For this month's Mind, Body and Spirit we present a personal account of a Native American Sweatlodge Ceremony. Clearly this was a powerful and healing experience. Healing can take place in many ways. Healing can be physical, emotional, and spiritual, or any combination. The methods and ways that people with cancer have healing experiences are numerous, ranging from specific rituals such as the sweatlodge, to a variety of individual experiences, relationships and techniques. Sometimes healing is visible, such as reduction in 'tumor size' on a CT scan. Other times, healing is invisible and indescribable. I believe that sharing healing experiences can be healing itself.

The Healing Power of a Native American Sweatlodge Ceremony

Marilyn Youngbird flew out from her Rocky Mountain home in Colorado and met with us in a preparatory session for two hours on March 10 in the Maffly Auditorium of the Alta Bates Comprehensive Cancer Center. From Arikara-Hidatsa descent, her authenticity and down to earth demeanor was apparent to everyone who attended , igniting the excitement of anticipation for the ceremony the following day.

We gathered on private property in Moss Beach at 9:00 a.m. on March 11 and began the proceedings that led to this Sweatlodge Ceremony, sponsored by the local nonprofit organization called Healing Adventures. All 21 of us took part in the Rock Ceremony and the building of the fire. The Native American tradition recognizes the rocks as beings of natural substance and Spirit. We got to know them as "Rock People" and our prayers went into each one individually. These were heated in the fire for hours and subsequently brought into the Sweatlodge one by one. Some rocks will explode when subjected to such heat. Not these. You have to know your rocks. As these Rock People absorbed the heat of the fire Marilyn instructed us each step of the way.

We sat down on blankets and tarps to make our prayer bundles. They contain tobacco and many species of sage and other herbs. A long, silent and meditative period followed as these herbs were carefully wadded into 2 inch green cloth squares and tied into strings of 16 prayer bundles by each of the participants. These would decorate the interior roof of the Sweatlodge along with other sacramental and symbolic cloths and prayer bundles all of which were explained to us in detail by Marilyn Youngbird. We were told that 4 days later our green prayer bundles would be burned in follow-up ceremony and that their smoke will rise with our prayers.

Now it was time to strip down to our cotton shorts and t-shirts and go barefoot into the Womb of the Earth Mother, the Sweatlodge dome. Before entering, some of us placed personal and sacred objects on the altar mound outside the door to the Sweatlodge. What transpired in the following hours I cannot report. Suffice it to say that everyone received exactly what they needed on a very individual basis. I have no words to describe it.

We each emerged in a significantly altered state. Not an altered state of consciousness but altered physiologically, psychologically, emotionally and spiritually. Much healing had taken place on this adventure. Bonds were forged. We had a chance to mingle with each other afterward as we dined on our potluck buffet.

I engaged a fellow in conversation, previously a stranger to me. I recalled that Marilyn introduced this man earlier in the day as having miraculously recovered from leukemia after his doctors had given up on him. He had participated in well over a hundred Sweatlodge Ceremonies with Marilyn Youngbird over the past two decades. He seemed awestruck as he told me that he could not recall one more powerful than this experience on this day. As I looked around me I saw the faces of people ranging in age from 25 to 60 years but I felt as if I were on a first grade school field trip because each face I gazed upon appeared to be 5, 6 or 7 years old, bright and shining and fresh as a daisy. Such smiles as I will never forget!

There were three of us in our car as we drove home with the sun setting over the Pacific Ocean. I remember thinking that I would do this again someday at another point in my life when I feel the calling. This experience was a rite of passage for many if not all of us. There was true personal growth bringing strength and a deeper understanding of our connectedness to all things in Nature. Thank you, Marilyn Youngbird! Thank you, Patient Resource Center! Thank you, Healing Adventures!

Laurence M. Klein
patient