Today’s episode is an interview with Dreena Burton, who really had a huge impact on me in my early days of veganism, with her very approachable and delicious vegan recipes. But the reason why I wanted to have her on the show is because she also teaches a fascia method and she shared some helpful information on movement and pain and how fascia really affects your overall health, and her work is so beneficial for menopause.
Dreena Burton is the OG vegan author with six solo printed titles and two additional books co-authored with Dr. Neal Barnard. A lifelong student and teacher of movement and health, Dreena teaches fascial self-stretching to give others the tools to regain a youthful body free of pain and stiffness. You can learn more about her work through DreenaBurton.com and FasciaFlo.com.
AP: Welcome to the podcast, Dreena.
DB: Hi, Anna. Thank you for having me.
AP: I wanted to invite you on to talk about fascia because I think it's really relevant to women in perimenopause. And I'm really excited to ask you questions and learn from you.
DB: Yes, great. Yeah, thank you. It's especially relevant, I think, as we age and we're now starting to understand a little more about fascia, but it's really evolving. It's really quite, for a lot of people, it's unknown. Kind of like how when I started plant based, that was rather unknown 25 years ago. And I feel like at that place with this work, too.
AP: Oh, wow. Yeah, it's a complicated system from what I've heard.
DB: Yeah, it's so complex yet beautiful. Like the fascia is in every area of our body. Everything is touched and penetrated and encased and protected and connected by fascia. I think a lot of us imagine fascia as being like this layer under the skin. And that's the fascia because sometimes we get myofascial release at a massage therapist or do some try to release ourselves, like with a massage ball or something like that. But it's so much more than that.
It is continuous and ever present in our bodies. It begins forming at two weeks in the embryonic phase, stage of life. So it's there before everything really, even before the heart begins beating. So we're self-forming through the fascia. The organs grow out of the fascia. And in our bodies, it literally penetrates the muscles and wraps muscle fibers and coats the bones and even penetrates into the bone.
So it's really such an important tissue that we all need to connect with and learn about.
Dreena's transition from vegan cookbook author to fascia work
AP: Well, that's great that you can share this information with everyone. I just wanted to go back because you have quite a few vegan cookbooks, and actually, your cookbook, Everyday Vegan, was one of my first cookbooks that I ever bought. And there's one recipe in there that it was a chocolate tofu cake. Or it was a chocolate cake with tofu icing. And that has impressed a lot of non-vegans. Anyway, I just wanted to hear from you how you transitioned from cookbook author to Fascia FLO.
DB: Yeah. Funny you mentioned that book. It's like such a relic now.
AP: Before vegan was cool.
DB: And even like the style and everything about it. I look back on it like with fondness, but it's also kind of like a little cringy too, you know. But yeah, that chocolate cake is probably my favorite recipe in the book or one of. Yeah, so I mean, it's interesting because I feel like my life, I've always had two parallel interests. I've always been interested in healthy food and cooking and developing recipes.
And then I've also always been involved in movement myself. Like exercise has been a part of my life since I was like a teenager. I wasn't involved in exercise as a kid. I wasn't involved in sports. I wasn't an athletic kid. But in my teens, I just started to exercise myself and it just kind of carried through my life.
And of course, the type of exercise I do now is different than when I was in my 20s. And I think it's important for women going through perimenopause and menopause to evaluate that. Just sort of observe what they're doing and maybe tweak because sometimes the movement that we've been doing for decades is not serving us well in the space of life. Like a little less is more.
And I took yoga teacher training, I think it's about seven years ago now. And something really called to me to take yoga teacher training. And I wasn't even sure I wanted to teach. I just felt like I wanted to do it from my own knowledge. And I think because I was doing yoga and still feeling like twinges and pains in my body. And I didn't quite understand. Like I felt like yoga was supposed to really open up and help things feel more free and mobile.
But I did begin to teach and I started teaching in yoga, which I love to teach. But even with yoga, my body still had these pains. And I felt like it was diet-related for a long time.
