Got Anxiety? Depressed? The Mind-Body Connection and How Massage Therapy Can Help

  The Cartesian concepts of duality don’t work anymore. The mind-body connection is irrefutable ~ Dr. Kelly Brogan When you feel sadness, your body reacts with tears. When you feel shame, your face flushes with embarrassment. The reverse is also true. How your physical behavior affects your mood. What you eat, your levels of exercise, how much sleep you get and even how you sit changes your mood and attitude. (Consider how being asked to ‘sit up straight’ is about improving [...]

Is Chronic Pain Taking Away Your Enjoyment in Life? Try Deep Tissue Massage

  Have you been putting up with chronic muscular pain? Are you simply adapting to what hurts in your body rather than doing something about it? As you move through life, your body finds ways to deal with physical dysfunction. Sitting at a desk for extended periods of time? You may begin to experience swelling or discomfort in your legs or aching in your shoulders.  Typing at a computer all day?  Maybe your neck is stiff or your wrists and hands [...]

How Massage Can Help Heal A Groin Pull

New Years resolutions and summer outdoors activities can be the perfect storm for injury as you get more active and try to live up to the promises you make to yourself to ‘get in shape’. If you haven’t been keeping up with exercise over the winter, jogging, playing basketball, hiking or riding your bike may result in a struggle for your body to meet the sudden and intense demands placed on it to perform. Such issues as a pulled [...]

Massage Support for Hamstring Injuries

Whether you are an athlete, a weekend warrior, or simply an active individual, you can thank your multi-tasking hamstrings for your ability to kick, jump, run, sprint, climb and execute sudden stop and start motions like those that are part of playing basketball or football. The hamstrings are a group of three large muscles (the semitendinosus, semimembranosus and biceps femoris) located in the back of your thigh that attach to the sitting bones (ischium) and stretch across the back of [...]

Can Massage Improve Brain Function?

Brain health is a primary focus of well-being. Your brain chemistry and function improve as you learn a new language, take up a new activity, stay socially engaged or when you commit to new experiences on a daily basis. Another significant way to maintain brain health is through regular physical activity. Here are two ways that exercise supports optimal cognitive function: Besides helping the body maintain good health, physical exercise is also known to increase the size of the brain’s hippocampus, [...]

Massage Therapy to Heal Scar Tissue

Each day as we walk, run, sit, bend, lift or rest, our body’s complex web of fascia, ligaments and tendons work synergistically to help those movements occur. Strung in perfect balance and function throughout our structure, these connective tissues stretch, tighten and hold as needed when we engage our daily activities.  Ideally movement is smooth and painless but injury, surgery and other damage can cause disruptions to this inner network inhibiting motion and causing discomfort. Such constrictions are the [...]

How Massage Can Energise You

Hidden within the relaxation effects of massage is also an opportunity for an energy boost. While massage is usually associated with relaxation and calm, there are a number of subtle ways it helps stimulate energy and optimises body functions to help pull you through those winter days of gray and chill.  A little extra energy can be a grateful gift during times of the year when there is less sun and colder temperatures.   Energy-Giving Benefits of Massage Better sleep – Lack [...]

Can Massage Help Carpal Tunnel Syndrome?

While stress is most notable as an emotional response to overwhelm, the body can become physically stressed from habitual movements repeated over extended periods of time. Stress in this context can cause: swelling, distortion and breakdown in the soft tissue that cushions the bones and tendons; tightness in muscles that leads to constricted circulation and the loss of the muscles’ ability to return to a natural resting state. The resulting disorder called Repetitive Stress Injury (RSI) can impair body movement and cause [...]

Can Massage Help Your Migraine?

Migraine headaches are one of the most common disorders affecting approximately one billion people worldwide. A migraine is characterized by debilitating moderate to severe pain and throbbing in the head (usually on one side), and can be accompanied by nausea, sensitivity to light, smells, sound, as well as visual disturbances called an ‘aura’. These symptoms can worsen with any exertion and are sometimes preceded by neurologic signs such as seeing flashes of light or noticing blind spots in vision [...]

Massage to Relieve Neck Pain

Neck pain is one of the most common reasons people seek medical treatment. Out of 291 conditions studied, neck pain is ranked 4th highest in terms of disability according to an Australian study, Global Burden of Disease 2010 Study.  Additional global research ranks neck pain as a significant impairment that affects quality of life and well-being. The neck is the main thoroughfare for muscles, blood vessels and major arteries, nerves, bones and cartilage to support vital brain, respiratory, and nerve [...]