Knitting in cancer care with Susan Yaguda

Hello and welcome back to series two of the Why I

Knit podcast. My name is Dr. Mia Hobbs and I'm a clinical

psychologist who's passionate about knitting and its benefits

for our mental wellbeing. Each episode I interview a different

knitter about why they knit and how it benefits their mental

health. This week on the podcast I'm joined by Susan Yaguda.

Susan is an oncology nurse working at The Cancer Institute

in Charlotte, North Carolina. Susan joins me to talk about how

knitting has benefited her own wellbeing and also how she's

used knitting in her place of work with both staff and

patients. Please note that during our discussion, we do

talk about cancer and bereavement.

So hi, Susan. Welcome to the podcast.

Good morning! Thank you.

It's afternoon here but morning where you are.

Oh, it's good morning for me!

What's the time where you are?

It's 8 o'clock.

8 o'clock, so early! Thank you so much for joining

me.

That's okay, I'm a morning person.

Oh that's good, me too. I always start the podcast

by asking where your story with knitting began.

I grew up in a family of knitters, to be honest

with you. I'm the youngest of six. My mom, my aunts, my

sisters all knit, growing up. For some reason, I did not. I'm

not sure why. I did some cross stitch and that type of thing

and really enjoyed that. And then when my children were in

Montessori school, they were quite young, and another mom,

who was an amazing knitter, said, "Hey, could we do a

mother-daughter knitting group?" And so I was up for that, and

there were several other moms. So we would get together, the

kids would kind of knit for a few minutes, and then they'd go

off and do their own thing. But we really, as parents, enjoyed

the sense of community and of course learning a new skill.

That was about 20 years ago, I think, as my daughter is now 28.

So I think she was around 8 years old when we did that. And

I haven't stopped since. It's just been such a blessing to my

life for so many reasons that I'm really grateful to that mom

for spearheading it and getting me started on it.

So you hadn't knitted at all before that point?

No.

Oh wow!

The funny thing is now, my sisters and my mom... my

Yeah. So it really feels like part of your

mom is quite elderly so she doesn't knit as much now, but my

two sisters and I get together with my mom (particularly before

the pandemic we would) for what we would call a girls weekend.

We all had our knitting projects and have tea and good food and

wine and just really enjoy a nice weekend together, and

that's such precious time when I think about it now, that we just

enjoyed one another's company, but it was always around

knitting too. Sometimes we would go to the local yarn shop where

my mom lives and just enjoy that as well. So now we all share

patterns. We ask each other about different techniques we

might have questions about, and so it's really become something

that I'm very... I'm very close to my sisters but it's been

really a nice thing to bond us as well.

connection with your family now?

Yeah!

And do your kids still knit?

I have a son and a daughter, and thinking back like

20 years ago, I did teach my son how to knit and he's actually

very good. He didn't keep it up, though. And my daughter, she'll

pick it up from time to time. She actually lives in the UK

now. And so, you know, being away from home has been

difficult during these past couple of years. And so I really

have encouraged her because it's been so helpful to me to have

something in my hands. And so she'll pick it up now and then,

and does still enjoy it, so who knows what she might do in 20

years? So we'll see.

I think lots of people that I've interviewed,

and certainly for me, have had long dormant periods where they

didn't knit, and then suddenly it was the right moment in their

life, and they pick it up and kind of go with it again. You

said there are many ways it's been helpful for you. I'd love

about why you knit and how it's been

helpful for you.

So the practicality of it - I really

enjoy giving homemade gifts, handmade gifts to people. So

that's definitely part of it. I'm a little choosier now, who I

gift with my knitting, because I think I hear other knitters say

too, some people don't quite get it. But definitely, I have an

appreciative pool of family and friends, and enjoy doing that

for them. But really it's a mindfulness practice for me.