You know, I think we live in a culture now too, that we feel like food is everything. And it's not everything in our health, right? There's so much we can do for our health related to food, but our bodies are more than what we ingest through food. It's what we ingest through life as a whole. And when I was looking at, you know, my diet, I'm thinking I'm eating pretty well. I'm not sure why I still have like pain. And I actually was seeing someone, a naturopath that does prolotherapy. And that's where they inject into areas of the body for relief. And it's like a homeopathic kind of solution to help with healing. And I was explaining to her that I was feeling like heaviness in my joints and I didn't feel good.
And she said, you know, I think you might have a food sensitivity and let's do some food testing. We did. And I did have a very strong sensitivity to pea protein, which we look at plant based products right now.
It's in so much. And I'm always talking on social and online about this because, you know, you can eat a pretty wholesome vegan plant-based diet, but if this sneaky little ingredient is in a lot of foods like yogurts, it's in cereals, it's in snack bars, it's in you granola, it's in so much, not just the plant-based meats. It kind of becomes this irritant in the body that we're consuming.
It's very processed and I think a little bit is fine, but if it's in things and you don't realize it, then it can become inflammatory. So that was my situation. So I got that out of my diet and things improved so much.
Like my body felt really good, but I still had these pain points. And it was frustrating because it was like turmeric didn't take care of it. Ginger didn't take care of it.
And as we move into this time of our lives, like in our forties, we start to notice these pains come up as our hormones change as well and things going on in the body. Yoga never really took care of those pain points either. And then I found this course online and it was about fascia.
I went, Oh, interesting. It was like, and as something was like this, light was like shining off my screen to me saying, you need to do this. Like I was just magnetized to it.
I can't even explain like how much I felt pulled to learn and do this. So I did it and it was backwards. I'm like, this is the opposite of what I've been doing in a movement in yoga and stretching all my life.
What all of us know how to stretch. It's the opposite. And I kind of felt like it was awkward. And so I sort of kind of went off it for a little bit, but then I came back to it and I kept with it. And after a few weeks, I noticed things change. I can notice I could look over my shoulder.
Like I would drive and turn over my shoulder and there'd always be something there restricting my movement and it hurt. And I had pain here and the back of the shoulder and the SI joint. And in time, everything just started to dissolve.
And I was like, wow, this is changing my body when nothing else had like prolotherapy would be wonderful for a few weeks, but then this would come back. You know, chiropractic would feel good for a day and then it would come back.
So I just took a deep dive and did training online and I went to the States to do training. And I've just felt like so blessed to learn about it and have it in my life now and be able to teach others because it's really been not just helping remove pain from my body, but also giving energy and just better synchronicity of all the systems, I guess in the body. So I feel like, uh, part of my work in, in writing cookbooks has helped me share this too.
Because I already had a community of people who sort of know me and trust what I'm doing. And so when I say this has really changed my life, they know that it has. And so they kind of came on board and tried it with me.
So it's been, it's been a fun little like journey over the past few years.
AP: Oh, that's great. I love that when you get sort of an intuitive feeling that you're going in the right direction.
DB: Yeah, it was undeniable. It was like something was pulling me to do it. And I couldn't say no, you know, I just had to follow it.
AP: That's awesome. So what were some of your other health shifts that you had aside from pain release?
How Fascia FLO works
DB: Yeah. So the system, the Fascia FLO work, what it does is it changes the fascia from the inside out. So for people who get myofascial release, you know that they work from the skin and it's hurts, right? It can be painful cause they're trying to manipulate and work out points.
This doesn't hurt, it's effort. You know, it's like a workout, but it doesn't hurt because we're working from the inside out. And it is the only thing that really changes that fascia on the deep level from the inside out.
So not only is it changing the fascia so that, because the fascia, when it's restricted, when it's dense, it's supposed to slide and glide very smoothly and be hydrated. And over time with how we move with repetitive activities, just with life, it starts to get dry and stagnant. And so the muscles are trying to move within it, but it's restricted.
It's almost like a straight jacket around the muscles. And so then other muscles have to compensate. And this is when we get pulls and tears and discomforts and pains and the yanking on the tendons and that kind of thing.
So that's one component is where it really helps the joints feel free and spacious again. But then it also connects with the energy system of Chinese medicine. So anyone who is familiar with acupuncture knows that you can needle certain points to bring energy into an organ and all of the associated functions and connections with that organ.
And this works in the same way when we connect with a particular FLO is what I call it. For instance, the inside of the leg is connected to the liver. Yeah, it's so cool.
