Benefits of Massage

Massage Therapists do not diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

Health Benefits of Massage 

The effects of a massage can vary according to the type of massage and the various techniques used to create a specific outcome. With most methods, the circulation of blood is enhanced throughout the body, the nervous system is calmed or activated and the muscles are stretched and relaxed. Specific techniques may be employed to target the lymphatic system, the digestive tract or other body systems. Relieving physical pain and stress improves your mental health and your physical well-being. Increasing the blood flow through massage can help to flush out waste generated by your muscles and body. 

Most people will feel very relaxed and experience relief from long-term aches and pains developed from tension, stress or a repetitive activity. Following an initial period of calmness, people often experience a surge of energy, heightened awareness and greater productivity that can last for many days. 

Massage enhances medical treatments and may shorten the time it takes for the body to recover from injury and illness. Massage can help release chronic muscular tension and pain, improve circulation, increase joint flexibility, reduce mental and physical fatigue and stress, promote faster healing of injured muscular tissue, improve posture and reduce blood pressure. 

Before chiropractic – A 30-60 minute session prior to your appointment is helpful to make chiropractic adjustments easier. Schedule a with us that within 24 hrs before your chiropractic appointment.  Many people have found that there adjustments have lasted longer and they went the chiropracter less often. 

Wellness Care – Many clients elect to be treated on a regular basis to enhance their performance with work, sports, recreation, and overall health. Massage is best used as health maintenance, as it helps to boost your immune system, decreases tension and knots in the muscles, which can block the flow of oxygen and other important nutrients throughout body systems, and thus decreases your likelihood of developing pain or disease conditions/syndromes.

Anxiety – Emotions can alter muscle tone. States of anxiety can create sustained increased muscle tone (hypertonicity) and stiffness.

The central nervous system sends unconscious signals to the muscular system that can cause sustained muscular contraction of which the person is unaware. It is common clinical experience that a client has habitually contracted muscles without any awareness that those muscles are tight. This condition is commonly experienced in the upper trapezius (a muscle that runs through the back, shoulders, and neck). When the therapist touches this muscle, the client is often surprised that it is tight and tender.

When a person is under stress, there is an increased tension in the muscles because of the effects of the sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the “fight or flight” response, and is active when a person is under stress. It releases adrenaline into the blood, causes constriction of the peripheral blood vessels, increases the heart rate, and inhibits the normal movement of the intestines (peristalsis) so that blood can be available to the skeletal muscles for fight or flight.

Depression - Depression creates a loss of muscle tone (hypotonicity). A person can be in parasympathetic override, which contributes to lethargy and loss of normal drives. The parasympathetic nervous system (opposite of the sympathetic fight or flight above) is responsible for bringing the body to rest, recuperation, energy building, and feeding. It decreases the heart rate and stimulates normal movement of the intestines and promotes the secretion of all digestive juices.

Pain with Depression and Anxiety – A disruption of signals in the nervous system is the cause of hypertonicity of the muscles and thus the pain syndrome. Since emotion can alter muscle tone, a gentle touch will engage the limbic (emotional) system of the brain and the parasympathetic nervous system, thus inducing a relaxation response. As the massage session progresses, it guides the client to bring conscious awareness to the muscles, altering unconscious habits of muscle tension, reeducating the reflexes to the spinal cord, and resetting muscle lengths and muscle tone. All modalities of massage for this condition are pain-free to avoid stimulating the sensory system to re-introduce hypertonicity.

Insomnia – Massage increases the body’s production of special neurotransmitters called monamines, which include dopamine (sense of feeling good/improves fine motor movements), serotonin (leads to sleepiness/reduces hunger and cravings), norepinephrine (sense of feeling good – low levels lead to depression and may excite or inhibit the autonomic nervous system), and enkephalin (reduces pain and inhibits substance P, which increases pain).

Relaxation massage also triggers the parasympathetic nervous system (described above in Pain with Depression and Anxiety) which helps you to sleep.

Decreases the Effects of Stress – If you are under stress, your adrenal glands are likely to be overproducing a hormone called cortisol “the stress hormone.” While important to life, too much of this hormone can become destructive to your body.

A person experiencing fluid retention, muscle weakness, vertigo, hypersensitivity, fatigue, weight gain, and connective tissue breakdown most likely has long-term high blood levels of cortisol.

Cortisol can also predispose a person to type 2 diabetes, because cortisol supports a rise in blood levels of glucose, fatty acids, and amino acids.

As age increases, the body’s ability to adapt to multiple stressors is decreased, making you more likely to develop disease.

Sympathetic nervous system overload (fight or fight) can cause increased breathing rate, increased bronchospasm, increased heart rate, increased blood pressure, and decreased blood flow to muscles and organs.

Regular relaxation massage can stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system to reverse the production of stress hormones and thus decrease your breathing rate, decrease bronchial tension, decrease heart rate, decrease blood pressure, and increase blood flow to your muscles and organs, leaving you feeling calm, loose, at ease, laid back, “super cool,” and relaxed.