It's definitely a way... sometimes for me in the morning,

when I'm having my coffee, I'll just knit even if it's just for

five minutes. It just sets my day straight with a calmer

attitude, I think, about going into the day. And then

definitely towards the end of the day, too, I might have a cup

of tea and just pick up my knitting again. Even if I only

have a few minutes to do it, I still appreciate those moments,

just to de-stress, to kind of let go of anything that was

going on during the day so that I can get a restful night's

sleep. It really is a very big mindfulness practice for me.

Other than my sisters, I don't knit a whole lot with others.

But there is a sense of community, I think, around the

knitting world, whether that's through social media or going to

a local yarn shop. You can always talk to a knitter about

what they're doing, what they're interested in, and it inevitably

leads to other conversations too, that keep that kind of

sense of connectivity amongst us. And I think, particularly

during this pandemic time where we often feel disconnected, it's

really an important tool to to being connected with one

another. In my work it's really been important to connect with

patients even, and to allow them to connect with one another. So

I would say between being able to produce something that is

homemade and I can gift from my heart, to the mindfulness

practice, and then the connectivity piece of it, too,

it's just been a really rich hobby to have in my life.

I'd love to go on to ask you, in a minute, more about

your work and how you've used knitting there. But first of

all, I'm curious for yourself, like have you got specific

things you prefer to knit? Does it matter what the knitting is,

in terms of the techniques?

Yeah. So I usually have two things typically going

at once, and one is kind of a no-brainer - I can sit in a

meeting and it helps me pay attention, but not have to count

or follow a pattern or that type of thing. And then I like to

knit just about anything. I've gotten into socks and go in

spurts with that. Mittens... I had like a run on mittens! And

I'm working on a sweater right now for a friend's birthday.

Shawls... I really, really love to make shawls, especially if

the designer has some really clear instructions. Hats off to

designers! I think that it's just magic what they do, you

know, to be able to create a pattern, put it on paper, so

that I can just blindly follow the directions and then voila!

Here comes some beautiful piece, you know, just because they've

had that skill set to do that. So I do love to make shawls. I

haven't done certain techniques, like brioche I haven't tried.

I haven't either, actually! I wondered whether

maybe this was the year for me. [Laughs]

Yeah, me too! [Laughs] Yeah, so maybe try

that. I've done some lace work, and again I've enjoyed that,you

know, as long as I am able to pay attention to it as well. So

having something that's mindless, and then having

something where I do have to pay attention a little bit. I love

cables - to me they're magic as well, just how slipping one

direction or another just makes this beautiful pattern! And it's

fun to work on those too.

So have you got times when you feel like you need the

more complicated pattern? It sounds like there are times

where you need the simple one, which is if you've got to pay

attention to something else. I'm interested in the times you

might need the more complicated one.

Yeah, when you have to pay attention to

something, follow directions, make sure you're counting

properly, it kind of takes your mind away from other things that

might have been creating stress in your life or things you kind

of need to let go of. It's a nice distraction, if you will.

And then after working on something for a bit, the stuff

that was bothering you previously just doesn't seem to

be a big deal anymore and you can kind of let it go until

maybe the next day. And you'll address it with fresh eyes and

be able to maybe be more productive in how to manage

something that was going on. So there's also definitely times

where I'm like, "I can't concentrate on this right now.

I'm just going to enjoy the soothing aspect of the rhythm of

knitting and just feeling it in my hands, and go forward with

that, too."

Yeah. You're a nurse, working in oncology, and I'm

really interested to hear about how you've brought knitting into

your place of work. I'd love to hear more about that.

Yeah, thank you! So I manage a team of

integrative providers. We have a wide array of services. So we

don't treat cancer itself, but we help support people through

their cancer journey at any aspect along the way. And part

of my team is we have a group of artists. And so one of my

artists had started with us as a volunteer, and then we were able

to contract and bring her on, and she's just amazing. My whole

team is amazing, but she was really just open to anything.