It's just so cool. The back of the shoulder here and down the arm to the back of the pinkies connected with the small intestine. So if we know we have stuff going on with the gut, we can work the small intestine, the stomach, the pancreas, spleen.
If we know that our liver is sometimes feeling overtaxed, if we have seasonal allergies and we're trying to process that histamine from the overactivity of these pollens creating that hormone reaction in our body, we can support that with more liver work. So we actually are nourishing the organ systems with this work. So for myself, not only have I like changed that pain in my body, I feel my energy is really stable and great.
Like I feel really good. My digestion is better. My immunity has improved.
There's been a few times where people in the house have cycled through colds and I'm like, I do not want this cold. It's like when you've got four other people living with you. And you know that it's probably going to come your way, but there's things you can do to boost the immunity from the inside out.
So some people notice other things too, right? It really depends. You can have emotional benefits and energetic benefits. If you feel like you're somebody who gets frustrated a lot, then you can again work the liver meridian because it deals with frustration, process it in the body, the lungs process grief.
So it's like all of these components of wellness can come together. And yeah, it's pretty phenomenal. Some of my students have noticed again, not just removing pain, but they, you know, it's not just for activities and being able to exercise and things like that.
It's like daily life. Like when someone can get up out of bed and put their socks on and that is the mobility they need or they can garden or they can play with their grandkids, you know, that's the quality of life. So that's pretty huge to me is just having that quality of life.
AP: Yeah. So it sounds very holistic and I love that aspect. It kind of makes you just feel good in your whole body.
DB: Absolutely. And what's especially wonderful is that the students that, you know, people who are members with my site, most of them are also plant based. And so when you're nourishing your body in that way too, with lots of whole foods and nutrient dense foods, then you're helping with the recovery from the process.
Because when you're doing this work, it's like when you get a pedicure and they're sloughing away at the heel and getting the dry skin off, it's kind of like getting that debris of the old dry fascia off and it sloughs away through the excretion in the body. So when you can recover from that better, then you also feel, you know, more, you feel better when you have the recovery component as well and you're eating well and hydrated and all those things.
AP: Yeah, I guess the hydration must be really important when you're doing that type of work as well.
DB: Yeah, definitely. Because healthier fascia, it's like, it's like when you have a plant that's really dry and you try to water it and the water just goes through and hold in the soil. As your fascia gets healthier, it begins to hold more moisture, more hydration, which you want, right? You want it to be very hydrated.
So yeah, taking in hydration, not just through drinking lots of water, but, you know, nutrient or water rich foods as well, that will help hydrate.
How Fascia FLO helps women in perimenopause
AP: Yeah, which we get a lot of as vegans already. How would fascial work be helpful for someone going through perimenopause?
DB: Yeah, I wish I had it when I was going through perimenopause. I'm on the other side now. And when I was going through perimenopause, I didn't know that's what it was. And I'm so grateful to people like you who are doing this kind of work, because I feel like women have come through this like time and have been all before our time, right? I have not known and understood menopause.
I feel like women are well more educated about hitting puberty and getting their period than this, time of life, the cessation of it. And you actually think that you're going crazy is what happens for most women or a lot of women, you think you're you're losing it. That's what I felt.
I thought I was having a nervous breakdown. My anxiety was just over the top. I was crashing, trying to keep it together for my family, my kids, all that kind of thing.
And really, it's partly some, you know, symptomatic of that time of life. And I feel like if women know that in their maybe early 40s, I think even late 30s, that they can start visiting a doctor, a naturopath or a good doctor that will help guide them because you can do your blood work and know when the hormones are shifting and guide you through with more grace than having to like crash. So in terms of the Fascia FLO work, in Chinese medicine, the kidneys, they govern the reproductive system and the kidneys stored what's called this jing, this life essence.
And as we age, that declines and the decline of that jing is also exacerbated by too much stress, too much overactivity. Well, that's our life. That's basically most women's lives is like stress and running around and doing things.
And so with that decline, if we're not sort of nourishing the kidneys, that can be, you know, a little more pronounced in a body. And then in terms of other organs, the pancreas and spleen also are associated with the uterus and the liver is important for this phase of life and the heart as well. The heart is often connected to sleep disturbances.
