Meditation—more than just ‘om’
by Nathan Solheim
When Diedra Roesijadi was diagnosed with multiple
sclerosis in 2007, she knew
her life was changing. She lost
her 70-hour-a-week job as a
corporate real estate agent. Her
doctor told her to cut down on
stimulants, including coffee—a
bad thing for someone who
lives in java-obsessed Seattle.
And she had to give up her
favorite sport, participating
in triathlons, because her MS
symptoms included debilitating
leg cramps and spasticity.
She needed something to fill
the void. So, Roesijadi enrolled
in a yoga class, and by last year
was learning how to teach yoga.
During the training course,
she was introduced to a style of
meditation that incorporates
slow movements and controlled
breathing.
Despite its origins as a
spiritual practice, meditation
today is often used as a practical
tool to calm the mind and
relieve stress, using techniques
that can include sitting still and
concentrating on breathing,
engaging in repetitive motions
or even listening to music.
After practicing meditation
and incorporating it into her
daily life, Roesijadi began
to notice an impact. “Last
summer, I was meditating 45
minutes a day, and with almost
While meditation has been around for
thousands of years, recent studies are showing
that its focus on mindfulness can have
positive impacts for people with MS.
no other changes to my lifestyle
or treatment plan, I was almost
able to completely calm my leg
cramps,” Roesijadi says. “And I
was getting to the point where
I could keep still, not just in
meditation, but also when I was
sitting and lying down.”
Roesijadi is one of many
people with MS who say
that meditation helps relieve
symptoms such as stress—
which can lead to other
health problems—as well as
fatigue, anxiety, spasticity
and depression. And used
as a complement to standard
MS treatments, meditation also
has been shown to improve
overall quality of life and
well-being.
While more needs to be
learned about the effects of
meditation, there are many
mindfulness and relaxation
techniques to choose from,
with relatively few negative
consequences. This means more
and more people are opening
their minds to meditation, and
the MS community is joining
right in.
A growing body of evidence
A recent Northwestern University
clinical trial looked at a
randomized group of 121 people
with MS who received stress
management therapy—which
included relaxation techniques
and meditation—for 16 sessions
during a 24-week period. MRIs
showed that the therapy reduced
the incidence of two types of
brain lesions in MS by more than
20 percent. However, the study,
published in the July 11 issue of
Neurology, also showed that the
improvements didn’t last after
the stress management therapy
ended, reinforcing the notion
that meditation should not be
used in place of standard MS
treatments, and that meditation
is most helpful when used on an
ongoing basis.
In a 2010 Swiss study of 150
people with MS, 74 received
usual care while 76 were
enrolled in eight weekly group-therapy sessions that included
training in mindfulness-based
meditation—a technique
aimed at creating awareness
and acceptance of moment-