And I said, "Hey, I really want to start a knitting and crochet

circle for our patients and care partners." And she was like,

"Sure, okay, but I need to learn how." [Laughs] So she went off

and took some lessons at a local yarn shop. And, of course, this

was several years ago, so she's a great knitter now, as well.

And so she started this group. Now it's on Zoom because we're

not meeting in person (hopefully, at some point in the

future), but I'm really happy that we were able to still

provide things virtually even, to help people stay connected.

And so the purpose of the group was not to do great knitting,

just like the purpose of the art programme is not to create great

art but it's really to use it as a processing opportunity to have

patients and care partners support one another. There's

something about when people have something that they're working

on in their hands, and for this group, obviously, it was

knitting, the conversation becomes much better flowing, I

think. People feel a little bit more comfortable sharing. They

find that they have shared experiences and can maybe have

their own experience authenticated because they're

hearing it from somebody else. It's just a very healing process

to have that type of support. And so Deborah, our artist that

was facilitating this and continues to, really her role is

just to maintain inclusivity with the group, to make sure

that the environment remains positive, that people feel

comfortable talking and sharing. And it's been just a really

positive experience all around. We also had some fun things come

out of that for community. So in our community, there's several

organisations. We're very philanthropically dependent, and

they help support us. And one is an organisation called 24

Foundation that does a 24-hour bike ride every summer in

Charlotte, where I live. It's a fundraiser, and a lot of those

funds go to support the programmes that I manage. And so

we got a bicycle, an older bicycle, and the people in the

knitting and crochet circle yarn bombed it! It's so cool-looking.

They did an amazing job. They had yarn bombed two chairs the

year previously, and we displayed them at a gala that we

had too, but this bike was something that we could give

back to the organisation that supports us, just as a way to

say thank you for all. So we bring it out when we have events

with them, and they in turn have gifted it back to us, and it's

actually hanging in our cancer rehab gym. But it's always just

a really nice reminder that we are all community supporting one

another through that. So that's been just fun. The chairs that

they did, it was really whimsical, little mice and

spider webs, and they did a beautiful job with that. And

those are on display in our cancer institution now, so

anybody can walk by and just enjoy taking a look at them. And

then from a medical perspective, I mean this is purely anecdotal,

but we had several patients who got chemotherapies that cause

neurotoxicity, and they can get neuropathy in their hands and

their feet, like a tingling and numbness. It really can be

distressing and impactful on things, even like buttoning a

shirt or walking safely, that type of thing. And one woman who

was really involved in this group also said that the

knitting helped her neuropathy, and she said, "If I could figure

out a way to knit with my toes, I could address it in my feet as

well!" But she swore that it was just keeping herself moving like

that, and maybe the tactile part of knitting, that helped her. So

that would be something that I would love to study at some

point. Can we really be impactful on that with something

so simple and low cost and extremely low risk, and make an

impact on something that really can be distressing to somebody

who's gone through cancer treatment.

What's the kind of feedback you've had from people

who've engaged in the knitting, so some of the people receiving

treatment for cancer?

It's really heartwarming to go into the

infusion suite and see people there knitting as a way to pass

the time. Oftentimes, they're there for several hours.

Is that when they're receiving their chemotherapy?

Yeah. And they really appreciate the community.

They come together when... you know, inevitably we have to say

goodbye to certain people at different times, and they really

come together as a community to support one another through that

grieving process. I think it also shines the light on...

well, for all of us but especially if you also are

dealing with cancer... your own mortality, and really coming to

terms with that, because you've lost somebody that you've been

close to. So I really appreciate that they form kind of a support

group amongst themselves. So that has been definitely one of

the outcomes that I was hoping for. The other thing is they

really have appreciated, particularly during the

pandemic, having knitting as a hobby to continue with during

their time when they've had to be more isolated, as well. The

other thing that is so cool about this group is they also...