So when we can, again, connect with these certain FLOs, you're now making me think I want to do a perimenopause sequence. I think I should.
AP: That would be amazing.
DB: To target all of those meridians. Again, we can bring the energy back into the body. And so, again, with in terms of the fascia, when it's dense, you can think of it like a traffic jam, the energy is not flowing well.
How Fascia FLO targets meridians to benefit your organs
So if we have a lot of density where the kidney meridian is, and energy is not flowing well, then it's not flowing to the organ well. And then when we do the fascia work, it helps to open it up and let the energy flow. So yeah, there's certain organs we can connect with to improve that communication in the body.
AP: Would you say you're toning the organs?
DB: Yeah, that's a nice way of expressing it. It's like tonifying, nourishing. And, you know, sometimes we don't, I think none of us really know one or more of our organs is a little bit depleted or a little more vulnerable.
And if we're doing this work fairly regularly, we can assist, you know what I mean? Assist that energy through all the systems. But yeah, that's a nice way of explaining it.
AP: And I guess increasing blood flow to the ovaries and to the uterus would make a difference. Like if the fascia is kind of all bound up in that area, then it would block.
DB: Exactly. And the meridians associated with the liver, the liver runs up into the groin space, the pancreas and spleen actually encircles like the uterus. So yeah, if you've got density there and restriction and compression, it is compressing and preventing free movement and free communication.
AP: And do you follow the meridian lines when you do the fascia remedies?
DB: Yeah, I mean, I think you have to imagine it somewhat in your head, like imagine you're working with it. And when I teach classes, I'll explain we're now in, say, for instance, we're doing the gallbladder and I'll say we're working the IT band area associated with the gallbladder meridian. And I'll explain that runs down, it actually runs the entirety of the outer body all the way up into the head. So people who have migraines, sometimes it's associated with often is the gallbladder meridian. And so I'll try to explain roughly where it is in the body so they can visualize and try to connect with it. And when then we work with the areas of fashion that are holding the most volume because that's where most of the torquing happens.
So if we are working, for instance, the IT band where it has more volume on the side of the leg. That's where most of the density in most people will occur and it begins to pull and torque on the other areas. So yeah, we're following the meridian lines that if you were to look up Chinese medicine meridians those are the planes that we work in terms of fascia.
Why the source of your pain might surprise you
AP: That's so cool. And you also reminded me that I've heard of fascia as being described as like the way that it's connected -- so like if you're wearing a shirt and you pull on the bottom of your shirt on the right side, then you would feel it on the left shoulder. So like one area can totally affect other areas that seem far away and don't seem like it's connected to it, but it all is.
DB: Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned that. When we feel pain, we often want to go after it, right? We go to massage and say, I feel pain here, can you massage here?
But the pain here is not usually, it's not coming from there, it's coming from somewhere else. So and that's frustrating because if someone starts working on your body and you're, you feel pain here and they're working back here, you're saying, no, I want you to get in there. That's the victim, right?
That's the victim what's suffering from the cause of the density somewhere else. And so that's a really cool awareness that when you start working with these movements, and there's really a system, it's a system that works so effectively, for instance, if you have pain in the front of the shoulder, and it's, I'll just say, for instance, it's in the area of the heart meridian, then you know you need to create, to clear the density in the small intestine meridian because a small intestine muscle group balances. The heart and the reason that area is suffering is because the other muscle group isn't working well.
So it's not working well and this one has to overwork and that's where we feel the strain and the pain. So it's really, really, really cool to sort of understand that our bodies are, it's complex, but it's simple in the same way. It's hard to understand at first, but when we get it and we just start working with it, then it's like magic.
It feels like magic, actually. It's like, how does this work? I don't know, it's magic.
But yeah, where we feel the pain is not where it's coming from and the fascia is so interconnected. We are literally connected from head to toe that we can imagine that a pain in the head could be coming from something going on in the hamstring, right? That's how connected we are. It's very common.
AP: So you kind of get to go exploring and try and find out where that cause is from.
DB: Yeah, totally. Although students will sometimes come to me and say, I have a pain here, like it's in the hip joint. And I know I can explain to them, well, you need to work stomach and pancreas. Those are the two organ groups and meridians that are associated with the hip joint where the femur meets the hip joint. And so if they're having pain right in that area, I can say, you need to focus on those two FLOs. But I always say you still need to do full body because you can't pull one thing out and say, just work on this.
