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Growing with Gardening
A Twelve-Month Guide for Therapy, Recreation, and Education
By Bibby Moore The University of North Carolina Press
Copyright © 1989 University of North Carolina Press
All right reserved. ISBN: 978-0-8078-4242-3
Introduction
Horticultural Therapy
How Plants Help Us
What is Horticultural Therapy?
The power of gardening to heal and help us grow has been recognized since the beginning of civilization. Used therapeutically, nature and gardening have helped restore people to health both through the restful and quiet viewing of lovely gardens and the sunlight, fresh air, and moderate exercise offered by outdoor gardens.
Horticultural therapy works through the ability of plants to interest us and hold our attention. This focused attention on plants allows for a pleasant concentration that takes us away from other concerns. As our curiosity leads us on, we experience pleasant sensations of smell, sight, touch, taste, and often sound.
Plants are beautiful, responsive to care, and productive. In turn, the person who takes care of the plants, the gardener, can come to perceive the self as a successful, nurturing, productive, and creative person with gifts to share. People, whether healthy or ill, need to be involved in activities that focus on their strengths. It is the simplicity of gardening that promotes a "can do" attitude.
Horticulture, as used in "horticultural therapy," includes working with all kinds of plants. A horticultural therapy program includes outdoor gardening, landscaping, indoor gardening, flower arranging, crafts-just about anything related to plants that is of interest to the participant. In a hospital or institutional setting using horticultural therapy, the treatment goals are set by the staff, and a professionally trained horticultural therapist assists the client by providing supportive horticultural activities that aid in meeting these goals.
How Plants Help Us
Caring for a few house plants in the home or office can give us a brief moment of rest from an otherwise stress-filled day. Have you ever caught yourself looking up from your work and absent-mindedly gazing at a plant for a few minutes or stopping by a window to watch the trees and sky outside? Have you ever been raking leaves and found yourself happily hypnotized by the repeated motion of pulling the leaves into piles? Working with plants can have a calming and soothing effect:
-Plants soften the man-made environment.
-Plants have a natural, predictable cycle that is comforting in our time of rapid and constant change.
-Plants are stimulating as they change through growth and blossoming.
-Plants are responsive yet "safe." A plant will not talk back or bite, yet it will respond to the care you give it.
-Plants do not make judgments. They are not interested in who you are, what you are, or what you have done.
-Plants allow us to change our environment. Sometimes we feel that we have lost control of what is happening in our world. By using plants, we can dramatically change our world.
-Plant-saturated environments-greenhouses and the outdoors-seem to be relaxing. A study at Kansas State University showed that people in a greenhouse workshop, versus a more traditional rehab workshop, were more relaxed. Another study at the University of Delaware showed that just viewing scenes of vegetation could "significantly improve" emotional states.
In chapter 16, I have listed some of the ways in which working with plants can help us grow, physically, intellectually, emotionally, socially, and financially. There are probably other benefits that we do not yet know. (See chapter 16 for "Benefits of Working with Plants.")
How Horticulture Can Be Used for Community Integration
Many social service and health care facilities look institutional and are boring places to visit or live. Residents often feel no sense of ownership in the place. Neighbors resist residential programs because of fears for personal safety and fear of decline in property values.
By demonstrating care of the home through landscaping and gardening, residents develop a sense of ownership and earn the interest and respect of neighbors. In many communities, much neighbor-to-neighbor interaction occurs over yard work. However, many group home residents do not have these skills or do not feel motivated or encouraged to acquire them. Furthermore, staff often lack the skill and knowledge to adapt gardening practices to the abilities of residents.
Horticultural programming provides needed recreational opportunities for residents. Today there is agreement that residential programs need to go beyond providing physical/medical care and include opportunities to learn new skills and explore recreational options. Thus, horticulture can be used to invite positive community attention while providing the students with a recreational interest that increases their sense of contribution to their home.
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Excerpted from Growing with Gardening by Bibby Moore Copyright © 1989 by University of North Carolina Press. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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