(this wasn't intentional, they just kind of came up with this

organically)... they'll knit caps for patients who have lost

their hair because of chemotherapy, scarves,

fingerless mitts, that type of thing, and then they go to our

resource centre and then anybody who's in need can take something

like that. To know that it came from somebody else who has

walked your path as well, I think is really meaningful.

There's a project here actually, that I've seen on

the news, called Knitted Knockers. I don't know if you've

heard of that?

Oh yeah! We did that. People continue to make

knockers. It's really taken off, hasn't it? It's so fun. And, you

know, women who require a prosthesis really like the

knitted knockers. They're soft, they're light, they're washable,

you can form them to fit yourselves perfectly, they're

free... you know, prostheses can be very expensive. With some

local yarn shops in our community, we did a knitted

knocker campaign, and then the fire department has a pink

firetruck and so they stopped at the yarn shops, and we filled

the firetruck up with knitted knockers! There were bags of

them! [Laughs] And then they delivered them to the Cancer

Institute, then we had to sort them and get them where they

needed to be in that way. But that was such, again, another

fun community project.

It sounds like some of the people in the group have

been very inventive about finding ways to have a more kind

of group knitting experience. Because I guess a lot of us,

even if we're knitting in a group, often the project is just

ours, I suppose, or we might be knitting something that's just

ours. It's not that often you knit something that is part of a

kind of cooperative project.

Yeah, we really saw it particularly when they

Yeah. And have you had the opportunity to go and

were able to meet in person and work on the yarn bombing pieces,

because they had to kind of plan it out together. And again,

nobody was telling anybody, "Here, you have to do this." It

just all came very organically. But it was fun to kind of be a

fly on the wall and just peek in and watch them and hear their

conversations. It just really fills my heart because that was

exactly what I wanted when I said, "Can we start this?"

join in with knitting with them at all? Or is that difficult?

I haven't since they have gone to Zoom, and it's

also during my work day. So sometimes I don't have the time

to do that during the work day. But when they did meet in

person, I would often just stop by, because they're lovely

people anyway so I would always love to catch up with them

regardless, but just to again, like I said, hear their

conversation and see what they were working on. To see them

helping each other, because there were some that were very,

very skilled knitters helping others that are maybe new at

something, new to knitting or new at a technique, and really

to have that fellowship within the group is really precious to watch.

Yeah. And that's brilliant for both parties,

isn't it? It's brilliant to be somebody who can share a skill.

That gives you a sense of self esteem, I guess, doesn't it? And

also to be able to be somewhere where you think, "Oh, these

experienced people can help me with this thing I'd like to get

better at."

Yeah, definitely. It definitely goes both

directions.

Yeah. And you mentioned that you've been

involved in a research project to do with knitting. I'd love to

hear a bit more about that.

Yeah, sure. So one thing that patients receiving

chemotherapy sometimes experience is something called

chemo brain. And if you're not familiar with that, it is just

difficulty after finishing chemo or even during, with tasks that

normally would have come easily to you. So it could be things

like sequencing or memory issues or word finding even sometimes,

and it's very distressing to patients to experience this. And

it's especially distressing when they finally finish treatment

and then they're like, "Okay, I'm going back to work." You

know, it's like some sense of hopefully some normalcy in their

lives again, but then they're having really some difficulties

functioning to their pre-cancer diagnosis levels. And so one of

my colleagues is a neuropsychologist and she

started knitting because we... This is another story, but we

started with my teammates. We had a couple of knit nights and

taught them how to knit, and several of my teammates

continued to knit as well, which has been really fun. And Jen,

the neuropsychologist, is one of those that has continued to

that. And so finally, I was like, "I know how knitting makes

me feel, as far as calming my mind and all of that." And we

got talking about the bilateral aspects of knitting, and we also

were thinking about chemo brain. It's not fully understood, why

it occurs. It could be related to inflammation or who knows.

