49. Pioneering a Path with Bonnie Moore Southgate

Episodes have been transcribed to improve the accessibility of this information. Our best attempts have been made to ensure accuracy,  however, if you discover a possible error please notify us at info@bendybodies.org

00:00
Jennifer Milner
Welcome back to Bendy Bodies with the Hypermobility MD, where we explore the intersection of health and hypermobility, focusing on dancers and other aesthetic athletes. This is co host Jennifer Milner, here with the founder of the Bendy Bodies podcast, dr. Linda Bluestein. 

00:16
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Our goal is to bring you up to date information to help you live your best life. Please remember to always consult with your own healthcare team before making any changes to your routine. 

00:27
Jennifer Milner
Our guest today is bonnie southgate, pilates instructor, hypermobile eds patient and former soloist with both american ballet theater and the royal ballet. Welcome to bendy bodies. 

00:52
Bonnie Southgate
Hello. Thank you. It's just amazing to be asked to be on here. It's quite an honor. I think. So thank you very much. 

01:01
Jennifer Milner
We are very thrilled to have you. The honor is ours because we can't wait to dig into your amazing story. So let's start at the beginning. You have had a very successful career as a professional ballet dancer. Can you tell us a bit about your background? 

01:16
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, definitely. When I think back now, because it was a long time ago, it did seem amazing, really, looking back in hindsight. So I started ballet just in Phoenix, Arizona, which is where I was born and danced. I had an amazing teacher, Mary Mo Adams, who it was quite a fun place to be. It was quite social, nothing too strict, and I kind of did my thing there. And then I won the National Society of Arts and Letters when I was, like, 1415, and that was in New York. And then I got all these offers to join companies, which was a bit of a big shocky moment. So I decided to go to Washington, DC. And I joined the Washington Ballet then because Mary Day, who ran it at that point, had a really great reputation and I didn't really feel like I was ready to leave my home in Phoenix for New York, which I think was quite a wise. 

02:18
Bonnie Southgate
You know, I had a great time in Washington, I think being mentored by Mary. She was very big on competition, so she sent me to Switzerland and I won there and then went to Barnabulgaria. Not in good shape. I think this is like I always had the Hypermobility. It reared its ugly head and I was not great there at all. And I was on really big bad drugs to get through that competition. But I still came away with a bronze medal. I happened to be there with Sylvie Guillaume competing against her. That was bad luck, wasn't it? They didn't give out a silver medal that year. They made sure there was a big gap. It was the Bulgarian competition of bendy bodies, though, I tell you. Right. You know what? I just think back. If I'd been in the adult category, I would have had so much more chance of winning that one. 

03:19
Bonnie Southgate
It's really unfortunate, but there we go. Sylvie was always really lovely, though. So I danced for four years there, and then I got headhunted by Borishnov, really. I just was phoned and asked if I wanted to take class, which I did, and he offered me a contract after. So a bit of an unreal career, really, in the ballet world. And then I was there for about three months and Kenneth McMillan had joined as a second director that particular year and he cast me in Juliet, like, three months after I joined. So that was also like, if you talk about being at the right place at the right time, I am the girl who had that all going on. So I did that and then I was sort of promoted after year one, and then I was doing crazy things like opening at the mountains one night, second act with Barishnipoff. 

04:13
Bonnie Southgate
It was a bit unreal in hindsight. I was super young, probably a bit too much too soon. There was a lot of controversy about that at the time as well. And I look back on some of the reviews and there was all this too young, too young, and you're in it in the moment and you kind of go with it. But I think as I went, it probably was too much and I was breaking down because I didn't know I had Eds, obviously, I was a dancer, were all flexible, and, yes, I was more flexible than anyone else. So I thought what made my career, and probably to a large degree it did, was that I think back then there wasn't as many people or as big an emphasis on the hypermobility aspect of things. So I came along and everybody loved it. It was really great, all my bendiness. 

05:13
Bonnie Southgate
It made it really hard for me, though, I think, like, keeping it together was really hard work. So by the time I left there, I'd met my husband, who was English, and I needed surgery on both feet. So I left there and had surgery in the UK. And Kenneth McMillan, who'd been instrumental in everything I did, was like, you're going to join the Saddler's Wells first and you're going to come back there and then we'll take you to the main company, which is basically what I did. So I came to the UK, had surgery on both feet, joined Saddler's Wells, which was know, met Kevin O'Hare, danced with him. He was the first person I danced Swan Lake with, and he's now running the Royal Ballet, so that was great. I ended up then transferring to the Royal Ballet and I was a first soloist, so they've got another position, like ranking in England that they don't have in America. 

06:05
Bonnie Southgate
That is, the people that will go on, usually to be principal. So you do a lot of the principal roles as a first soloist, so was able to do that, found it really, obviously hard work. I think the Royal Ballet was amazing. I got to rehearse a lot with a lady named Gerd Lawson who used to train all the greats, and she is the person who got me. And she would look at me and go, you need to sit down like you've had enough, and make everybody else continue. And she was really fab. She was a lovely lady who, again, you get these people in your careers that kind of make and break you. But I had only been there a couple of years. I needed another surgery on my did. I did struggle, and I, at that point, thought I've had enough. I've had a great career. 

