The Snake Oiler

Basic Massage

2009-03-22T18:53:00.001-07:00

You'll have to forgive my indulgence, but massage is one of my loves, so I will return to it a number of times throughout the course of this blog.

Touch is one of the greatest healing interactions we can have with one another. It is so powerful and needed that one area of touching is life giving, and another, as the above post emphasizes, is life sustaining. Too often (especially in America) touch is lacking. We are so scared of physical interactions and their implications that we simply don't touch each other anymore. I was a little startled when a friend of a friend gave me a hug. It was across gender and he was married and I was not. But it felt natural and genuine and safe. Afterwards, I tried to remember the last time a man gave me, a single women, a hug. Our society is like an over-protective mother that winds up smothering her child's progress. Maybe that's why we have so many trivial ailments in this country. Massage, though based in touch, is much more complex than simply touching another.

Massage school was intense. We spent 9 hours a day for nearly a year studying anatomy at the UofU Medical School, observing movement and learning about structure and function, and hours, including weekly clinics that led to nearly 1000 hours, practicing technique. Professional massage is a complex science and art. That stated massage can be given by and received by everyone. Let's start with some basic.

Warnings:
1. Before you begin, do you or the one you are massaging have an illness, or are either of you running a fever. Close contact for long periods of time is certainly going to spread an illness or infection. And, if you massage properly, you'll release toxin into the system that could overload an already taxed system, making an illness significantly worse.

2. Do not massage a recent injury. People ask me often to help ease a pain that has come from an injury or over exertion. In an injury or over exertion under the skin soft tissue has been damaged. Essentially, it's an open wound under the skin. Massaging over such a wound would cause secondary tissue damage. Wait at least seven days before massaging an injury to assure you don't cause any additional damage. And don't massage over open wounds, skin irritations, or rashes.

3. Avoid bony landmarks, or don't massage firmly over an area that is just skin over bone - like the bones down the middle of the back, ankles, or front of the hips. It will hurt!

4. Massage should NOT hurt. Some seem to have this false notion that once they find a muscle with a problem or what is known as a "knot" that they should press as hard as they can and dig into it. This causes those wounds under the skin and actually damages the person you are massaging.

Areas to Avoid
Unless you know more it is best just avoid these areas: the front of the neck or throat, arm pit, just below the ear on the neck, underneath the upper arm, back of the knee, deep massage of the abdomen, over the last rib in the small of the back, and the bend of the elbow.

There are a number of different kinds of massage which will be outlined in a later post. For now I will go over simple Swedish to get you started.

Make sure you communicate. Though massage is soothing and relaxing, you really can't know if you are being of benefit unless you ask, and it's easier if the person you are massaging tells you what they want or need. I can usually tell which muscles need my attention, but sometimes a person just needs to be cared for through touch. So ask.

Tools
You can use many parts of your own body in massaging another, including: fingertips, open hands, fists, base of your palms, edge of your fists, knuckles, forearms, elbows, and sometimes knees and feet. Be creative and experiment. *hint* -most people don't mind being experimented on. :)

Basic Swedish Techniques

I. Effleurage - gliding over the skin without effecting the underlying muscles.

Gentle Touch
Feathering is where you gently caress over the surface. Our skin has many nerve endings, making it the best way to calm a whole system. Feathering can calm a crying infant, lessen severe pain, sooth emotional distress, and relax just about anyone. This is a great technique to start and end a massage. Simply let your fingertips or hand softly glide over a surface. If goosebumps appear apply slightly more pressure.

Defining the Body
Deep Effleurage are gliding strokes with a little more pressure. These are very helpful to let a person feel how their body is connected. This may sound strange, but if you work on a leg, then an arm, then a foot, next the head, a person feels very segmented. But it is pretty amazing to realize the whole length of your body. One of my favorite strokes for my clients was to role up the side of my clients draping (while still allowing for appropriate covering) and do an entire body stroke down one whole side, from head to toe. This helps people to feel whole. When we are injured in some way, whether it be physically or emotionally, we feel broken. This is a simple way we can help put each other back together.

