Therapeutic Tai Chi
My Journey with Multiple Sclerosis My Path with Tai Chi
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(My mentor, Dr. Dave`) taught me to be in the moment, and not try to either go back to my old life, or deny that I had the disease, or be who I wasn’t. I had to do something about the physical therapy routine, though. I hated it. I did everything I could to skip doing it (and felt terrible the next day). I started looking at my old martial arts training. I remembered the Tai Chi and Qi Gong exercises. I could no longer execute flying front kicks or spinning back fists like I used to, but I remembered the slow and mindful movement of Tai Chi. I thought about one wellness lesson, of balancing physical and mental activity. I knew that the body was more receptive to medication and everything else, when it was relaxed. In stress, during the “Fight-or-Flight Arousal Response”, we tighten the muscles and constrict the entire cardio vascular system. Everything works better, when we are relaxed. I began to do some of the Tai Chi movements, and found the movements to be similar, if not as intense (or painful) as the physical therapy exercises. I called my physiatrist, Dr. Doroba and asked her about this. “As long as you do something, as long as you are still building muscle tone, and keeping yourself fluid and moving, go ahead and do Tai Chi a couple times a week. Maybe you’ll keep doing exercise.” (She knew that I was skipping my therapy more and more often.) She also said that at almost every conference of Physical Therapy she’d attended in recent years, Tai Chi was a big subject. . .
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About the Book
Therapeutic Tai Chi is a gentle form of daily physical activity, developed with medical experts and physical therapists, that is based on the ancient forms of Tai Chi Ch'uan. Therapeutic Tai Chi is the tool used by the author to rise above crippling Multiple Sclerosis. The book includes ove fifty gourmet recipes from the "Chef Garibaldi" cookbook. Each chapter is fully illustrated with photography that details the movements.
About the Author
Gary Paruszkiewicz was a celebrated gourmet chef, certified by the American Culinary Federation, and a member of "Chefs de Cuisine de Chicago", working and managing some impressive restaurants in the midwest. In 1990, he was diagnosed with MS, and by 1994, he was using a wheelchair, taking up to 16 tablets of Valium(r), and 2400 Mg Ibuprofin everyday. Through stress management studies, and using the ancient Chinese techniques of Tai Chi and Qi Gong, Gary has risen above MS, and now teaches wellness programs, Stress Mgt. workshops, and Tai Chi classes almost every day.
Gary has a BA in Psychology, and is a Certified Stress Management Educator
He is the owner of Stress Mgt. Workshops, Inc., Director of Community Wellness Programs of the Kankakee Valley Park District, and teaches through Kankakee Community College as well. He is the presenter/instructor of Therapeutic Tai Chi and Integrative Qi Gong(c) at the Heartland Spa (a "Top Ten Destination Spa"). He is a member of International Stress Mgt. Assn., and the Qi Gong Assn. He is a member of the advisory board of the Arthritis Foundation, and a former Adjunct Professor with Governors State University.
Gary has been the keynote speaker at many wellness conferences, has made presentations nationally and regionally, and works closely with commmunity groups, teaching Therapeutic Tai Chi, Integrative Qi Gong(c), A.R.M. Method of Stress Mgt.(c),and "Continuing Improvement...for life!" workshops. He has presented the "Therapeutic Tai Chi In-a-Chair" program with the MS Foundation, the National MS Society, and with many disability support groups, such as the Parkinson's Disease group, and the Arthritis and Fibromyalgia support groups.