06:55
Bonnie Southgate
So I was going to go off sailing with my husband, and Kenneth asked me if I would play the role of Louisa in a remake of Carousel, which he was choreographing at the time. And I did that, and he unfortunately died during that choreographing it, and he'd done everything but my solo, so I had to choreograph that. That was also daunting. And then I retired. After that, I was just like, he had been too instrumental, and I was just kind of wrecked by then. I'd had knee surgery at that point. I was just like, I'm tired. My husband and I then just set off at sea. 

07:36
Jennifer Milner
So I feel like there's about six different conversations that we can have here, because part of me just wants to completely fangirl and dig deep into what life was like during this extraordinary time, because you just kind of glossed really quickly over a few key things. You're like, I went to Switzerland and won. Like you're skipping over the fact that you won the Luzanne. 

07:56
Bonnie Southgate
Right. 

07:57
Jennifer Milner
Huge deal. And then you're going and know, Borishnikov invited me to take a class, and I got a job, which is what happens to every dancer. Every dancer gets invited to take a class with a major ballet company and then offered a job. That's how every dancer gets a job. And then you're saying that you just were lucky and happened to be at the right place at the right time, which I think anybody who's seen you dance would strongly disagree with and say that however much luck you have, if you don't have what they're looking for, that luck isn't going to do anything. So I think there was a fair amount of hard work in there. And then let's also not skip over the fact that, as you mentioned, you were pretty young. And I think you were part of that first group of baby ballerinas. 

08:41
Jennifer Milner
That was sort of all the rage that everybody was talking about, and a fair amount of focus was on Ballantin and his baby ballerinas. But that wasn't the only place. And so you were part of that first group of dancers who were really starting to dance at a younger age, which is, I think, more commonplace now, and sort of you were part of that cultural shift with the good and the bad that goes with it. So there's a whole lot to unpack in your amazing career. 

09:11
Bonnie Southgate
What time do you have? 

09:14
Dr. Linda Bluestein
This could be a four hour episode. 

09:17
Jennifer Milner
But the thing that we wanted to talk about, the thing that we wanted to have you share with our listeners, is it's been a struggle for us, as the people who do this podcast, to find examples of people who have had an amazing and healthy career with Eds. It's difficult, as you know, because you went through it. So it's great for people to hear, yes, I had it, I struggled with it. Here's what the tipping point was. Here's where it took me down, right? And saying that at Varna, you were taking a fair amount of medication just to try to help you get through it. Ankle surgery, pain in the knee, like all of these things. So that other side is what we want to unpack today and have people see. But it is difficult for me to walk away from that amazing and juicy career and not just completely pick your brain. 

10:05
Jennifer Milner
So when you look back on this amazing career, you've mentioned the ankles, you mentioned a couple of surgeries, things like that. Did you feel, you said, probably the earliest sign that your tissues were not supporting you the way they needed to be? Was the varna competition. Up until that point, did you feel great and then after that, was it just sort of a part of your life, or was it something that would flare and then just kept flaring more and more frequently till it was a part of your life? How did that start manifesting itself in your career? 

10:35
Bonnie Southgate
No, I think it manifested it was there from birth. I mean, I had events like, I look back as a very young girl walking down the hallway at a friend's house, and I broke my toe. I didn't actually do anything, so that's not normal. As a child, my father was a pediatrician, so I was very well looked after. So if I wasn't well, one day we had this kind of thing going, and I would look at him and he would put a tongue depressor on my tongue, and he'd say to my mother, she needs to stay home today and give me ice lollies and Coca Cola. I was really looked after. I didn't do sport in school. My father gave me notes that wrote me out of sport in school, and the excuse was, I had so much dance after. So in some ways, I used to do my little ballet classes. 

11:29
Bonnie Southgate
I used to do three classes a day after school. I'd go and I'd do the class before my class and the adult class, and I'd do my class properly, but I'd pop into the other classes. But I didn't do any of the sports activities at school that I think would have probably really not been great for me. And I think that the dance, although dance, how you approach dance is really important, probably held me the other. And I did have OD occasions. I just remember having my arm in a sling, but I don't remember why, but I had Daddy who always looked after me. So I did have that really amazing support network that I think probably made a huge difference in my being okay. And you hear stories of people a lot who've got Eds and with children, they're not believed or they might be in pain or the parents don't understand and the physicians don't understand. 

12:22
Bonnie Southgate
I was really lucky. I was totally encased in complete care by my father. So that probably made a big difference in how I was. And I also think my ballet teacher was really instrumental because she still is just amazing. And it was like, pull yourself together, pull yourself together. It wasn't about the mobility at that time and I think that approach was what I needed. But I do remember right from the get go, it was so hard to pull myself together. It just was like everybody else was trying to stretch. It was so hard for me to pull myself together. Doing classical rolls was so hard for me because just to just maintain contraction of the muscles long enough was super hard. I also remember anything allegro, I was like, no, don't give it to me. I cannot move quickly. I cannot get my muscles and my limbs to go quickly. 

13:27
Bonnie Southgate
Everything I loved was all extension related and Adagio and all of that. And I think as I progressed through my of Washington ballet was great. We had an interesting choreographer and he choreographed stuff that was really good for my body. And then when I got to Abt and I was looking at having to do more of the big classical pieces is probably where things did start to take their toll because I was asking much more of my body at that point to try and do these things. And I ended up with about eight bone spurs and I think it was just end of range, bang, bang on the bones. And so that would have been progressive. And I ended up just feeling like I had knives in my feet the whole time. So it was difficult. But I also suffered with a lot of stress fractures, which again, would have probably gone with the hypermobility. 