But we were looking through the literature and did not see

anything that looked at increasing neuroplasticity

around cancer-related cognitive impairments. And so we wanted to

could teaching somebody to knit make an impact on their

cognitive impairment? So we did a pilot study, and we had the

support from Universal Yarn, which is a big yarn company,

particularly here in the US - I think it is in Europe, too. They

have a headquarters very close to Charlotte, and they provided

us with yarn and with needles and really put together these

nice kits for the study. And we enrolled patients who had

finished the chemotherapy and were self-describing some

cognitive impairment. And they could not have been knitters

before, so it had to be completely a new skill. And then

they came in and we gave them a battery of neuropsych tests,

which are all validated for the age group within the inclusion

criteria. And then we had a volunteer working with us, and

she taught them to knit. And so she would have groups of maybe

1-3 women. They were all women. It wasn't designed to be all

women, but that's the way it fell, which I think is another

thing I'd like to change at some point along the road.

So that was who opted in?

Yeah. They learned to knit. They got a project - it

was a scarf. And then they had another lesson, we gave them

videos, we checked in with them every week, and then 8 weeks

later they came back in. They had to have at least 8 inches of

their scarf done so we knew that they were doing it. So we had to

measure it, and then they were re-tested. And what we found was

really fascinating, in my opinion. All of them tested

within the normal range at the start; however, it may have been

low for them. They were all college educated, they were all

professionals, that's the group that we got for this pilot.

However, the distress levels were quite high across the

group. Post-intervention, they all improved cognitively, in

certain domains at least. I think almost 70% of the group

improved cognitively in at least one of the domains that we

tested. Across the board, they all significantly reported less

distress. That was just really validating, that there's

something going on, whether it is neuroplasticity, or whether

it's decreasing stress so you're able to manage some of those

challenges better. I mean, who knows? We're really eager to dig

a little bit deeper into the whole 'what's happening behind

the veil' kind of thing. We had to close accrual early because

Because like you said, from a research

of the pandemic. We ended up with 16 people, I think, going

through and we'd wanted to get 18, I think. So just a little

perspective, it would be great. It's such a shame you had to

bit short of our original goal, but enough to have some

significant data. And to this day, I hear from people in the

finish early because of COVID. And it'd be great to do a trial

study and they're still knitting! That's another win of

the whole thing. So I look at this as such a low-hanging fruit

with a control group and lots of measures. But even without that,

for an intervention for a condition that is incredibly

distressing for our patients, and how simple it could be, how

it sounds like it has offered a great benefit, even just

inexpensive it could be, how low risk it could be to really

provide this for people who are interested.

anecdotally, or in terms of stress reduction, or giving

people a coping mechanism to take with them for the rest of

their lives. That sounds like it actually has been a super

helpful intervention already.

Yeah. And the neuropsych tasks were all

validated tasks, so we really felt confident about those. They

weren't tasks that you could do well with repetition, you know,

we made sure we didn't have that practice benefit with the tests

that she chose. So we do know that there was benefit. But

yeah, to have a control group would have been nice, since they

were each their own control, but there's so many areas that we

could dig in and explore further that it makes it exciting, for

sure.

And I think you mentioned, while we were

messaging about setting up this conversation, that you'd quite

like to have a group for professionals as well, so for

healthcare staff. I haven't done it formally for that purpose,

but in the past I've informally ended up having groups of

colleagues in health settings to mainly create gifts for somebody

who's having a baby, but have really noticed the positive

effect it's had on team morale, and that we've had different

conversations, that people have been kind of taking a lunch

break for half an hour, once a week, to sit and knit together,

and that it really did feel beneficial, I suppose, on a team

level. I'm interested in what your hopes were for that.