There's always other interplaying relationships. So I'll say do a full body FLO like once or twice a week and then focus on these. And that's going to help with the hip joint.
Similarly, if someone has plantar fasciitis, which is really common, I can say work the spleen pancreas meridian. That's going to ease that issue in your body. And it does.
So it's a system that's pretty mapped out and you can explore yourself. Like I like to kind of get on the mat and go, what's going on in my body? And try to work around and find little spots.
But at the same time, some of it's somewhat prescribed. We know some of it's connected quite directly and we can work with it.
How does Fascia FLO work?
AP: Okay, so the system that you're using, it sounds a lot more detailed than just using a tennis ball or, you know, I've seen people use sort of a rolling pin. Do you use any tools in your method?
DB: No, you don't need anything. You just need your body. And I have flows where, and again, I use the word FLO. It's not a yoga flow. It sounds like it, but it's FLO. It actually is an acronym for how the system works.
It's, you need to contract the muscle. It's a flex of the muscle. And then you keep the resistance. So for instance, if it's a bicep curl, but we don't really do bicep curls in class, but just because everyone knows what a bicep curl is. This is when your muscles contract it. So this is your flex. So you feel that engagement and you keep it. You keep that contraction and then you lengthen the muscle with that resistance. That's the lengthen. F: flex.
L is lengthen. And then always observe when the resistance fades. That's when you let it go and you start again. We don't lengthen into a stretch. So this is what we've been told to do. Right? When we stretch, we just lengthen, but that's just lengthening. And a muscle needs to contract and lengthen and rotate and all of this stretching creates little micro tears. And the body goes in and puts in more fascia for the micro tears, which creates more density.
So this formula, flex, lengthen, observe the flow, is what engages the fascia from the inside out and begins to slough away dry, dead fascia, rehydrate what's there to make it purposeful and healthy once again. And you don't need anything other than working on the mat or on a chair. I have members who don't like to get down on their knees.
So we work on a chair. I use yoga blocks sometimes for my hands, but that's it. And that's why it's not painful because you're not rolling on anything or using a tool to manipulate, which, you know, if you want to use those, that's fine. Go for it. But in this work, you don't need it.
Who Fascia FLO is for
AP: Can anyone do this work?
DB: Yeah, really anyone can. You just need to be a little curious and a little willing. I have members, most of my members are over 40 because that's when stuff starts to crop up. Most of us don't feel pain in our bodies in our 30s, unless we're perhaps, you know, a very dedicated like musician and we're doing that repetitive motion with an instrument over and over. And that creates a lot of density in areas of the body or for an athlete and doing repetitive motion like, you know, a tennis pro or something like that.
Most of us don't have pains until we're in our 40s, because that's when life starts to get stuck, right? That's when the density starts to accumulate over time. But I have members who are in their 80s.
And then I have my daughter who's a competitive swimmer. I get her doing it too, because I know it's going to help her muscles perform better. So really, it is for everyone.
Fascia and tight hamstrings
AP: I'm thinking this would be really good for people who have an office job too.
DB: Yes, yes. Because we sit so much. We sit far more than our bodies are meant to sit and it's part of life. We can't not sit most of us driving, driving to work, parents driving their kids around. I mean, parents can spend like three hours a day commuting kids. Look, it's ridiculous.
And all of that sitting is really hard on the low back and shoulders and the density begins to build up in the hamstrings. And the hamstrings create, they set up our pelvis. And so if you go to a physiotherapist, often they manipulate your pelvis.
They want to see what's happening with the pelvis, because the pelvis sets up the spine and the shoulders and the head. And if our pelvis is off, our shoulders are off. So the hamstrings that they have a lot of density, they pull on the pelvis and create an over arch in the pelvis, either too flexed or too extended.
So that's where most of us have a ton of densities in the hamstrings. And I'm always talking to my students about doing the hamstrings. And we're actually going to start a hamstring challenge because we did a class yesterday of just hamstrings.
And I had members after going, I can't believe my shoulders feel so good after that class. And we did nothing for the shoulders. It was all hamstring work, but that's how powerful it is when there's density in the backs of the legs affecting the pelvis, affecting the upper body.