14:25
Bonnie Southgate
I was the only one coming back from Tours with four stress fractures. So I had no idea at that time. I just thought that was what came with the profession. I had drugs all the way through. I was just given nasty drugs all the way through. Didn't question it, didn't really care as long as it kept me going because that was my mindset and that was what it was about. I just made the assumption that was normal because we as dancers in those sorts of companies, you don't do anything for yourself. You like, I go to the physio. American Ballet Theater had a fantastic physio, Peter Marshall. And I was just in there every day and he just popped my cuboid back in. He's like, I'm going to write a paper on this because it keeps popping out. And he'd be like, oh, I can feel your spine through your stomach. 

15:17
Bonnie Southgate
I'm like, Isn't that normal? No, your organs are moving out of the way, like little things. And I just was kept held together because I had that on tap. It was there for me, like, every minute of every day. We had that on tap, and we had the best surgeons, we had the best physicians on tap. So in my situation, I was young, but I was still held together by this kind of network. I think of people at the time, it was always there, though. It was just cumulative. The damage got cumulative as I went, I think. 

15:55
Dr. Linda Bluestein
And I'm so glad that you mentioned about being given medications to help you get through performances and competitions and things, because I was at a conference, a dance medicine conference recently, and were talking about pain in the dancer and different signs, worrisome signs. And I said, Wait, a huge Worrisome sign is taking a lot of medication to get through class and performances. But you're right at the time, you just think it's normal because you don't really know any different. So I think that's a really important message for dancers to hear. 

16:33
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, definitely. And I think, unfortunately, in my case, because it was that baby ballerina time and it was like the competitions and stuff, and it's like, you get through it. You've had that much preparation. But I was given something called butyzolidant they don't even give it to humans anymore. And the side effect is leukemia. That's what they give a horse to finish the race with a broken leg. I was given some really, like it's amazing I'm alive, I don't know how. And Ibuprofen, because I was a youngster off the shelf. You don't think about kidneys or your organs, you just pop whatever you need and off you go. I just lived off. It was like, normal. 

17:21
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Sure. And you were diagnosed with Eds after your retirement. Do you regret not having more information about your condition while you were dancing? And what would you have done differently? 

17:35
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, definitely. I never put any what I want to say importance on the diagnosis later in life. But when I look back, I think it would have totally changed my approach in terms of the need for strengthening or extra stuff and also mentally just the coping mechanism of it all. Because I do think I got fatigued more than other people. I think that I'd go into rehearsals and other people seemed to be able to keep going and I was like, oh, God. On the floor and pain and all of that. And I think had I had known that, I would definitely have taken more care to do certain things, to look after myself better, which it just never came into the picture at all for me. I remember Cynthia Harvey once saying to me, you really should be doing Know alongside this. And I'd only done Pilates for rehab from injury. 

18:39
Bonnie Southgate
I never did it alongside dance. So I was really young, I was out there kind of floating around by myself. I did the Pilates and would come back from injury and be like, Well, I feel a bit stronger. But I never connected the two. I was just like, Back to dance class. And when I did the Pilates, I was like, Why are they asking me to breathe? Why are they asking me to do this? I was like, Get me in legs and straps and do something that's like a plie. I didn't get it. I was too young. 

19:11
Jennifer Milner
Well, and I think dance medicine was young at the same time, so, I mean, everything was sort of evolving along with you. The idea of cross training as a regular part of a dancer's regimen really didn't exist for a long time. So it was impressive to me when I was reading through your biography about that you did start doing Pilates while you were still dancing. And even if you were just dipping into it as a rehab tool, right, that's still more than a lot of dancers did. And so it's impressive to me that you instinctively felt it, but also at the same time, we're just trying to figure out how to keep moving and how to keep going from one day to the next with the Pilates. Did someone suggest to you, hey, you're injured, so you have to go do Pilates? Or did you seek it out because you were injured? 

20:07
Jennifer Milner
And did you find it helpful in sort of trying to put all the pieces back together again? 

20:13
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, so originally I first heard of Pilates in New York, but I never really took up on oh, I think I was quite difficult, really. I remember being approached by agents and all sorts of people, and I was like, I don't need anyone. No, I'm fine. So I think that some of that support network maybe I could have had I remember Leslie Brown mentioning Know, but it was fatty. It wasn't like a thing, it was just a fad. And some of those dancers were off trying it. I was like, I'm not spending the money for that. And then when I went to the Royal Ballet, having had surgery on both feet and then needing another surgery, that's when I started doing the Pilates. And yes, I was made to do it. They had a studio, and when you were injured, you went and you did an hour a day, every day. 

21:09
Bonnie Southgate
That was what they made you do to stay in shape and to help with recovery and things. So that's where I really got my first experiences, which were great. She was a great teacher. And again, I didn't understand it. I so remember vividly in my head coming back and the first sort of I had a little private class with Monica Mason afterwards, and she was so shocked at how strong I was coming back from my injury. And that's because I was doing things on the flotty's equipment with resistance. And of course, my body provides no resistance. So, like, trying to strengthen without that, forget it's flinging your limbs around and just stacking bones. I didn't really have any muscles going at all through most of my career. It was just grit your teeth and get through it. But when I did the Pilates, obviously I was working against a bit of resistance. 

22:06
Bonnie Southgate
I had to develop a bit of muscle. And again, I think by that time I was kind of feeling undone as well. So had I had that right from the get go, I think my career would have been really different. I think it would have really benefited me hugely. So, yeah, the Pilates was good for me. 

