How the hell do you pronounce Osteopathy, opening in a Pandemic and what we can learn from Teachers

"What is it again?"

"How do you say it?"

"What in da jesus is that?"

"Os-t-eo-op-o-pathy? Did I get it this time?"

We've heard them all, and I can't really blame anyone! Physiotherapy is pronounced : phys-i-o-ther-a-py, but the structure of the word is such that it easily flows together and we get: Physio-therapy; a nice and easy to pronounce word because it looks like it sounds.

So naturally when we see Osteopathy, we think we can just break it into two and put it together, just like physiotherapy. So we get osteo+pathy= osteopathy. Unfortunately, the reality is that it is more complicated than that. While physiotherapy doesn't need to be broken down and sounded out, that's what we need to do here. This is how we actually say it: os-te-op-a-thy. It may take a while to convince your brain that this is the right way to say it, but now that I've explained it and you understand, hopefully soon you'll be nailing it every time!

People generally fear the things they don't understand. Now that I've taken the fear out of saying osteopathy, I hope you feel confident in using it! Understanding is powerful; if you understand something, you usually feel a sense of control. Understanding breeds autonomy.

And talking about understanding, this is where I think we can learn from teachers.

Before I dive into that, I just want to show some love to those teachers who persisted with their teaching during the pandemic. Being ripped away from the class you've developed a relationship with all year can not be easy for student nor teacher. So I just want to say a big thank you to those teachers who persisted with their teaching through zoom and google classrooms. I'm sure parents, university students, and kids alike appreciated the taste of normalcy you were able to provide your students with in the craziest of times!

But what can we learn from teachers?

Good teachers understand understanding. What I mean by that is that real learning doesn't occur when students simply have to memorize things. I like to think of understanding as sticky; once you understand something, that's when it actually sticks.

If I gave you the math formula: 1+X=2, what would you say X is? I think almost all of us would say 1, because only 1+1 can give us 2 in this equation (without dealing in negatives).

Now, what if I gave you: 2+X=4 and asked you what X is? If you just memorized X in the above equation as 1, you would say X has to be 1 and wouldn't understand the equation (X must be 2). Because you simply memorized that X=1 you didn't understand X is not 1, but instead is a representation of a number needed to complete the equation. Memorization isn't adaptable across different contexts, but understanding is.

The point of this spiel is that understanding is the fundamental part of learning. When we see a patient, it's not enough for us to tell them they have posterior pelvic tilt or thoracic kyphosis; these are just words that likely mean nothing to the patient.

Part of our job as health care practitioners is to educate patients so that they don't have to continue to depend on us to remain healthy. They need to understand that thoracic kyphosis is more than just a combination of fancy Latin or Greek words and that there are exercise and lifestyle changes they can make to improve their condition. The end goal for our clients is to understand their bodies well enough so that they no longer require our help. It's funny in a way; we're in the business of helping people not need our business anymore!

Speaking of business, how about opening up one during a pandemic? I never imagined I'd even live through a pandemic, let alone attempt to open a business during one! It's been an interesting experience to say the least, but I count us as one of the lucky ones. We're in a good situation in regards to our overhead and rent, but I'm sure many other businesses are struggling in that regard. You see it all over Facebook now but before I sign off I'm going to stress it again here because it is important: please consider supporting local whenever you can! Whether you're ordering food, buying clothes or even buying tech, look to the smaller, locally-owned stores before you go looking at the larger ones.

We've done a great job of getting to level 3 and if we just stay responsible for a couple more months, the worst will be behind us.

Hold Strong NL!