This week I’ve had multiple clients returning after many cancelled appointments since they graciously stayed away from me to recover from cvid-19 and other maladies sweeping through families and communities right now. It’s no surprise that once you’ve recovered you want a little care from a professional. Step in the RMT! Something I noticed with the return of these clients was that we were not immediately rushing back into the treatment plan we had previously set. Rather my clients we’re tired, frazzled, sore, and hanging their head as they announced they hadn’t been working through their movement drills, or doing much of anything. And I think it is important to say that: it is totally OK! – because as you come back from illness or injury, the body is still in recovery mode from fighting off the invaders and could use additional support to fully reset and resume life as usual. What I have noticed with all these clients, was a generalized fascial tension throughout their body, and they too reported feeling tight and stiff (after laying in bed for days) but specifically was tension and soreness in the neck, shoulders and back ribs. I wanted to highlight what I did with these clients to help them manage the aches and pains they were reporting.
I began with stimulating the lymph nodes in the neck, getting the fluid of the body pumping naturally to flush out stagnant waste. I move down the sternum where fascial tightness and tenderness abounds the chest after days or weeks of coughing; fascial manipulation plus a rocking technique to loosen any restrictions found at the chest plate while shaking the lungs (and loosen any gunk left over in there), fingertip kneading within the spaces of the ribs + fascial stretching across the pec major muscle. At the lowest ribs, I performed a diaphragm release by hooking the underside of the ribs and slowly raking across the ridgeline pausing on any tender points or sticky spots; followed up with gentle abdominal massage to encourage lymph and circulatory flushing aswell as relax the abdominal musculature after spasmodic coughing. From here, I return to the neck and head to gently mobilize the esophagus encouraging it move amongst the SCM muscles + soft tissue techniques to relax the scalene muscles at the ribs on the inside of the collarbone – these guys act as secondary breathing muscles, so with coughing can become overworked from the forces. A Sub-Occiptal hold feels like heaven at the back of the skull as tension gathers here after time stationary in bed, craning the neck to be entertained on your device and the force of coughing endlessly.
My clients all found these treatments to be deeply relaxing and restoring, and we were still able to make headway towards their ultimate goals of pain free activity. This application of Massage Therapy was able to provide them with a chance to reset after collecting new tensions, and before those tensions accumulate and further disrupt their routines. Now they can start to resume their usual activities and get back to regular life feeling more at ease in their body.
I wanted to share this example as a way for you to better understand how your RMT thinks about the body, and what can be achieved with Therapeutic Massage Therapy. If you’ve been sick recently, book in with me and let’s get you back to feeling 100% with an intelligent and therapeutic massage treatment.
Take a deep breath, does your chest expand and your shoulders rise up under your ears? You my friend, are not breathing properly…No offense. Why should you care?
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