22:30
Dr. Linda Bluestein
That's interesting, as you're describing kind of your I have this visual, we've seen dancers like that where the limbs are all kind of going, and like you said, there's less control and just kind of hoping for the best. It's fascinating how you're describing that. And getting back to Eds, what was the process like of getting your Eds diagnosis? 

22:53
Bonnie Southgate
So as far as Eds went, I didn't really twig that I had anything going on until I did my Pilates training. And for my original matwork training, you have to do an essay. And I remember going to my mentor, who was this amazing extrapease artist, and she was like, you should do it on Hypermobility. And I'm like, Why? She looked at me and she's like, oh my God, I've never seen anybody like you before. And she's a trapeze artist. And then I went home and I kind of Googled things and I was like, oh my God, that's me. Yeah, okay, now it caught my interest and I was like, that was it, I was off. So from that moment on, I was aware of it. So that was really my initial training in Pilates, very beginning, that I then understood it, and then it just became a journey from there. 

23:49
Bonnie Southgate
I only got my diagnosis, number one, because I think I have three children, and it's helpful for them for me to have it. But also when I talk about the condition and things like that, I have the diagnosis behind me. So people actually do believe me, because I think sometimes with my career, people won't necessarily believe I'm Eds. So I needed it in a way, for credibility. But I knew I ticked every box. It was very clear that I had Eds to me. So getting the diagnosis was easy because I knew I ticked every box. And I just sent an email to Professor Akeem and he was really busy and I'm like, I'm not here because I need your services. But I wanted the diagnosis because I'd managed myself, I'd learned how to manage myself. So I went to one of his colleagues that he recommended and went in there and actually she looked at my arm span and was like, have you had your heart looked at? 

24:50
Bonnie Southgate
She looked a bit freaked out by me, actually. So I got that diagnosis was really easy. It wasn't questionable. I ticked all the boxes really quite easily. 

25:03
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Sure. And I think that you just hit on such an important are. I know, Jen, you probably hear this all the time. I hear this all the time. People saying that it is not possible to have a professional dance career, especially professional ballet career, and have Eds. And I know people who they definitely have Eds and it's hard for sure, but it's not like they're absolutely it's kind of an advantage and it is advantage all at the same time. So it's so important. This conversation is so important and people learning from your experiences and your story. And I would love to know, looking back, did the Eds diagnosis afford you any AHA moments? 

25:52
Bonnie Southgate
Oh, yeah, well, the diagnosis didn't as much as just the realization that I had it. I think my AHA moment was with that girl going like, you're nuts. And then I started to pay attention to what she did with me as well. And she'd be like, because I had so many shoulder subluxations and dislocations and they were all over the shop and she'd be dealing with me and she's like, can you feel that? I'm like, I don't feel anything. Can't feel anything. And then she's like, but your scapula is moving like 4ft. You can't feel that? I'm like, no, I can't feel it. And I think then I started thinking like, oh my God. When I was dancing, I always had trouble with my arms. They were my worst sort of bit of me and everybody. My arms were always a bit awkward and I'm like because they weren't even attached to my body. 

26:46
Bonnie Southgate
Yes. If I'd gone back having had my diagnosis, I think everything would have been approached differently. I don't think I would have needed my surgeries. I think that the reason I needed them was because I was so hyperextended in my knees. And if I'd ever done anything not that you can't hyperextend your knees and dance, but if I'd done something to counter it, like, aside from my dance, I could have really changed the mechanics of how everything worked. I think I would have been stronger and probably just gotten through my career with so much less many less issues and injuries. 

27:24
Jennifer Milner
Well, dancers everywhere who are listening to this podcast right now and other artistic athletes. I mean, I can practically hear their heads rattling as they are nodding vigorously to all of this. So many of the things that you say resonate for me and for my dancers as well. When you talked about your fatigue and how it was just hard to be in the dance studio. When you talked about how hard it is to build muscle, when you talk about how you can't feel your scapula and they are literally six inches off of your ribcage. All of these things that you have, these teachers that sort of eye roll or get impatient or think that you're faking it when you're talking about how tired you are, or that you're just being a prima donna. It's really encouraging to hear from someone who's had a successful career that you went through these things and that you felt these things as well. 

28:10
Jennifer Milner
Because it is something that we are trained as artistic athletes to sort of push past the pain, to push through the fatigue, to sort of move beyond it. But we also have to acknowledge that there are some parts that are not healthy. 

28:23
Bonnie Southgate
Right. 

28:24
Jennifer Milner
It's okay to try to dance when you're tired and you still have to get through act three, but you have to start to recognize what is not like everybody else in the room. And you were able to see and you had a few people in your training career, it sounds like, who could see that you were different and say, hey, it's time to sit down, or, hey, it's time to go do pilates and do your exercises and help you pull everything together. So with the Pilates that you did while you were dancing, and then you retired from dancing completely, what led you to seek a Pilates certification after that? 

28:59
Bonnie Southgate
So when I left dancing, I decided I left mentally. I needed to leave and do something different. So my husband and I actually went cruising for four years. We left. We had decided were just crazy young people, that were going to go sailing and never come back. And then I had my first child in southern Italy, and we decided to come back. And you know what? I'm a fidgeter. I wonder why I wasn't going to be the stay at home wife with the kids and my body. I knew I needed to do something for my body. So I decided not dance because it was an after school career, and I was having children, and I wanted to spend the time with my children. And I'm like, I could teach Pilates, and that would be really good for my body. And so that's what really drew me to the Pilates initially. 

