The Healing Pulse: A Family Journey with PhysioPod®

In this heartwarming piece, 71-year-old Mrs S shares her 11-year journey of finding at-home relief from arthritis and Lipo-lymphoedema using her personal PhysioPod®. She also humorously recounts how her sporty, sceptical family went from teasing her about her "teleshopping purchase" to heavily relying on "Mum's gadget" for their own sports injuries and sciatica

I am a 71-year-old woman who has a long history of arthritis and Lipo-lymphoedema.

My family's journey with using a Physiopod started 11 years ago after I attended a Lipoedema Ladies Conference.

Mary and Julie gave a presentation and demonstration on the use of the Physiopod to help with symptoms of both Lymphoedema and Lipoedema. I was really impressed with the ease of use, the ability to break up fibrotic tissue, and the pain relief regular use offered. So, after much thought, I decided to invest in a personal machine for home use.

Since then, I have used it regularly as part of my Lipo-lymphoedema management plan, plus for helping my arthritic joints.

I probably use the machine for equal amounts of time to ease the pain and stiffness in my knees as I do for reducing swelling and breaking up fibrotic tissue in my legs because of the Lipo-Lymphoedema.

After each 15-minute treatment on my knees, I find I can bend my knees with less pain and walk much more freely. Obviously, it doesn’t cure the arthritis, but it definitely gives me immediate relief, which lasts at least 24 hrs, often longer.

It's so easy to use that I often carry out the treatment whilst reading a book or watching TV.

Each Oedema treatment takes a little longer at 25 mins, but again, it doesn’t interfere with my reading or TV watching.

In fact, I find it quite a relaxing experience, as it forces me to take time out of my busy life.

I must say that, in addition to being a really beneficial purchase for me, it's also been of great use to my family.

I have a very sporty family who, on paper, appear to be very accident-prone.

At first, they were very sceptical about the benefits of using the Physiopod to aid recovery, as I think they just thought it was one of their Mum's late-night Teleshopping purchases!!

However, as the years have passed and their injuries increased, they have actually tried it out and, very reluctantly, now admit it did actually help reduce inflammation, ease pain and speed up recovery from their various injuries.

The injuries we as a family have used the Physiopod for range from spinal surgery, various broken bones, muscle ruptures, torn hamstrings, bulging spinal discs pressing on nerves, and so the list goes on!

I promise we aren’t as accident-prone as this sounds - just a bit unfortunate, plus the recovery help needed after the extreme challenges my children put themselves through in the name of sport and fitness!

We have had many laughs along the way, starting with them being so sceptical about their Mum's new ‘gadget” that they wouldn’t even consider trying it at first.

One New Year's Eve, when, after a few celebratory drinks, my son finally decided to ask our daughter-in-law to try using it on his strained hamstring. After a couple of harmless little electrostatic shocks during the treatments (because we mischievously didn't explain how to hold the bar properly), the treatment went really well, and he was impressed, especially after we explained it was impossible to be electrocuted with the PhysioPod!  I think he has just about forgiven us now !!

He has recently had a problem which has required some intensive Physiotherapy (a trapped sciatic nerve caused by a spinal disc bulge ).

The physio who worked with him also works at a top level with several very high-profile athletes and Teams. He spoke very highly of the Physiopod benefits and explained how lucky my son was to have free access to one during his recovery.

His pain was so bad, especially during the night, that the Physiopod was the only treatment that eased that pain enough to allow him to get some sleep.

So, at long last, my children have some restored faith in their Mother's gadget and hopefully don’t now view me as such a weirdo!!

I’m absolutely sure they will be asking to borrow it a lot more from now on.

So, in view of all their initial scepticism, maybe I should start charging them…!