AP: So is it sort of like if your head is forward and your body is kind of collapsing forward, then your hamstrings take the brunt of that and just try to hold everything up?
DB: Yeah, and you know, they are holding us up. Our hamstrings are holding us up in the IT band area. It's very stable tissue, but it can become overtight. And any time we're sitting in a way that we're just sitting too long, our body is responding. We're always creating our fascia, really. Everything we do imprints our fascia.
And if we had no bones, no muscles, we'd still have our shape because it's our fascia. It's like a fingerprint, right? Everyone's fascial imprint is unique to them, and it's based on their life experiences.
It's based on traumas, not just physical activities. But yeah, when we sit, our hamstrings are very extended in one area or long in one area and shorten another. So then again, the body goes in to keep us protected.
And that is usually by laying down more connective tissue, which it's doing in an adaptive response, right? It's good for us. It's keeping us from injury, but it's creating postural misalignments and discomforts.
AP: That's so fascinating, Dreena.
DB: It is. I call it fascia-nating because I'm working like that.
How to get started with Fascia FLO
AP: How can people get started with this?
DB: If they want to just try a couple of free classes and they can hop over to my site and you can sign up for my newsletter and it will bring you right to a page with some free classes to try out. And you can start sensing right away, even after a few movements, how it feels different than anything you've done before and how it starts to create more mobility and space. So they can just hop right to my site, try some free classes and then consider maybe joining, giving it a try for a month or so.
AP: Can you explain a little bit about your programs?
DB: Yeah. So right now I have memberships to my site that are monthly or three month memberships with a discount and there's bonuses for the longer term memberships and an annual membership as well. And then if people are a little uncertain about memberships because some people don't want to sign up for something, you know, monthly or three months or whatever.
I have a program, it's called Fundamentals, and it's like a one time you purchase it. It's a platform that you have the videos forever. You can download them, do them wherever you're going.
So even some of my regular members have that program as well for when they're travelling and they don't have internet, they can have the videos on their screen and practice that way as well. But the bonus with the members and the membership is that we have live classes. And when we have, we have two live classes a week, and then I get to interact with people and I can look at them on screen and help them out if they need some guidance with their form or if they have questions.
And having that community is special because sometimes we need that to get going, you know what I mean? Like some of us can do it on our own very well, but a lot of us want to have a group setting, even if it's online, right? If it's on Zoom, which is where I teach, having that community kind of fuels you to get through the class.
I say get through, but it's not like a workout where you're like slugging it out, but you are involved and you're engaged. And I don't play music just because I really want people to be connected to what they're doing in their body and the sensations. And yeah, being with other people and doing that is really fun.
How long it takes to free your fascia
AP: How long are the various FLOs?
DB: Oh, great question. So our regular Thursday class is usually an hour. Sometimes it's like 50 minutes. I aim for 45 minutes to an hour. And then the weekend classes, we usually go about a half hour, but I'm often known to go longer, 45 minutes or so. But for sure, the live classes are like a full class.
And then in the members area, I have videos ranging from like 10 minutes to I don't usually go longer than an hour. I feel like that's enough for most people. But I say to my regulars, even if you do 10 minutes a day of something, it's better than nothing, right?
Get in the consistency because that consistency, it's like a habit. It's like brushing your teeth. I feel like it's like brushing the fascia. So if you can do a little bit every day, wow, it makes a huge difference. And then I have themes for digestion, immunity, flows to do before and after a walk, things like that. FLOs before bedtime with some acupressure. So there's some different styles of classes in there too.
AP: That's great to know that people can still make a difference even if they only have 10 or 20 minutes.
DB: Yeah, you know, my practice myself right now, I'm glad you mentioned that because I do about 20 minutes every day. And I don't usually do more than that. That's really my morning practice.
I go through the entire there's eight muscles and meridians in the upper body and eight in the lower body. And so I go through this sequence of all of them and I do it every morning. It's like 20 minutes.
It's very doable, right?
AP: Yeah.
DB: So even if you can do a little bit, it makes a huge difference.
AP: Yeah, so it's not overwhelming at all. If you only have a few minutes, you can still do something.
Why fitness doesn't need to be painful
DB: Yeah, I think we've been, you know, in our culture, we feel like exercise has to be this long drawn out process of like slugging it out of the gym for an hour.