29:55
Bonnie Southgate
But what was very interesting is I probably had more problems at the start of my Pilates training and my equipment training than I ever had. And I think that was because my body, as long as you weren't challenging it with load. And because I'd strengthened enough up, it was okay. But everybody got very excited because I was an ex ballet dancer who'd had that career. So they used to load me up with stuff and expect me to do all the big classical stuff, and the minute they'd up the springs, it was like the joint would just slide out. And I think that, again, was a really big learning process for me. And I became obsessive by the movement of the bones because mine just kept falling. Right. I remember saying to Linda as like, when I was dancing in New York and I was sending love letters to my husband because were across Atlantic and I was like, reading these letters and it was these letters going like, I just don't feel like my bones will stay in place. 

31:03
Bonnie Southgate
And I'm like thinking, oh, my, like, how did nobody ever twig that I had Eds? But I guess it just was never really on the radar back then, diagnosis of it. But it's so obvious now. 

31:16
Dr. Linda Bluestein
And Bonnie, you and I have talked about sharing your story a few different ways. Of course, this podcast is a great way, but I think absolutely it would be fabulous for you to write a book. And you could include photos, just little snippets of those things that you wrote because we love visual cues and it just makes it so real then. I mean, that's just fascinating that you came across those. 

31:44
Bonnie Southgate
I know, well, I am writing a book, but it's not on that because I swear that the thing is, I swear that after this one that I was never going to write another word as long as I live, because I'm just not like I grew up and my brain was developed through movement, not writing. It's like the hardest thing I've ever forget, the Eds writing, that's really the challenge. 

32:10
Jennifer Milner
Well, but you had to write an essay as part of your Pilates training, right? And that essay sort of led you to do your deep dive into your hypermobility, which led you to dig into a diagnosis for Eds. And I also noticed that you pursued additional training. And I would love for you to tell me what made you want to pursue that additional training as a sports therapist and a corrective exercise specialist. 

32:36
Bonnie Southgate
So that came about, I think, partly because of my fascination just with the human body. And although Pilates was great and I learned a lot, I have come from a really medical family. So medicine and the interest in things in anatomy have always been there, I always thought. And I go back again looking at some magazines I was in and they said, what will you do after dance? And I always said physiotherapy. So I always had an interest anyway now, because I moved to the UK. And my education was through correspondence, through Nebraska University, finished my high school education that way. So I didn't have the normal sort of educational background and I probably if I'd been in the States, I might have pursued physiotherapy instead. But it was easier to do sports therapy than physiotherapy in this country for me. And not only that, I'd been working with footballers, of all things here, and I was getting really cranky because I was seeing things that I didn't understand, and neither did the physios. 

33:46
Bonnie Southgate
So the physios weren't clocking what I was seeing because I was looking at movement, I was looking at them in a different way, and I was like, can't you see this? This isn't right. You've got to deal with this is your job. And I was just getting really fed up that as I became a better Pilates teacher, I saw more and more things that I felt like I didn't understand why I was seeing them. So I started going on little courses. I call myself a course whore. I mean, I've put sports therapy down there. I am known for going on every course going, and I don't care if it's evidence or not evidence based, I go on every course that comes out. It's like everything they allow me on, I'm on because, you know what, there's something to learn from everything. And like every course I've been on hundreds of them. 

34:36
Bonnie Southgate
I convert into Eds, so I'll go through I used to go with a lovely friend, we'd go together on these courses, and it used to drive her nuts because she could see in my brain it being calculated into, oh, well, that was interesting. Like my advanced met course, it was only the eccentric phase of Mets that work for me. And then I'd go back to the clinic and I'd be like, trying it on all the hypermobile clients. OOH, that's the one that worked for us. So sports therapy was a great thing because I thought it would convert into working with dancers as well, or populations of people that I thought I was interested in. I think I've just, in the end, gone much more down the Eds route because I understand them and actually a lot of people don't seem to, so I've quite neatly gone into that. 

35:32
Bonnie Southgate
So whether physiotherapy would have been a better fit, I don't know, but then I don't know that I would have done all the courses I've done, because you really have to be although the sports therapy is also evidence based, only Pilates isn't. So I was able to go out and explore more. I think that's what took me into cranial sacral therapy, which was the only thing that helped my neck bizarrely. So a lot of things haven't been researched. I have so many things I think that need research, but yeah, it's just sports therapy I name because it's a qualification that people understand. But I've done so much stuff, really, that you have to go under the banner of some things, don't you? 

36:21
Dr. Linda Bluestein
I think the path that you ended up on was perfect for everyone that you work with and your personality, because you are pulling together all of these different areas. And you and I also are in an Eds echo group together. And so it's fascinating to me that you're bringing up about evidence based medicine, which is sometimes abbreviated as EBM. And in the world of Eds, there's not a lot of evidence. We need a lot more evidence, but it's really a risk benefit thing. So when I'm working with patients one one, a lot of the things that I'm recommending, yeah, there might not be a lot of evidence for, but I'm always evaluating the risk versus the benefit. And if something like Cranial sacral therapy, the risk is probably so minimal. So it's like, why not give it a shot, right? So I think it's great that you're doing all of these different things and pulling all of these different things together. 

