philosophy of going to a gym. If you went to a gym and worked out a muscle, maybe, you know, once a month, that's not really going to strengthen it to too well or too effectively, um, that wouldn't be something that you would necessarily be coming in, you know, weekly for colonics for the rest of your life. It's just to really kind of tone and help the colon to remember, Oh yeah, yeah, that's right this is how I'm supposed to move. Um, lymphatic drainage, again, it depends on what issues that you're dealing with and what you're willing to do just at home. So are you willing to move your lymphs on a daily basis with dry skin brushing and deep breathing and rebounding? Are you willing to drink the water so that you're hydrated and that you have more lymphatic flow and are you willing to eat, eat in a way that your body can not be creating a lot of inflammatory responses or congestion, um, you know, cranial sacral therapy. Again, it just depends on what a person is dealing with. So it's really very specific to what somebody is going through as to how often they should come back.

Mimi (15:59):

Got it, got it. And with regard to Lyme patients?

Stephanie (16:03):

Yeah. So, you know, as far as Lyme goes and I do have, uh, several, uh, Lyme clients, a lot of the symptoms that my clients come in for, whether it's fatigue or body aches, headaches, neck, stiffness, swollen lymph nodes, or, you know, inflammation surrounding the brain, or just in general. It is important that I state this, that I am not a physician I don't prescribe diagnose or treat. So when I speak of these things, this is really, um, either observations that I had, or mostly what clients have told me themselves, but the people that have had Lyme that come in for these different, um, kind of therapy sessions, they really notice a reduction in their symptoms. And again, whatever somebody can do on their own. And that means to look at physically, you know, what are they ingesting, but also are they dealing with their emotions? Are they looking at what their beliefs are and are they willing to shift that, are they willing to step into a place spiritually where they really start to trust so that they're not creating a lot of stress within their body? But I do notice that especially the metaphysical work that I do in addition to just these different therapies, as I've explained them to you, people are really noticing that there's some symptoms have reduced quite a bit. I mean and maybe, maybe you can, you know, kind of share with your listeners what you've noticed from the sessions themselves.

Mimi (17:30):

Yeah. I mean, I definitely agree with that for me. I definitely, I think part of having Lyme is like figuring out a way to release toxins. I do think the less toxins you have in your body, the better you feel. And so if that's through sauna, through colonics, through, um, you know, whatever else, other modalities, like if it's like the energy work. So just figuring out, like I find sometimes when my worst symptoms is because I must be backed up somehow I'm not going in the bathroom as regularly as I should. I have more toxins coming in. Like, figure out how to detox. I mean, I think for myself, especially, I don't know if other people, but the MTHFR gene, which is mutated for me, I find a lot of people who have Lyme or chronic Lyme have that issue and that, and that means that you don't detox easily. Right. And so I know that's one of my problems is I do not detox. And I have had constipation my entire life, which I think is making this whole Lyme thing so much worse and why I have chronic Lyme versus just getting better after having the course of antibiotics. So it, I think it does go hand in hand. And so that was always my go to thing is coming to you and like being like, you know, that was the one thing I did where I knew I could feel better after I left, you know, and I would always schedule it. Right, right. When I got back from vacation. Cause we all know when you go on vacation, you're not eating the way you should because there's more constipation traveling on the plane. So whatever. So I always felt like, especially when you get back from traveling to use that as like your way of like resetting your body,

Stephanie (19:06):

Right. Yeah. It's always wise that you do that.

Mimi (19:09):

Yep. So I have a question as you, so what else you touched on this a little bit about like doing energy work in between, but like in between sessions, like I found myself coming, you know, once a month, but can you talk to our listeners about, um, what things would you recommend doing? I mean, I don't know if you think that coffee enemas are something I've read a lot about, or if there's other like energy work, things like you talked about briefly the dry brushing every day or the rebounder, like anything else that you would recommend that someone does to help them or people who don't have, there are people who are listening. There's no colon hydrotherapist locally for them. So is there things that they should be doing at home that would benefit them that you've talked about today?

Stephanie (19:55):

Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Right. You know, when it comes to that type of approach, I'm very, very simple as a therapist. I really believe that, you know, eating anti inflammatory foods is probably one of the most important things. If there's nothing that you take away from this today, the most important thing is to just stay off sugar because it, you know, whether it's processed sugar or whether it's certain carbs that break down into sugar because that's going to inflame your body probably more than anything. And so that's really, really important to do. I know that that takes some discipline, but if you think about, uh, you know, when I was talking a little bit about whether it's the colon therapy or the lymph or the cranial sacral, it all has to do with fluid in the body. All right. And so if we're eating foods that are, you know, carb heavy or sugar, and that creates congestion, that's going to affect how that fluid flows in the body. So that's number one. Um, what you said in terms of making sure that your bowels move, that's very important. Generally speaking, you want your bowels to move about two to three times a day and to be as full, as complete as possible and preferably after meal. Um, and then just, you know, feel that it's a complete evacuation with that, what people can do or there's, um, different things that you can try. I really like this one product called WW, and it's a tincture that I take as well as Slippery Elm. That's an herb that I take, um, that really helps. Um, I do make sure that I'm drinking about at least half my body weight in ounces of water per day. Now one thing that some people don't realize is when you're taking caffeinated drinks, you want to replace ounce for ounce water. So actually a little bit more. So let's say you're doing eight ounces of coffee in the morning. You want to do an additional 12 ounces of water per day to help counter the dehydrating effects of caffeine. Same goes with alcohol. Um, you want to make sure that you're moving your body as much as you can every day, especially now, because we've got a combination of more sedentary lifestyles, as well as, um, you know, stress, um, whatever you can do to manage your stress is really important. So, you know, laugh as much as you can, you know, do whatever you can to enjoy yourself. Um, I actually just got some like coloring Mandela sheets so that I can start to do that. It's very creative, but it's also very calming for the body. I like to crochet, that's very calming and relaxing from myself. Whatever it is that you can do to reduce your stress is going to be a really, really important piece because again, the more relaxed that your body is, the healthy it's going to be, um, you did mention coffee enemas and you know, sure. That's absolutely fine. A lot of people do find that that helps when you can clear your liver with the coffee enemas, there's a particular way that you have to prepare it. It's not like just going to Starbucks and getting a cup of coffee and using it in an enema. You do have to use a process to pull the potassium out for it to be effective, to clean the liver. But that can be really helpful. Some people do like to take, you know, a squeeze of lemon in some warm water in the morning that can be helpful. Oil pulling is, um, you know, a treatment that people can do on themselves. You can also use a neti pot to help clear your sinus areas. You can gargle with a little bit of tea tree and like a drop of oregano oil, just to kind of keep that clear since your tonsils are your first line of defense. Um, that would be really important do so, whatever, you know, you can do, that's going to help to really strengthen your body. Your immune system reduce the amount of congestion and inflammation in your body. That's going to be very important.

Mimi (24:00):

Now, Stephanie, I'm a big infrared sauna person. So is that in essence doing the opposite of what I mean, would that be counter productive if I was doing colonics?

Stephanie (24:13):

No, no, not at all. It's actually a wonderful complementary modality to add to it, you know? I mean, and it's one of the reasons why exercise is so important is because we sweat and we're meant to. So I like infrared. I use infrared lamps and whatnot in my sessions, but I really liked the saunas because it's basically heating you from the inside out. And as it's doing that, you're detoxing.

Mimi (24:34):

Great. Great. I didn't know if it was a dehydrating the body in any way, but I do make sure I drink while I'm in there and drink some big glasses of water.

Stephanie (24:44):

Correct. Yeah. That is important to rehydrate after that.

Mimi (24:47):

And Stephanie, I know that you have a metaphysical course online and I wanted to let you talk a little bit about that and how that might help our Lyme warrior friends out there.

Stephanie (25:00):

Oh, thank you. Thank you for asking about that. Um, okay. So, you know, really, again, the thing that I teach people is what you really need to heal is what you can do on your own. And there are four major aspects of that, that I think if people were to be able to master they're going to have health. So number one is taking 100% responsibility for your part in your life. Nurturing your vulnerable self. That's really accessing the younger parts of us that experienced and survived our childhoods because a lot of our self perceptions, which create our perspectives started when we were children. And some people actually are still using those perceptions of self well into adulthood. And sometimes those perceptions that were created in childhood were not accurate, specifically that we're not worthy or that we're not lovable. And those are the two areas that really cause the most suffering for people. So that's probably out of the four that I'm talking about. That's the most important. The third one is called living free from victim mentality. So this could have to do with if you experienced trauma any time in your life, but it could also have to do with just a particular mindset. And sometimes when people have chronic illness, the mindset can go to, you know, why is this happening to me and more of that type of victim mentality. Even though I do understand it and I have compassion for it, of course, I don't feel that victim mentality is helpful in any way. It's certainly not empowering. It's not a position of strength and I always encourage people to work with themselves so that they're always coming from the strongest position possible. Um, and then the fourth one is called daily mindfulness living. And that's very important because the more mindful we can be about what we believe to be true, we can start to shift those beliefs. And that's really important.

Mimi (27:15):

Very interesting. That's amazing. Thank you. This has been amazing. I've learned so much even though I've been coming to you for several years, it's amazing what you still can learn when we actually sit and talk about it, but, um, thank you. We are so grateful. And I just want to tell anybody out there who wants to learn more about Stephanie's treatments or her intuitive healing practice, you know, classes online, you can either go to Iyasucolonics.com Which is I Y A S U and then colonics.com or metaphysicalcleanse.com, which is pretty much spelled the way it sounds metaphysicalcleanse.com. And we will have that on our website as well for you to find if you don't catch it here. But thank you so much. This has been amazing.

Mimi (28:04):

Thank you, Stephanie, so much.

Stephanie (28:07):

Thank you, ladies. I really appreciate, you know, the honor of being on your podcast. It was lovely.