AP: No pain, no gain.
DB: Exactly. That was what we grew up with. And it's funny. It's like, how did humans get to this place where we have to go to a gym to move? To move our bodies, really, we should be able to find ways that are maybe a little more accessible than driving to a gym. If you love it, great. Do it. But I think a lot of people would rather find more convenient ways to feel good in their bodies.
AP: And I find the treadmill incredibly boring.
DB: Yeah. Yeah.
AP: I mean, the "dreadmill".
DB: I like that!
AP: Yeah. I see you on Instagram bouncing on your rebounder. Can you talk about that? Is it related to the fascia?
DB: It's not related at all. I love my rebounder. And again, I do it, I'd say like about three or four mornings a week. And I never bounce for more than about 10 or 15 minutes. Again, I think we feel like we need to be doing these things for a half hour an hour.
And especially at this stage in our lives as women, it can be depleting to do that much in our bodies. So I bounce about like 10, 15 minutes. It's really good for circulation and lymph flow in the body.
It feels good. It's fun. It's soft and easy on the joints.
And I use a Bellicon. It's not noisy. It's a bungee cord, not a spring.
So it's not noisy. And it's a really nice way to get some cardio if you are one that likes a bit of cardio, which I am. I just like that little pickup of heart rate.
Really nice for the joints and good for balance and proprioception and all of these things that are good for us as we age. So I love it. And it's not related.
But I will say I do have a rebounding section in my class where I do fashion flow on the rebounder. So I use the rebounder in a way that we can hold it to resist and move and use it as a platform to do the work. So that's kind of fun.
AP: That sounds fun. And it looks like you're having a lot of fun on the rebounder.
DB: I love it. I really love it.
AP: We have a lot of wildfire smoke throughout the summer sometimes. So I'm thinking of ways that I can get cardio while I'm stuck inside. So that seems like probably a really good way.
DB: Yeah, definitely. And again, like you can do it's one of those things where you have to pick and choose. You have to go on YouTube and find videos that work for you.
But I do find there's a lot that are on there that are like 45 minutes or a half hour. And most of us, 15 minutes is quite sufficient. And you can find those online.
And I will say with Fascia FLO, too, it's very it's hard to imagine that it offers this, but it does. It offers some cardio benefit when you're working through the movement, certain ones especially. You get a cardio response and you're also strength training.
So it's very good for the bones and bone health. So your strength training, you're getting a little cardio and you're changing the fascia. So it's it's a nice thing because I have a lot of students say, do I still need to strength train? I'm like, you don't really, if you want to go for it, but you're doing it already.
AP: That's so interesting. How does it give you a cardio effect?
DB: It's just the there's resistance involved with every movement, right? So there's you're resisting a muscle and then you're lengthening. And when you're doing that in certain areas of the body, there can be a lot of resistance.
Like in where there's density, there's a lot of resistance. So it's effort, a lot of effort to move through it. And you're doing a number of repetitions.
So it just picks up the heart rate, especially with certain planes that you're working with, as I mentioned. And the strength training is there, too. And I have found because for a period of time, I was like, no, I still think I need strength training.
And when I've done some strength training, I feel it in my joints. It doesn't feel good in my body anymore. And when I do this, my joints feel good.
So I always say to members, if you want to do strength training, by all means, it's like I don't want to discourage people from doing the things they love to do, but make sure you do some of this after to take that wear out of the body. Because everything else we do in life is kind of aware on the joints and this freeze it up again.
Where to find Dreena
AP: Well, that's so interesting. I really hope that listeners go and check out your programs. Where can they find you?
DB: Yeah, my site is fasciaflo.com. And if they search my name, Dreena + fascia, they'll find it that way, too, if they just Google my name and fascia.
AP: Well, thank you so much for being here. I really enjoyed the information. And you have so much to share. I really appreciate it.
DB: It's a pleasure. Thanks, Anna. It's been nice to chat and wonderful to be able to explain more about this with your audience. So thanks for having me.
AP: Thank you.
Dreena's websites: dreenaburton.com and fasciaflo.com
Follow Dreena on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dreenaburton/
Follow Dreena on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DreenaBurtonPlantPoweredKitchen
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