Day 6

Goddess Durga symbolizes the divine forces (positive energy) known as divine shakti (feminine energy / power) that is used against the negative forces of evil and wickedness. She protects her devotees from evil powers and safeguards them. It is believed that Goddess Durga is the combined form of powers of Goddesses Lakshmi, Kali and Saraswati.

Practice was really busy and Guruji seemed to be focussing his teaching on his nearest and dearest. Each day there is a small group of select students close to the trestle where he works and as he does his practice he teaches them. There is always an audience that gathers to learn from what he is giving them and often he teaches to include the audience. Today though he spoke very quietly and so I stayed away – he wanted to teach just them. Though from where I was I could clearly hear Abi’s tortured groans as she endeavoured to stay in Sirsasana and follow his instructions.

I cannot help but marvel at his tolerance – I don’t believe I could share my daily practice space with 100 plus ‘yoga tourists’ and I’m sure I would be deeply irritated as they all gawked at a personal lesson I was giving a family member. I went about my practice with Guruji’s voice in the background just a few feet away, almost shaking my head in disbelief – it’s amazing to be sharing my practice with such distinguished company – it’s like a devout catholic kneeling down to pray with the Pope every morning!

After practice I disconnected the pump, drank a 1/3 of a bottle of lucozade and jumped into a rickshaw to the laboratory to repeat the C-peptide test in a non-fasting state. Upon arrival I was told I would need to wait until 2 hours after the glucose, so I went next door to the ‘Shoppers Stop’ to kill time and found a nice blouse suitably modest to wear in India. Test results tomorrow and it will be interesting to see if there is any slight response in the insulin level to the glucose intake. Clearly there won’t be a full response as I’m type 1 diabetic, but will there be anything at all?

Medical class was quite an experience. I went in with a blood sugar of 7.2 and started with resting poses with my new understanding of correct positioning for the organic body. So Adho Mukha Svanasana, Uttansana and Prasarita Paddottonasna with concavity in the dorsal AND lumbar spine, head and mid thigh supported. Then we moved to trestle for supported ardha chandrasana with organ body in mind. When I came down Raya came and spoke to me and told me I was firing on all cylinders at once and I need to learn to do just one action, stabilise that action and the move onto next action. Not everything at once as it made me become hard or tense in the pose.

As I was given the next pose I realised I was hypo and checked sugar which in 30 minutes had dropped to 3.2. I disconnected the pump and took lots of Lucozade to bring the level back up, which normally works almost instantly. Today though it took longer and a few more doses of glucose, so my teacher called a halt to the active work and we moved to resting poses. Just as well as I had exhausted my glucose supply – enough to last me at least a week usually. The power in this work is incredible. It is well understood that aerobic activity can bring a sharp drop in blood sugars – but contrast this with the super-tough sequence of standing poses and inversions she gave me on Friday, where the sweat was dripping off of me and I didn’t need even a swig of glucose during it, yet here with a supported sequence designed to work on the pancreas the effect is immediate. It lasted until late in the evening where normal insulin requirements resumed. (later update here – up 3 times in the night for glucose, so effects have continued and will need to adjust insulin regime accordingly).

After class brought Lynda flowers for her birthday and stayed with them for some food. 

This family pulled up alongside us at a junction, to my left, out of shot is a veritable throng of cars, motorbikes and rickshaws all with engines revving, horns blaring and fumes spewing. See baby fast asleep oblivious to the chaos!

6th-january-2014