Introducing Pyramid Holistic Training Centre & Spa!!

Antoinette Moore

How did Pyramid Holistic Centre come about..?

I always thought my journey into holistic therapies started back in the 80’s when I use to bring my mum to reflexology to help with arthritis in her knee. Seeing the relief, it gave her was wonderful. But now that I’m sitting here thinking about it, I’ve realised that I’ve always had a gift for healing. I remember as a child sitting in the kennel with our dog Beauty and her pups that my mother bred. When one of them was sick, I would pick them up and hold them till they felt good, then I would put them back to suck on her. In hindsight, I suppose this was actually the very beginning of my healing career.

What was I missing..?

It wasn’t obvious to me in my younger years that Holistic Therapies was my path in life. So at first, I pursued my other passion in life, teaching. I thoroughly enjoyed teaching, I got married and I had a beautiful family, but I always felt like something was missing.

In 2001, I started a new job in a college. Working full time alongside some other family issues that arose at that time I found myself very stressed and looking for a way to de-stress. I turned to getting reflexology done for my own personal benefits. After a while of getting the treatment done myself, I felt very connected to reflexology and that is when I decided to train in it myself.

Pyramid Holistic Centre- Before and After

The beginning of Pyramid Holistic Centre…

In 2005, my husband Sam and I bought a house in Donegal. It had been derelict for 12 years and it was in very bad shape. Over the next few years we worked hard and restored it back to its former glory. Once the house was complete and liveable, we turned our attention to the beautiful outhouses we had surrounding the house. It was then that I got my inspiration to turn one of them into a therapy room and it was from here that I started giving treatments to family and friends.

Original Therapy Room- Before & After

I continued to progress in both my teaching and Holistic Therapies careers. 2009 was an exciting year graduating from Trinity College Dublin, in the area of assessment of special needs. This was always a dream of mine. Working in the college with special needs students drew my interested in studing more physiology after a lot of research. I decided to train in Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP). NLP looks at how we can change our habits changing our paradigms, this can support you to a new and positive life. After studing with Richard Bandler in Edinburgh, which was an amazing experience. We worked with clients to help in areas of fears of heights, snakes, spiders etc.

Meeting Joe Gough…

In 2011 I was offered an opportunity to work with Joe Gough. Joe’s guidance and care was an invaluable support to me following the passing of my Dad at a great old age of 94. Joe trained me in Reiki and the support I got from both my own healing and Reiki got me true a very sad part of my life.

I was still working in Dublin at this time and commuting up and down for work every week became challenging. I toiled over taking a career break and working on the holistic centre full time. But limiting beliefs always had an answer why not to do it… You’re not going to have a steady income? It might not work? and lots more!!!! Every year the time would come to apply, and I would make more excuses not to do it.

The wake up call…

All I needed was a wake-up call and that is exactly what I got! In 2013 my mum passed away. As the youngest in a family of 6, I was very close to both my parents and was the last to leave home (I was not in a hurry to move out!). When I returned to work, I noticed a past student around where I was a lot. One evening while driving out of the college gates he threw a rock at my car. The windscreen broke and in shock and anger I jumped out of the car and went after him (not a cleaver thing to do!). Some of my students had seen what happened and went to get the porter for me. He managed to stop the man, called the gardai and he was arrested.

This was the aha moment for me, the universe stopped me in my tracks and made me rethink my life. Shortly after this my first grandchild was born and this was a turning point. After so much loss and turmoil, holding a new-born gives you knew life and meaning.

Training Room- Before & After at Pyramid Holistic Centre

Training Room Outside- Before & After

I decided to take career break and start working on my  passion. I wanted to teach holistic therapies in Donegal at Pyramid Holistic Training Centre and Spa. We turned our attention to developing another of the old outhouses surrounding our home into a training room. It was very hard work but working alongside my husband and my family was very therapeutic (when we weren’t killing each other!).

ITEC Accrediiation

Training began…

The following years I spent working on planning, creating new courses and policies and inspections in order to get accredited with ITEC. And in September 2015 we ran our first ITEC Reflexology course! The following year we offered our first course in Holistic Massage, and Education and training and the centre just took off running!

Classical Sauna at Pyramid Holistic Centre- Before & After

The beginning of the Spa…

We started to develop the Spa area to offer spa treatments like massage and facials. At first it was just the Sauna and a shower. From here we progressed on to add a relaxation room. In 2016 we installed the outdoor Hot Tub and done some more renovating. In 2017 the spa started to get very busy and we added 2 extra therapy rooms, a waiting room and reception, changing rooms and another shower and some more bathrooms.

Sauna Area at Pyramid Holistic Centre- Before & After

In the meantime, I did my master’s in Integrated Energy Therapy. Edmond was a great support and visited pyramid holistic centre on a regular basis. I trained in Thai Foot Massage and recently I felt drawn to Life coaching and graduated in September 2019. We also added some extra short courses like facial massage and IET training.

New Office Space at Pyramid Holistic Centre- Before & After

Our recent big changes…

2019 has seen us some BIG changes! We created a new office space for our ever growing business, we hired some extra therapists, we are now offering nutrition courses for complementary therapies and for physical activity, we had Mark O’ Sullivan join our team to offer Homeopathy courses and we designed new courses and received accreditation from FHT in the area of reflexology for cancer care, fertility, maternity, advanced techniques in reflexology and hand techniques in reflexology. And we had Radha Patnamreddy join our team to offer an Indian Head Massage course.

2020 is going to bring some exciting things and we still have lots more to offer so watch this space!!

Classical Sauna- Before & After

Toilet Block- Before & After

Sauna Area- Before & After

Infrared Sauna- Before & After

ABOUT AUTHOR

Karen