A Year of Monthly Massage

Susie is a wife, a mother, and a hard working professional. Like many people, she believed she was too busy for massage. Then one day, her husband got a great idea. He called me up and asked if he could buy a year’s worth of monthly massages for her for her birthday. I was moved by this man’s love of his wife. He said he knew if she got it into her on-going schedule, like her hair appointments or pedicures, she would realize that she can fit it in.

At the midpoint in our year, during the intake part at the beginning of her appointment, I noted, “This is massage number six in your year of monthly massages.”

She quickly replied, “The best year ever!”

We both laughed, but it’s true!

Regularly scheduled massages make a difference in one’s life. As a recipient of massages, myself, I love it for stress reduction, a chance to surrender during my busy week. When I get a massage in the middle of a hectic day or time in my life, I treasure it. I often say something like, “Hooray, an appointment where I get to lay down and relax!”

Massage therapists manually treat our muscles via kneading, gliding, stretching and other modalities that increase our circulation, improving the health and tone of our muscles. A therapist can treat areas of chronic tension or pain, and even help correct postural distortions. But another important factor is the way the therapist communicates with a client’s nervous system. Beginning with simply placing hands on you and holding them stationary, for instance, the therapist lets your nervous system know, via a calm, gentle “Hello”, that this is safe touch, which calms the nerves further, encourages deeper breathing, and helps with the release of tension in the muscles. The therapist helps guide your body from a stressed state, even a “fight or flight” response (a function of the Sympathetic Nervous System) caused by deadlines, life changes, bosses, anxiety, etc., to your “resting and digesting mode” (a function of the Parasympathetic Nervous System).

Our bodies were not designed to be under stress constantly with our adrenal glands over-stimulated. The fight or flight response is really meant for extreme danger, but the many stresses people sometimes experience in the modern world can put our nervous system in that mode. Here’s where massage comes in handy, bringing us back to “resting and digesting”. It’s like a reset and a reminder of our calmer way of being.

Now it’s up to us to take that feeling of relaxation and renewal with us after an appointment, and maintain it with healthy choices for self-care such as stretching, exercise, hot baths, yoga, meditation, creative outlets and drinking plenty of water.

Try prioritizing self-care more, and see how it affects your life, busy as it may be. You might find you have more energy and more to give. Feel free to comment here and let me know about your experience.