Healing Gardens "The heart is like a garden: it can grow compassion or fear, resentment or love. What seeds will you plant there?” -Jack Kornfield The garden as a healing space has been something I've always valued, maybe you too have benefited from the restorative and healing nature of gardens. From a sense of connection to Life, Mother Earth and Beyond, to radical inclusion, to opportunities for reciprocity and contribution, to an opportunity to foster new ways of being in the world, it's always been fertile soil for some potential aspect of growth, even with limitations. In my personal experiences, I've seen how much the environment has the potential to intensify the consequences of various impairments and potentially exacerbates behavioural problems, or conversely, helps in the positive scaffolding of mental and cognitive disorders and related emotional distress. Green spaces and healing gardens have demonstrated objective and measurable improvements in well-being. Designing Gardens for Healthy Ageing The Art, Memory and Life garden [1,2,3] is a healing garden guided by a neuropsychological approach contributes to improving cognitive, behavioural and psychological disorders, providing cognitive rehabilitation and psycho-social enrichment. The healing garden includes various sensory elements such as varied scents, colours, textures, and sounds which helps fight against sensory deprivation and the garden, plants, and sculptures facilitate the evocation of autobiographical memories and the pleasure of sharing stories, and reminiscing. It helps provide a sense of harmony and sensory modulation. "The design was complemented by incorporating an artistic vision together with established design elements, the existing architecture (including pre-existing 4 squared areas of equal size) and a variety of sculptures around the theme of the four elements assigned to each respective square: Earth, Fire, Water, and Wind" 1 Figure 1. The Art, Memory and Life garden Designing Gardens for Special Needs Generally the higher degree of natural complexity, the greater the restorative potential in therapeutic gardens but they must allow easy orientation. Some common aims: - increased socialisation opportunities including with communicatively challenged individuals - feeling of self-determination and control - quieter places for solitude - increase the meaningful activity in their lives. - Reminiscence - Sensory stimulation - Sense of independence Figure 2 and 3 are gardens designed for autism. In severe autism, a garden devoid of sensory richness with a high level of predictability but allowing opportunities for sensory 2 input seems preferred Figure 2 Figure 3 3 In people with cognitive disorders, nature allows calming and focusing of the mind. A garden for dementia is picture in Figure 4 Figure 4 In severe learning disabilities (often lacking language or having impaired non-verbal communication skills), people often suffer hypostimulation (leading to aberrant behaviour) so one designs the garden with maximum variation, lots of different leaves, flowers, edible fruits, scents Eg: diversity of sections like a bog area, Zen garden, fish pond, meadow In spinal injuries, final picture, the patients often desired satisfying emotional needs in the garden with beauty, along with accessibility eg lots of perennial plants, seasonal variation and colour, see Figure 5 4 Figure 5 My own experiences with Healing Gardens Some time ago, I was involved in a 'Medicinal Herb Healing Patch' from scratch. It helped me develop a special healing relationship with plants while so ill. The medicinal patch became a sacred healing space for me to start caring for my personal ecosystem and stay connected in some way. It had an array of medicinal herbs and tea herbs. 5 Other Healing Gardens projects included a 'Bee and Butterfly garden', among others. It included things like Pink Yarrow, Lemon Bergamot, Dianthus, Butterfly Milkweed, Queen Anne's Lace, Cosmos, Sunflower, Calendula, Californian Poppy, Tagetes, Evening Primrose etc 6 References: [1] Gueib, Claire et al. ‘Impact of a Healing Garden on Self-Consciousness in Patients with Advanced Alzheimer’s Disease: An Exploratory Study’. 1 Jan. 2020 : 1283 – 1300. https://doi.org/10.3233/jad-190748 [2] Jonveaux, Thérèse Rivasseau and Fescharek, Reinhard. ‘When Art Meets Gardens: Does It Enhance the Benefits? The Nancy Hypothesis of Care for Persons with Alzheimer’s Disease’. 1 Jan. 2018 : 885 – 898. https://doi.org/10.3233/jad170781 [3] Jonveaux, Therese & Batt, Martine & Fescharek, Reihard & Benetos, Athanase & 7 Trognon, Alain & Chuzeville, Stanislas & Pop, Alina & Jacob, Christel & Yzoard, Manon & Demarche, Laetitia & Soulon, Laure & Malerba, Gabriel & Bouvel, Bruno. (2012). Healing Gardens and Cognitive Behavioral Units in the Management of Alzheimer's Disease Patients: The Nancy Experience. Journal of Alzheimer's disease : JAD. 34. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233838678 8