Massage Benefits- Better Posture and Alignment

Your body works best when it is aligned properly. Better alignment means you move easier and are less likely to experience pain and injury.

In part, proper alignment means that your shoulders are level, your hips are level, your knees are directly over your ankles, and your feet point straight forward. Poor alignment stresses your body. For example, if one hip is forward of the other, it creates torque in your body that stresses muscles and wears away cartilage in joints.

The most important thing to remember about alignment is that bones do what muscles tell them to do. The key to restoring alignment is relaxing tight muscles and strengthening weak ones. A series of weekly, specifically targeted massage sessions can help restore good alignment. Just be sure you find a massage therapist who works specifically on alignment, because many do not.

A common form of misalignment is a forward tilting pelvis (that is, your hips are rolled forward).

“Forward pelvic tilt is the source of much of the minor low back pain that many of us take for granted as we get into our thirties and forties. By increasing the arch of the spine, this dysfunction is like a hairline crack in the wall of a dam. The overall structure is weakened. In time the crack gets wider. The constant flexion of the spine, beyond its normal range, is putting wear and tear on the vertebral disks.”*

 

Another common misalignment is everted feet. That is, your toes point outward when you stand or walk.

“The situation is the rough equivalent of having two flat tires. The big gait muscles of the leg have stopped working. The feet evert because the gait muscles have become lazy and transferred the walking function to the hip flexor muscles.”*

 

Note: Telling yourself to stand up straight does not work for two reasons. First, many people’s concept of straight is NOT good alignment. Second, when you stop thinking “stand up straight” your body goes back to its programmed position. You must change this programming. The best way to change it is using a combination of massage (or other bodywork) and alignment exercises, such as those in the following books:

Massage Benefits

Less Pain

 

Another massage benefit is relief of muscle aches and pains. Aches and pains adversely affect your health and drain away energy that you could be using to pursue other activities.

 

Treatment of Soft Tissue Injury

 

Soft-tissue injuries (such as muscle pulls and strains, tendonitis, ligament sprains, and whiplash) heal faster with specifically targeted massage.

Massage Benefits- Better Health and Well Being

Better health and well being give you the ability to live your life to the fullest. You feel great and have the energy to meet life’s challenges and pursue your interests. Massage benefits your health and well being in many ways:

Stress Relief

Massage reverses the effects of negative stress by bringing about the relaxation response, which includes reducing blood pressure, heart rate, respiration rate, and the level of stress hormones (such as adrenaline and cortisol) in the body. To understand why reversing the effects is stress is essential to your health, read about how stress affects your body.

Massage benefits your ability to monitor stress signals and respond appropriately by sensitizing you to your body and improving your body awareness.

Better Circulation

Massage benefits blood and lymph circulation. Good circulation is vital to good health. Your blood and lymph carry nourishment to millions of cells throughout your body and carry away the waste eliminated from the cells. Massage increases the flow of blood and lymph, encourages better exchange of nutrients at the cellular level, and promotes detoxification. This process is important because the “future you” is determined by how well your cells regenerate themselves.

 

Increased circulation also helps both prevent and relieve muscle tension—lack of circulation can lead to chronically tight muscles. In turn, chronically tight muscles impede circulation and do not receive enough nutrients.

Easier Movement with Less Risk of Injury

Massage relaxes tense muscles, enhances tissue elasticity and flexibility, and increases range of motion in joints. This makes it easier for you to move and pursue all the activities that you want to pursue. And you are less likely to injure yourself because a less tense and more flexible body is better able to handle any movement you make, even the sudden, unexpected ones.

 

And More Healthy Massage Benefits

 

• Massage strengthens your immune system.
• Massage improves sleep patterns. Sleep deprivation is a major problem and the cause of many accidents.
• Massage promotes deeper and easier breathing. Shallow breathing means your body is not receiving the optimal amount of oxygen, which causes your health to deteriorate.
• Massage reduces anxiety and mental stress, creates a calmer mind, increases feelings of well-being, and relaxes you. All these massage benefits increase your capacity for clear thinking.
• Massage speeds recovery from exercise by helping remove waste products from muscles. Read more about sports massage.