Yeah, definitely. So we did do for just my

department. At the time, we were in a different location while

our current building was being built, and it was tight

quarters, you know, which has its own challenges. But we had a

couple of knit nights, and it was just a time again, for

whomever wanted to, to come together, learn to knit. And

then, similar to what you're talking about, we did find

people sitting at lunchtime knitting. And then we also found

we were able to help each other out with questions about a

skill, or, "Oh, I dropped a stitch. What happened here?",

that type of thing. And it did allow us as a group of

colleagues to interact on a bit of a different level. And then

several of my colleagues really use knitting now as a self care

practice. It's a relaxing thing that they go to daily, almost,

in order to just take better care of themselves. So that's

been really positive. I think, you know, it's no surprise to

anybody how strained the health care profession is right now,

globally. And interestingly, before the pandemic, I had been

working with some other people on my team on moral injury and

resilience, and what can we do to help support one another, to

build up resilience and address moral injury in a positive way.

And then to think that we were doing that work before COVID,

and now what people are having to deal with still two years

later, it's unfathomable. And I really feel like we need to now

kind of shift gears and look at trauma care. How are we helping

our colleagues through trauma, because that's what this has

been, for so many people. And I don't want to simplify things to

the point of saying, "Oh, just give everybody knitting needles

and some yarn, and it's all fine." But I do think that

knitting serves a role in the toolbox as a self care practice,

as a way of soothing. We know that the rhythm of the movement,

of using both hands, has neurological impact. And so I do

think that it could be a useful tool for colleagues to be able

to use for self care. There was a study that some nurses in

Washington did, that I think Project Knitwell helped support.

And again, this was several years ago, with oncology nurses.

They taught them to knit, and the outcomes and the feedback

from those who participated was really positive, how it was

really soothing. And when I was re-reading the manuscript,

"soothing" kind of kept coming up, and I kind of feel like

yeah, it is soothing. And that's maybe part of the benefit of us

bringing it to somebody. We're not going to fix the issues in

our healthcare system by knitting, but if we can help

somebody feel better for a little bit of time and then be

able to be a bit more refreshed to go handle what they need to

handle, then maybe that's our role at this point. So I'm

looking at creating honestly like a toolkit for my

colleagues, our teammates across our system, that has a variety

of ways to take care of yourself and to address the trauma of

what you have experienced during all this time. So I think it

will definitely have a role there.

Yeah, I think that's really true. I've had quite a

few health professionals get in touch with me since starting the

podcast, talking about the idea of having a group with their

colleagues. And I think the tricky thing is, like you said,

it doesn't have to be just knitting, and knitting isn't

going to be for everybody, but the idea of maybe the system or

prioritising self care for the health care staff, because you

can't pour from an empty cup. And in the pandemic, it started

off as a sprint and it's now a marathon. But people are just

getting slowly more exhausted, I guess, and like you said,

traumatised. But it is interesting, the idea of one of

the trauma therapies, EMDR, is focused on using bilateral

movements a bit similar to knitting. And when I spoke to

Betsan Corkhill, I interviewed her for series one about that,

and she said there have been ideas about doing some studies

using knitting as the bilateral movement in the EMDR, so trauma

processing. So it'd be really interesting. I think the tricky

thing is funding for all of these studies.

Most definitely.

And also for the self care for the health

professionals! That's also the problem, isn't it? Getting that

as a priority and funding it.

Yeah, most definitely. However, if you look

at the cost of replacing a critical care nurse, for

example, it's quite costly, especially somebody who has a

lot of experience. And then who are we replacing them with? So I

think that's one thing. And, you know, I'm talking about health

care professionals but it's really across the board. My

heart breaks for our teachers, for parents with young children,

and how they're managing all of this and trying to work and keep

their children happy and healthy. It's across the board -

service providers of any sort. Our resources are not an

unending bucket. There is a bottom to that. So if we don't

start to really take care of what we've got, it's going to be

quite impactful.

Interesting, because I was going into a primary

school to offer a therapeutic knitting group, and a number of

the staff said, "When are you doing one for staff?" And I also

love the idea of the parent and child knitting group that you

started off talking about. I think that's a lovely idea, to

be able to have an activity to share between parents and

children. I'd love to ask you about a significant knitting

project, Susan. Can you think of one, for yourself?