37:19
Dr. Linda Bluestein
I've heard of cranial sacral therapy. I don't really know a lot about it. Can you tell us more about why you think that it's helpful for people with Eds and explain what it is? 

37:29
Bonnie Southgate
So I don't really like explaining what it is because I think that the explanation isn't great. I think one of the reasons it's not been researched well enough is the I did my Cranial Sacral therapy with the Ledger Institute, which I think is fabulous. And my God, these people are so knowledgeable, like, outrageously knowledgeable about the anatomy and everything to do with don't. Like, there's a lot of claims made about systems that we don't have evidence to provide or to back up with. So I wouldn't want to say or claim that it does anything. I think for me, from my perspective as the type of therapist I am, you definitely have neurological input with your hands. And I think of the Cranium and the Dura, and that neurological input is massive. I don't know how it works entirely. I was drawn to it by not drawn to it from the EDF side. 

38:40
Bonnie Southgate
But I had done work with a really amazing physio here named Jenny Cardu, who was the first person to qualify with Diane Lee in the Integrated Systems method. And it's like I knew her through a biomechanist who was here. It just is like a small world. Anyway, Diane Lee very kindly allowed her to teach me the Ism method, and she had family down by me. So for like, almost a year, she came down and Cranial corrections were in what she does, looking at the driver of things. And I know that she did things like ultrasounds on bladders, and you could do a correction of the Cranium and see the bladder move into place. So whether it's a fascial connection, whatever it is, I don't know. So in certain people, in looking at what might influence their pain or whatever it is, I started doing these cranial corrections and I could do like it was bizarre because you could unlock neurological tension by doing a correction which was unexplainable. 

39:49
Bonnie Southgate
And so I was like, I need to know more about this whole cranial thing. So I then decided to go and do the cranial sacral therapy training. I've only done like level one, I'm not a cranial sacral therapist. I practice cranial sacral therapy just to make that really clear. And I found it helps on both the sympathetic parasympathetic sort of bringing the sympathetic nervous system down. I think there has been bit of study on that which we know with people with Eds, a lot of times they can end up in a state of sympathetic overdrive. So on that level alone, I think it's really beneficial. But for me, I had a really locked neck, I couldn't move at all. And the only thing that helped that was a cranial psychotherapy. And I don't know why, muscles from jaw, I don't know why, but it can have a profound effect. 

40:43
Bonnie Southgate
It's a bit of the body that because they say everything's fused, they completely ignore in rehab, in MSK, I mean, I was trying to read up on some of it, there just isn't enough research. And there is one paper that was like well, certain bits don't actually fuse into your, in your like and some people it doesn't. So possibly the Eds community has less fusion or the integrity is not quite there. So I use it quite a lot and do find that people really benefit and love it. I give my own clients the ability to ask for what they want from me at the time they come in. So if they're highly stressed, if they had really bad Pots, it might be a cranial sacral therapy session or they may feel they want to get into the Pilates studio and do stuff because they've been having more subluxation issues. 

41:38
Bonnie Southgate
So I listen to the person in front of me and we work from there. Really? Yeah. 

41:45
Dr. Linda Bluestein
That is so fabulous. What would a cranial sacral therapy session be like? If I'm coming to see you for that or on that day, that's what I want to do. I think it's one of those things that's kind of hard to wrap your brain around. What would I be experiencing? 

42:02
Bonnie Southgate
So it's super light, hands on touch. So they use grammage and it's like five Gramage. It's the equivalent of, I don't know in America like a dime hero, 20 PP. So if you put that on your hand, that's how light it is. And actually the lighter you touch somebody because I'm a manual therapist, in many, I've learned lots of different manual therapy techniques. The lighter you put your hands on someone, the more feedback you get and the more interaction you have with that person's system because you're not threatening it. It's like you have to be invited in by the body and Cranial sacral therapy is very like that. But hands, the positioning of the hands again, is down at the sacrum, which is where your parasympathetic nerves come out. So you're at the top and the bottom end where all the parasympathetic nerves come out. 

42:52
Bonnie Southgate
So you're at the base of the cranium. You do little bits, maybe in between, just looking at where the body is in half. So you're looking at where the diaphragm is or the pelvic floor. You're looking at those different areas of the body and you're really letting the body decide what happens. It's very much not a do to it's a do with kind of thing. So we spend a bit of time at the sacrum. There's protocols for the hands on placements, things like that, and then you're looking at the different parts of the cranium, so you're looking at the different bones. And the placement of the hands is specifically so that you're on the bone that you want to be on. You're not overlapping bones. And again, there's a protocol of what you're doing. It just feels super light hands on, but actually people will give feedback that they're actually feeling huge stuff going on. 

43:51
Bonnie Southgate
My personal experience was like somebody was pushing my nasal everything out. It was like decompressing. I don't know. Everybody gets different sensations, but they can have quite big sensations. Yeah, it's quite an interesting technique or whatever you want to call it. I think it needs research done. Whether it'll ever get funding, I don't know. But it would be really interesting to have some proper research done in it, definitely. 

44:21
Dr. Linda Bluestein
And I think an area of research that would be to me, really interesting. I have a lot of patients with Arachnoiditis, so that's inflammation of the Arachnoid layer and people with Eds are at increased risk for that. And I think that would be a fascinating therapy to study with Arachnoditis, which is a pretty stubborn condition to deal with. So I think that would be really fascinating. 

