16 hours Ago By Harriet Flinn
A physical therapy trend helping reduce muscle tension is on the rise, and Perth woman Kerry Billstein is hoping to lead the way for WA to get behind fascia release as a stress-relief breakthrough. Every week for the past year, Ms Billstein, of Applecross, has been hosting free yoga-like workshops called Fascia Flow at Scarborough Beach to entice more people to use therapeutic exercise to relieve stress and improve flexibility. “It’s more about bringing our body into awareness, and people really empowering themselves by understanding their body and that their bodies are trying to speak to them,” Ms Billstein said.
“Fascia is our connective tissue that entwines itself amongst every bone, muscle, organ and fibre in our body. “When it becomes tight — and it becomes tight for many reasons, stress, trauma, dehydration, environmental — it constricts and causes tightness in our body, putting us in a state of unease.” The Scarborough workouts include a series of exercises and stretches that aim to loosen tight and fatty restrictive tissue, which Ms Billstein says is almost like an “immediate fix”.
“It really comes back to how efficient and how quick it is to assist people,” she said. “Just the quickness and the awareness that people get simply by doing a manoeuvre is really quite profound. I’ve never witnessed anything like that.
” Ms Billstein has had a lengthy career in body therapy work but it was only last year that she discovered fascia release during a tour of Canada. Her learnings quickly became a New Year’s resolution — which she’s proudly kept. “On the first of January this year I was committed to doing as many free classes as I could,” she said.
“I still run the free classes at Scarborough every Tuesday. I’m up to about 90 free classes now.” A return to her roots via a regional tour is next on the cards.
“I grew up in a very small community town and spent many years in the mining sector and I know that those areas don’t necessarily get all the latest wellness trends or get to experience stuff like this,” Ms Billstein said. “We’re just going to go to as many places we can with our workshops, which will be be a combination of free and paid classes.”.