Yeah, certainly. It's so interesting to hear

other people's stories about knitting through grief. And I

think that, for me, I have a pair of socks... it was just

I guess you want to take really good care of them!

when I was just getting to knit socks, so I still was not very

confident about what I was doing. I had to pay attention

quite some bit. But my dad had gotten ill and finally we got

him into hospice care, which was such a blessing, and I'll never

forget sitting with my mom. It was New Year's Eve that year,

and it was just quiet in his room, and I really just wanted

to be there for her, as well. And so I had my socks I was

working on during that time. And I also wanted to give her the

space to to be with this man that she'd been with for 70

years, during his final days. So I could work on my socks and

kind of be there for my mom, but also be in the background for

her to have some quiet time with him. He ended up dying, like two

days later, very peacefully. And those socks are just so special

to me because it just reminds me of how blessed I am to have had

him for all these years as a father, but also how blessed I

I do, yeah!

am to have been in that space with him and my mom. I'm just so

fortunate to be able to be there, and be there with both of

them. And for myself, as well. So those are my special socks. I

don't wear them a whole lot, but I pull them out once in a while.

It's interesting, Susan, that you mentioned that

actually, because I think, like you said, grief has come up

quite a lot when I ask people about a significant knitting

project. And actually, you're not the first person to mention

the idea of knitting allowing you to offer kind of

companionship, but without conversation. So that's

something that maybe in the grief period... or also other

people have spoken about being with somebody who's unwell in a

hospital, and that the idea is you don't necessarily have to

say anything. And I think in a bereavement period, often there

isn't anything you can say that can make it any better, but that

you want to kind of be alongside somebody, and that knitting has

offered an almost unique way of being able to do that, where it

feels okay that there isn't a conversation happening at the

same time.

Yeah. You're just holding space.

Yeah. So those are your special socks. And it

sounds like you've got a very positive relationship to them

now, even though it was from quite a sad time, in a way,

also.

Yeah, most definitely. He lived such an

amazing life, so it wasn't like there was regret by any means.

And I think that makes a huge difference in how you process

loss. I miss him, you know, I still hear his voice telling me

different things and stuff. But, again, it really comes from a

place of gratitude, for sure.

Yeah, sure. So I always end the podcast with

what's the greatest gift knitting has given you for the

rest of your life? I don't know what you think of when I ask

that question.

Well, it's hard to choose just one. [Laughs]

Definitely, it's that anchor to a mindfulness practice which has

been really important to me, particularly through the

pandemic as well. And again, I love the connection with my

sisters and my mom, that we have that in common. And then the

ability just to make something and share a bit of myself with

somebody else, so that they know a piece of me was with them,

whether it's a shawl or a sweater or a pair of mittens or

whatever.

When you say that, are you talking about gifts?

Yeah.

And also in the conversations you have sometimes

with your patients about knitting - I guess that's a way

of sharing yourself too, isn't it, to talk about what you're

knitting or what they're knitting?

It is. It's a great way to form a connection,

and then people tend to feel safer, it seems, to talk about

other things once once you've kind of formed that bond, if you

will.

Yeah, sure. Susan, it's been such a pleasure to

talk to you. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

Thank you so much for having me, and thank you for

the work that you're doing. You're shining this great light

on the importance of using knitting and crafting for our

wellbeing and I really appreciate that you're doing

that.

Oh thank you so much.

Thank you so much for listening to the Why I Knit podcast. If

you'd like to find out more about therapeutic knitting, you

can follow me on Instagram @knittingistherapeutic or at my

website www.therapeuticknitting.org. If

you're enjoying the podcast, I would really appreciate it if

you could leave a rating and a review on your podcast app. This

will help grow the podcast and let more people know about the

therapeutic benefits of knitting. And don't forget to