44:42
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, the original thought process behind it was that it was going to restore the CFS flow up and down. And we look at the possibility of venous drainage issues in the hypermobile community and all of that, and whether it's really helping with that whole not just the CFS, but also the vascular system. And you're under there on the base of the cranium and behind the ears in the temporal bones, all in the areas where all of that sort of flow happens in and out. So whether you're restoring that, which would be theory behind it really well. 

45:25
Dr. Linda Bluestein
I'm thinking if you have chia malformation or Cranial cervical instability, if you can get some improvement with Cranial psychotherapy, that would be a heck of a lot better than having surgery. Of course, there are cases that I'm sure that would not be helpful for, but it's something to me that would be so worth trying. So that's really interesting. Getting back to dancers, what do you think that hypermobile dancers, what would you like them to know? 

45:56
Bonnie Southgate
I want, first of all, for the dance world to stop fixating on the overextension of everything. This is a trend right now. It's not pretty. Why are we going there? We're losing the beauty, for me, of the lines in dance, when we do that, and I liken it to like, right, a bit of hyperextension is fine, but then you start to shorten the limb. Why would we want to shorten the limb? That's not pretty. We want to keep it long. So I don't get it. I don't know where this is. It's becoming more of a contortionist circus thing and we need to reevaluate a little bit what's going on. And I'm sure it's social media and I'm sure it's all the photographing of these things that's intriguing when you look at it, but doesn't translate to dance on stage, which was an art form and should be looking at the artistic side of things and the story that the person's telling and the emotions and everything else. 

46:59
Bonnie Southgate
And there needs to be that strength there, because that's what's amazing when you watch a really beautiful, accomplished dancer, is that you have these gorgeous lines, but with that incredible strength behind it as well. So I think I would be really trying to my message would be, let's go back a bit. We're always trying to improve on the past. So you go to the Olympics and you're trying to break the record. And I think that unfortunately, with dance, what they're doing is trying to make everybody more hypermobile, but that's not really where it should be going, I don't think. I think it needs a little bit of reevaluation in that department. That would be my go to everyone out there. And if you're a dancer, don't fall into that trap. It's great to have those curvy lines, but also they need to be in proportion. 

47:59
Bonnie Southgate
So the legs and the torso and the arms and the shoulders, it all needs to be proportion. That makes sense. It does. 

48:09
Jennifer Milner
And I'm glad you said that, because I was going to ask you about that and what you thought, because we've discussed this many times on the podcast, this trend towards extreme hypermobility and even artificial hypermobility, right. The forced overstretching to get the joints to do something which, as you said, isn't an art form. It doesn't translate on stage. It might look great on social media, but doesn't translate into a moving, living art form. So I love that you said that. Is there anything else that you would want to say to dance educators, company directors, choreographers, about working with dancers, with hypermobility, with Eds, conditions like that? 

48:48
Bonnie Southgate
Yeah, I think just being aware, I think hopefully we're getting better at diagnosing something like Eds, because I do think there is a differentiation between just a mobile dancer and somebody with Eds, like in my career, it was very apparent. And I think the Eds dancer can be a wonderful dancer. And I would want everybody with Eds out there who wants to dance not to be discouraged by your condition, to know that it is possible. I want the people that work with them to realize, though, that sometimes not doing more is you'll get a better result out of, you know gerd Lawson knew when to let me sit down at the end of the rehearsal and not continue to push myself because I would have ended up injured. Instead, I did what my body needed to do to prepare me for performance, which is what it needs to be. 

49:46
Bonnie Southgate
So the mentality of push, push isn't great. I think also, like nutrition massive, and I think we're better at that now than we used to be again. But I think that it's like elite athletes. You look at the elite athletes and every bit of them is looked after. Like how long they sleep, their rest, their recovery time, what they eat, everything is so looked at. And we definitely need this in dance. I think it's being brought in at the higher levels. I think it needs to be coming in at all the levels of the companies and just in the mindset of the teachers, too. Teachers of the younger people need to get together with the parents and they need to really discuss the whole eating and all of that, because there were a lot of dancers with eating issues when I was dancing. And you can't be at the top of your career and be like that. 

50:48
Bonnie Southgate
You need to have something fueling the system. And I think if the child won't get on board, then they're not going to have a career. They need to get on board with that side of it, especially if they do have something like Eds need to really and the parents need to really be part of that whole education process for the young kids. I think my big thing when I left was I was super young and I was very much out there on my own. So having the teachers there, having the parents there, really overseeing and not just leaving them to their own devices is really important. 

51:26
Jennifer Milner
Absolutely. And it sort of circles back to what you experienced as a child as well. Because when you were talking about your childhood and how you felt like you were so well taken care of and so looked after health. Wise from an early age. It reminded me of the interview that we did with Camille Shrier, who is the Miss America 2020, I believe, and how she found out at a relatively early age. I think she was eleven. That she was diagnosed with Eds and how that helped her and her family's interest and love of science sort of helped them see all of the things and kept her from doing too much. Like, your dad wrote you notes to keep you out of PE class. So that early intervention really is key. And it's not like wrapping you in cotton wool and sticking you in a drawer. 

52:13
Jennifer Milner
It's using that knowledge that you gain from the diagnosis or even from just learning about hypermobility and how to work with it, that I consider the early intervention. That's so helpful, having the teachers understand how much to push, having the parents understand the importance of nutrition and advocating for their child. So I think that's a huge topic in itself, and I'm really glad that you mentioned that. Is there anything that we haven't discussed that you wanted to make sure we covered today? 