Aura Strokes
This is a good time to address therapeutic temperatures. A basic temperature is where our body as a whole is ill. The whole of the body is used in an effort to help in fighting and healing the problem, therefore the whole body feels hot. But the human body is incredibly intelligent. If you injure only a part, say you get a mosquito bite, or sprain your ankle, the fluid necessary to heal is only sent to that area. Next time you get a bug bite or an irritation from a plant in a localized area feel it - it will be hot in just that area.

An Aura Stroke serves two purposes - to help locate hot spots to let you know what area is distressed, and to locate cold areas. Cold areas? ATP is the bodies energy. It starts at the level of our cells combines with the flow of the nearest energy source (another cell's ATP) and creates energy pathways. These pathways feed energy to the whole body. If something is wrong then these pathways don't flow as freely. If you gently let your hands glide about a half an inch above (not touching) the body you will feel both hot and cold areas. I was having some issues with my liver while in school and my teacher placed her hand on my upper-abdomen and felt an intense heat. I knew I wasn't feeling well, but wasn't certain as to why. This turned out to be true, and after a cleansing I felt much better and the heat over my Liver subsided. Give it a try - it's pretty amazing to see what the body tells you, if you know how to speak body.

To be continued....
Next Petrissage!

The Need for Touch

2009-03-22T18:22:00.000-07:00

This is an excerpt from my Massage Therapy basic workbook pg. 22 from UCMT:

"There is a biological need for touch, an actual skin hunger, which can be met only in contact with another human being. When touching is denied, or severely restricted, infants die. Children, abandoned at birth and transferred to foundling homes, died by the thousands during the 19th century. They literally wasted away, despite the fact that they were fed, kept clean and protected from danger. The condition, known as marasmus (Greek, meaning "wasting away") claimed the lives of nearly 100% of the infants under the age of one in U.S. foundling hopsitals, as late as 1920. What these children lacked was physical contact. Other infants, raised in their own homes, were cradled and fed at their mother's breasts. These foundlings weren't. When this connection between life and touch was realized, doctors and nurses in many institutions cooperated in a plan to supply mothering for these children. It consisted of holding, stroking, speaking to the infant, allowing significant periods of cuddling the child, especially at mealtimes. The results were dramatic and immediate. Infant mortality rates dropped within one year of adopting these touching procedures."

~ Ryan and Travis, excerpt from Wellness Workbook

Welcome

2009-03-22T00:00:00.000-07:00

This blog is started with the idea that more knowledge is better knowledge, and the best way to get more is to combine many minds. Hopefully, this will be more of a collaborative effort. I am not a medical doctor, so nothing within this blog is meant to be used as a diagnosis or prescription. I will post all of the references of my research, and invite those who contribute to do the same. This is to be a place where we can have free-flowing, open conversations and where we can share what we know, ask questions about what we would like to know, and post information on what we learn.

I am a girl who grew up in a combined world of traditional western medicine, traditional eastern medicine, and alternative methods. For example, the three oldest siblings in my family were born in hospitals, while the next three were born at home (the youngest I actually delivered - but that's a whole different blog story.) My mother researched all types of methods of healing and treating, and as I got older I did too.

I have gone through minor midwifery classes, herbal courses, graduated from massage college where courses included - hydro therapy (therapy to treat the body through temperature and water), sports massage, acupressure, cranial sacral therapy, aroma therapy, Russian and Swedish massage, trigger-point therapy, etc.; and I have taken first aid, first responder, and stress and rescue courses. And though this blog may tend to lean to the physical realm more often, I believe the body needs to be viewed from a whole perspective, meaning that psychological, emotional, and at times, spiritual aspects will also be addressed. Again, I'm not an expert, but would love to share what I've learned.

Feel free to post questions. I would love to research new items. And feel free to answer questions or make comments. I hope this blog will prove to be intriguing, educational, enjoyable, and lead to better care and healing.

So, open your bathroom cupboards, pantry doors, and garden gates and let's see where this wonderful road to health can take us.

Warm regards,
The Snake Oiler