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After Your Massage…

• Drink water to help flush out waste products moved around by the increased circulation created by massage.
• Deep tissue or injury/pain treatment massage may leave you feeling sore for a day or two. If you were experiencing pain when you came in for the massage, the general expectation is that you may be sore the first day, but by the second day you should feel looser and probably have less pain. Let your massage therapist know how you felt, so that he or she can adjust the approach if necessary.
• Call your massage therapist if you have concerns or questions.

How to Receive Massage…

• Tell your massage therapist if you are cool; massage is more effective if you stay warm.
• Let your massage therapist know if you prefer different music or no music at all. If the therapist is chatty and you want quiet time, speak up!
• Tell your massage therapist if any part of the massage is painful or too uncomfortable.
• Breathe slowly, deeply, and evenly. When your massage therapist locates pain or tension, consciously try to relax the area by visualizing your breath flowing into the tension and then exhaling the tension with your breath.
• Relax. Do not help when your massage therapist lifts a body part. He or she will tell you if you need to move or shift position

How to Receive Massage-Before Your Massage…

• Before Your Massage…
• Avoid a heavy meal for a couple of hours before your massage because massage on a full stomach may be uncomfortable.
• Check your skin for any open cuts, scrapes, and scratches, and cover them with a bandage.
• Let your massage therapist know how you felt after your last massage and about any changes in your health, pain, or injuries.
• Be aware that massage is not recommended in the early or acute stage of cold or flu, because massage can help the virus spread through your body.

How to Receive Massage-Your First Massage Appointment

Your First Massage Appointment

When you arrive for your first appointment, you will fill out a health questionnaire that gives your massage therapist the information needed to offer you safe and effective massage.

 

You will discuss any pain or injuries you have and what you want from the massage. Depending on why you are receiving massage, your massage therapist may observe your body alignment or do other assessments (for example, check your shoulder movement if you have a shoulder injury).

Your massage therapist will then leave the room while you undress and relax onto the massage table, covering yourself with a fresh sheet or towel. You can undress completely or wear underwear (unless you are receiving a type of massage that is done fully clothed)—you will be covered at all times except for the area being massaged. If you are unsure about anything, ask!

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Massage and Migraine Headaches

by Susan Peterson, LMT, NCTMB

Massage therapists often see clients seeking relief from chronic headaches, and migraines are the most common type of chronic headache. Unfortunately, migraine headaches are poorly understood and treatments are inadequate, according to the American Migraine Foundation (AMF).

 

According to the AMF, 42 million Americans get migraines, and 6 million of those people have chronic migraines. This fact puts migraines on the list of the World Health Organization’s top 20 most disabling health problems in the world.

 

 

Severity is the major difference between migraine and tension headache, according to Dr. Stephen D. Silberstein of Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is a past President of the American Headache Society, which met on June 24, 2010, for its 52nd annual scientific meeting in Los Angeles, where I spoke with him about migraines.

 

Silberstein said that people with migraines tend to go to the doctor with a list of disabling symptoms, while people with tension headaches get them occasionally, take a headache remedy, and keep going.

Doctors don’t see migraines as a progression of regular tension headache, Silberstein said, although the two are often confused in practice. “Some people have little migraines that are misdiagnosed as tension headaches, when they are in fact migraines,” he said.

Silberstein states that massage is a good adjunct therapy for migraines as long as the person has seen a doctor and been screened for other illnesses that create headaches. He also warns that massaging someone with a headache caused by an infection or injury can worsen the problem.

Most massage therapists are used to seeing people who have already been diagnosed with migraines and are seeking support to reduce the frequency and severity of attacks or to reduce their use of migraine-halting drugs.

The American Headache Society offers a quick way to assess the difference between tension and migraine headaches. Tension headaches occur on both sides of the head, do not throb, and are not severe. Migraines are one-sided, with severe, throbbing pain. They can also come with a bucket-full of other symptoms, such as sensitivity to light and sound and visual auras.

The American Headache Society’s website is full of information helpful to massage therapists. Besides listing symptoms, their archives contain interviews with researchers who have linked migraines to a history childhood abuse. This research can be very helpful to massage therapists, who may be the first person a client confides in about abuse.

