Workshop Piece 1

Feature

Bonnie Kestner

Bonnie Kestner swims only in the Boathouse Lake. If you are one of the many that enjoy sunny days on the dock, you may see her in the warmer months, cutting swiftly through the water or maybe languidly backstroking down by the dam. An avid and accomplished swimmer and coach, Bonnie continues to practice her favorite sport—but refuses to do so in Sweet Briar’s pool. To understand Bonnie’s personal boycott of pools, we must first understand Bonnie herself.

Bonnie is the former Head Coach, current Lead Assistant Swim Coach, and she also teaches classes in nutrition at Sweet Briar College. She swam for Yale’s swim team in college and then briefly coached there, before accepting the position at Sweet Briar, where she has now been part of the faculty for 33 years.

Why will Bonnie not swim in the pool? She answers, “If anyone asks, that’s why I’m not swimming personally now. It does take a huge toll on the skin, hair, and actually, surprisingly, on the thyroid.” To go along with this, Bonnie would like to substitute chlorine in our pool for a saline system, because it is much less caustic on the human body. As there are no alternative pools nearby, Bonnie has decided to refrain from swimming at all when she cannot use the lake, and has noticed the difference: “I haven’t been swimming for the last few months and I already feel the difference in my hair and skin. I’ve also been doing new things nutritionally, so I can’t isolate it and say that it’s 100% from the lack of chlorine, but I believe in my heart that it has got to be having positive effects.”

Bonnie’s desire to live as healthfully as possible comes from her interest in holistic medicine. “[Holistic wellness] looks at all dimensions of a person”, she explains, while drinking from her eco-friendly water bottle. It is essentially a practice or lifestyle in which one believes that the body, mind, and spirit must all work together as one. Bonnie became interested in a natural and holistic lifestyle when a friend’s son was struggling with many health issues, including diabetes, and conventional medicine wasn’t helping. Bonnie then began researching the disease, and stumbled upon books on alternative healing. Her interest in helping a friend sparked a flame that spread into a wildfire of research, which in turn translated into a lifestyle. She maintains, “you have to take responsibility for your health and really do the research for yourself.”

Through my own research, I found that “holistic” is defined by Webster as “emphasizing the importance of the whole and the interdependence of its parts”. This is the approach that Bonnie takes to her health, and explains why she believes that something as simple as chlorine can take an impressive toll on the body. Not only does it affect the skin and hair directly, but those problems also have the capability of leading into others. “I’m convinced that my thyroid could be functioning better. It’s something that doesn’t show up on the doctor’s tests, but I’ve read literature that says chlorine can affect the thyroid.” Trivial as these things may seem, Bonnie continues on to say, “It’s just my desire to do the best things I can for my body.” This is the true heart of Bonnie’s desires… not to simply have an alternative pool, but to have healthful opportunities for herself and for the community as a whole.

As a champion of health and wellness, Bonnie’s dreams for Sweet Briar reach much farther than an alternative pool. Our conversations morphed from the possibility of a new pool system, to a holistic nutrition and exercise class, to hiring a holistic health professional, to a wellness resource center, and finally to her ultimate plan. “My overall biggest idea would be … for the college to have a certificate program in sustainable living… It would encompass multiple disciplines; environmental science, economic aspects of it, certainly the health, wellness, fitness aspects. And it could have so many career opportunities because this is the wave of the future.”

Natural and holistic health certainly is becoming an interest and a priority to many people. The emergence and saturation of organic and whole foods, green initiatives, and homeopathic medicine in the everyday mainstream market has grown exponentially in the past few years. Bonnie sees this growing interest as an opportunity for Sweet Briar: “At Sweet Briar, since we’re looking for innovative things, this field is the wave of the future. The more people go into it, they’ll want to help other people and to help themselves.” While Sweet Briar may not be big enough to support a major field of study for something of this nature, a certificate program may help garner interest and also help retain students. Bonnie recognizes this as well, “One of my students from last year, she transferred, because she was looking for a program at another school where she can go into this kind of study. If we could develop something similar and have the personnel here to facilitate something like that, we’d really be on top of it.”

Bonnie takes a real interest in the people around her, as evidenced by her foray into alternative medicine for her friend’s son. A former swimmer, Laura Wolf ’11 also notes this characteristic of Bonnie: “Not only is she an excellent swim coach, but she’s an amazing mentor. You may not see her very much, but she always makes herself available.” When asked to describe her as a coach, Laura said, “She is encouraging in so many aspects… she’s supportive, and inspiring. She has endurance not only in the pool, but also on the side when everyone’s cheering you on… she will cheer you on through a whole race. All the way at the end of the pool. She’ll stick with you and track your growth from start to finish.”

The way that Laura describes Bonnie as a coach translates seamlessly to the way that a past student, Jodie Stevenson ’12 described her as a professor. In her class, Nutritional Challenges of the 21st Century, Jodie said that Bonnie “was committed to get us to realize the challenges we face, in terms of how we can change our nutritional path, or lifestyle.” It is obvious that Bonnie cares about other people, but she also cares very much about the Sweet Briar community in general. She believes so strongly in the natural and holistic wellness, that she is willing to work hard for these resources to be available to the community.

The holistic lifestyle looks much different than that of the average college student. Little sleep, cafeteria food, Sheetz runs, and excessive alcohol can throw a student’s body out of its natural rhythm, thereby limiting its functions. This is certainly not conducive to being a productive student, and surely isn’t in line with the ideals of a Liberal Arts education (cultivating a sound mind and sound body). Bonnie believes that, with the addition of wellness resources, students will begin to understand the importance of a holistic lifestyle and in turn, will adopt it. Thankfully, She has just been approved to teach a course next year on Holistic Wellness.

This dedicated, encouraging woman may be just the person to push Sweet Briar forward into the ever-growing and exceedingly popular beliefs of holistic wellness. I believe that if she gets the word out, the Sweet Briar community should finally return the favor, and cheer on Bonnie.