52:43
Bonnie Southgate
I don't think so. I mean, maybe as well with teachers, maybe I didn't point out, like, making it fun when they're young as well. I think anxiety really causes a lot of problems, and I think it's very easy for somebody who's trying to become a dancer to become anxious and stressed about it. My early years with my teacher were so much fun. She was a strict teacher, but it was also like a big family and there was no pressure on any of us in there. And I think you get some teachers who are super serious and they're going to get a dancer and they're going to make it and all of that. She was not like that, but interestingly because I went through the whole Royal Academy of Dancing method and did exams and everything every year. She ended up becoming an examiner because all of her pupils, they kept seeing it was just such a high standard, but there was no anxiety or stress that came along with, I think, you know, keep it fun. 

53:49
Bonnie Southgate
You got to keep it fun. When I danced, I was the crazy girl who would go off and learn how to scuba dive before we started the day, I tried to keep my groundedness with me along with it a little bit because you can become a bit crazy if you don't. So keeping real life going alongside it is super important too. 

54:15
Dr. Linda Bluestein
That's great, because what you're talking about there, too, is having your identity be more than just about dance. And then when your dance career ended and you transitioned into the second phase of your professional career, it probably was hard. But I think so often now, dancers get so I think sometimes they're almost, like, addicted to dance. The love of dance may or may not even be there, but they're just, like, addicted to it. It becomes so all encompassing, and they see themselves as a dancer and only as a dancer, like, and exclusively as a dancer. So I think that's really important, what you just shared. 

54:59
Jennifer Milner
Well, before we go, Bonnie, where can people who have been listening find? 

55:04
Bonnie Southgate
So I I have kind of been doing my own little thing down in Dorset. I've got a clinic now that I run. I actually bought a small building and I've got lots of Pilates equipment in it and I've got a physiotherapist there and a couple sports therapists alongside and I've been sort of doing my own thing there. I run the support group in my area for Eds UK and I often offer free initial assessments or appointments to those who are really struggling. So I have, like, I call it my pro Bono Thursdays, which I do every other Thursday, and I get really struggling people in and I see them and try and support them. So I'm doing my own little thing here in Dorset. As far as social media, I'm on Twitter quite recently, but I'm under HDDs rehab and then I'm also on Facebook. 

56:08
Bonnie Southgate
I've got a page called Hypermobility Exercise and Education. So if anybody wants to join that, then that's a little group that I started over Lockdown because I was a bit bored and I started it and then realized I had to make content, which was a bit of a moment when I realized that. So anybody wants to come on and ask questions, that will help me with my content as well. And then I've got another Facebook page I've just started, which is also HEDs rehab. So trying to get more out there in the HEDs world. So you can find me on Facebook, Twitter and hopefully on Instagram soon. I'll probably be under Heeds rehab there as well because that seems to be what I'm going under now. Anyway, that's where you'll find me. 

56:59
Jennifer Milner
That is awesome. Thank you so much. Well, I think I'm going to be processing this for a while. This conversation, it has been so encouraging to hear about your journey and to hear about someone who instinctively had the support that she needed from her early age, but obviously was still in the early years of hypermobility in general. And for sure Eds and diagnoses like those back before dance medicine was as advanced as it is now, back before people understood the importance of cross training. You still had a very successful career, an amazing journey through the dance world, and then the work that you have done since then, taking your knowledge and your experience and using it to help future generations of athletes and dancers and movers is really encouraging. So I really appreciate you sharing your story with us today. 

57:55
Bonnie Southgate
Thank you. It's been amazing to be on this podcast. Can't believe I'm actually on it still. My daughter is such a fan and when I told her, she was like, oh my God, I've been following them for like the last year, so she's going to be super excited about this. So thank you for inviting me. 

58:12
Jennifer Milner
Well, absolutely. You have been listening to bendy bodies with the hypermobility MD. Today we have been speaking with Bonnie Southgate. Bonnie, thank you again so much for sharing your expertise with us today. 

58:26
Bonnie Southgate
My pleasure. Hopefully we'll chat again. It was fun. 

58:29
Jennifer Milner
Absolutely. We will definitely have you back. 

58:32
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Yes, we would love that. 

58:34
Jennifer Milner
Bye. 

58:35
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Thank you for joining us for this episode of Bendy Bodies with the Hypermobility MD, where we explore the intersection of health and hypermobility for dancers and other aesthetic athletes. If you found this information valuable, please share it with a colleague or friend and leave us a review on your favorite podcast player. Remember to subscribe so you won't miss future episodes. If you want to follow us on Instagram, it's at bendy underscore Bodies, and our website is WW bendybodies.org. If you want to follow Bendy Bodies founder and co host Dr. Bluestein on Instagram, it's at hypermobilitymd all one word, and her website is WW hypermobilitymd.com. If you want to follow co host Jennifer Milner on Instagram, it's at jenniferperiodmilner Milner and her website is WW dot. Jennifermillner.com, thank you for helping us spread the word about hypermobility and associated conditions. We want to hear from you. 

59:40
Dr. Linda Bluestein
Please email us at info@vendibodies.org to share feedback. The thoughts and opinions expressed on this podcast are solely of the cohost and their guests. They do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of any organization. The thoughts and opinions do not constitute medical advice and should not be used in any legal capacity whatsoever. This information is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease, as this information is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment, please refer to your local qualified health practitioner for all medical concerns. We'll catch you next time on the Bendy Bodies podcast.