About the Author

Sue Peterson, LMT, NCTMB, has a private practice in Orange County, California. She writes regularly on all things massage therapy athttp://findtouch.blogspot.com.

Courtesy of bellevuemassagetherapy.com

Injury Massage

Specifically targeted injury massage helps soft-tissue injuries (such as muscle pulls and strains, tendonitis, ligament sprains, and whiplash) heal faster. Massage reduces spasm, pain, swelling, and formation of excess scar tissue. Massage also breaks up excess scar tissue and adhesions (stuck together tissue) that weaken muscles and contribute to further injury.

“Skillful, knowledgeable massage can make the difference between a one-time muscle strain that takes a few weeks to resolve and a painful, limiting, chronically recurring condition… By applying skills to the proper

Extrasformation of scar tissue, the reduction of edema, the limiting of adhesions, and the improvement of circulation and mobility, massage can turn an irritating muscle tear into a trivial event.”

A Massage Therapist’s Guide to Pathology by Ruth Werner

When you injure a muscle or other soft-tissue, small tears occur in the tissue fibers. To heal the tears, your =dy immediately begins to form scar tissue at the injured site.However, this scar tissue does not necessarily run parallel to the fibers of the injured tissue, which can lead to excess scar tissue that is weak and prone to further injury. Also, because scar tissue is not elastic, it can restrict movement of surrounding fibers, again setting you up for further injury.

Injury massage creates tension and stretch that breaks up excess scar tissue and helps align the new tissue fibers. This process makes the injured site stronger and less prone to new injury. Massage also increases circulation to the injured area, bringing needed nutrients and removing waste products produced in the healing process.

Massage for injury requires a regular schedule, no less than once a week. In some cases, you will see much faster results with a twice-a-week schedule. For how long? It depends on the nature and extent of the injury, how old it is, and your ability to heal. It also depends on your willingness, when appropriate, to ice the injury, do some exercises or stretches, or identify and eliminate the cause of ongoing injury.

Injury massage is not necessarily relaxing and can leave you feeling sore for a day or two. However, it’s not necessary to be in a lot of pain after the massage—that’s too much work—always let your massage therapist know how you felt after your last massage.———————

 

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Massage for Chronic Pain

Massage for chronic pain can break the vicious cycle of pain, where pain leads to muscle tension, reduced circulation, and restricted movement, which in turn lead to more pain.

Massage for Chronic Pain Reduces Muscle Tension

Muscles contract around any painful site to protect the area. If pain is resolved quickly, muscles relax. If pain persists, muscles can become habitually tight.

 

Sometimes tight muscles press on nerves, causing tingling, numbness, or more pain. Massage therapy helps by stretching tight muscles and by stimulating the nervous system to relax muscle tension.

Massage for Chronic Pain Improves Circulation

Tight muscles reduce circulation, letting waste products accumulate, which can leave you feeling fatigued and sore. Plus waste products can irritate nerves, causing pain to spread.

Massage therapy releases contracted muscles and increases circulation. As massage relaxes the nervous system, blood vessels dilate to increase blood flow. Waste products are flushed away and replaced with oxygen and nutrients.

 

Areas with poor circulation often develop trigger points—highly irritable spots that refer pain, tingling, or other sensations to other places in the body. Trigger points respond well to standard massage techniques.

Massage Stretches Muscles and Improves Movement

Eventually, the body lays down connective tissue in any contracted area with poor circulation. While helpful for healing injuries, this natural reaction can “glue” muscles and their connective tissue coverings into a shortened state. The stretching and kneading of massage therapy softens and lengthens connective tissue.

Summary

Irritating waste products, painful trigger points, and shortened muscles make even simple actions difficult and tiring. As your capacity for movement and exercise decreases, you lose the most important means for maintaining good circulation throughout your body, risking pain in new areas.

Massage for chronic pain helps restore normal movement by releasing trigger points, removing waste products, and stretching shortened muscles. Also, because you feel better after a massage, you may find renewed energy and motivation for physical activity.

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