As soon as your head tilts forward, your shoulders naturally respond by tilting forward, pulling and taking over the support of the low back. This makes our center of gravity on the shoulders and less on the pelvic girdle defying the support of gravity. Internally the liver quits detoxifying the body and turns glycogen into glucose for the flight and fight. The toxins it was working on are flooded into the bloodstream along with the glucose for the flight and fight response. The extra glucose and toxins increase inflammation throughout the body.
Nothing can stay chronic without an emotional attachment. The glue in this whole posture stance from pain is…FEAR. Fear of pain, fear of hurting that area more, fear of not performing as you normally do. What conquers fear? Exercise? Eating? Staying home? NO! …Acts of Love!
Love is not a feeling, it is an action. Love is patient, love is kind, it is not easily angered, love protects, love always trusts and always has hope, love forgives… and love CONNECTS! Fear disconnects.
You have a ‘love’ center in your brain. It is known as the Limbic System. The Limbic System also contains the ‘underscore’ of any situation…good or bad …it measures intensity. It is called the Amygdala. Massage rhythm relaxes the Limbic System (especially the Amygdala) and in extreme cases when the Limbic System totally shuts down, massage can open it up to feeling again.
The long soothing strokes called effleurage strokes not only connect the body again to the brain relaxing the Limbic System but also supports and aids in the Lymphatic System moving toxins properly. When your Lymphatic System is working properly, it removes the larger toxins that your veins cannot pick up and is key in taking down inflammation. Inflammation is the physical cause of chronic pain and always delays healing.
Getting chiropractic adjustments and physical therapy treatments address the issues of the pain but… Chiropractic care focuses just on joint adjustments and are generally scheduled every 15 minutes before the next patient gets on the table. Not much personal attention and true listening to the body.
Physical therapists push the identified muscles into action in elongating and shortening those muscles to their highest potential. They specialize in making that SECTION of your body go back to ‘normal’ flexion and extension. Many times they push the body beyond ‘releasing’ pain and create new pain that the body stores in the tissue. Now if you re-injure the body and the pain meets the level of intensity that the body stored from the ‘healing pain’ those capsules are broken and INCREASE your pain in the injured area. Pain does travel!
Massage connects the whole body again to the brain. Massage is one-on-one for a full hour or more where your body is being heard. Massage is human touch soothing the limbic system in a professional pattern of shutting it down through the body reconnecting to the brain and being heard.
Massage is the touch that reaches your inner child reconnecting your inner child to the adult. It reaches and connects every part of your body to the whole. Your brain cannot digest emotions….your viscera (hollow organs) do. That is why you hold your stomach tight. That is why you want to put food into your stomach to soothe it into digestion…parasympathetic action, so the viscera can change channels before conquering the emotions of fear presented to you. When emotions are too intense, you throw up or refuse to eat…your emotions are OVERLOADED at this point.
Massage slows your healing down by gathering ALL of your body through the movement of all of your blood. The rhythmic strokes with the soft music work on the Limbic System in calming the center of the brain. Massage re-attaches you to your brain so the body can reason with what happened, that today is not yesterday’s injury day and that your body can work with your brain in healing your body one day at a time. That ‘feel good, everything is going to be okay’ moment is when the brain is connected back to the body and you are no longer working from the head up through the injury. Your body MUST be heard to heal.
Massage therapy and counseling are the only two modalities where you get to be with a professional for a full hour or more with one-on-one time. Counseling gives you the tools to use to enable your mind to calm down mentally. Massage connects your body back to your brain. Or…counselors connect from top down; massage therapists connect from bottom up!
The Licensed Massage Therapist (LMT) has the training of the body, of muscle attachments, the nervous and digestive system and their schooling touches on the limbic system. Once the LMT gets out of school they find that the limbic system is critical in accessing in order to get their client to relax. How does the LMT know when the client is relaxed? The tissue tells us and we follow our hands LISTENING to your body and making adjustments where your muscles and energy are stuck. Sometimes that is stopping and holding the area, sometimes it is having you breathe with us in that area and sometimes putting more pressure or cross-fiber friction on the area loosening the fascia in releasing the pain and toxins in the area.
Should you use Chiropractors and Physical Therapists? ABSOLUTELY!!! But use them with massage so massage can keep your body connected to your brain. Now when you follow your massage with Chiro and PT, you won’t encapsulate your emotions into the injured area as easily. Your whole body is aware and WILLING to support the work they do in the injured area. Your massage therapist has calmed the Limbic System in your brain BEFORE you see the professionals specializing in joint and muscle rehabilitation.
Your brain was not intended to be made to stay in the flight and fight over-riding the body on all decisions for more than a few minutes during the crises. Then it is supposed to work WITH the body in healing, analyzing and managing the areas of the body that need to be heard. Only massage has all the actions of love. Remember love is the antidote of fear. Your therapist will spend a full hour or more massaging and moving everything toward the heart. Simple procedure. Anyone can do that. Can they do it with the intent that a good massage therapist can? No. There is something about knowledge of the body that is intuitively released through touch and the body KNOWS when a true professional is working on it and will respond and communicate to the therapist on this level.
LMT’s don’t have the training to diagnose. I am not saying come to us before you get diagnosed as to your condition. But…..let us be your first stop before you continue treatments with PT and Chiro. Let us connect your whole body to the PT’s and Chiropractic work. Let us soothe the fear of movement with love that listens, is patient, is kind and slows down your world so your limbic system is ready to heal by staying out of the flight and fight mode and listening to the body again.
We at Centering Massage are your professionals at ‘making your body a good home for you’ again!
About the Author:
Connie Weisel
Founder of Centering Massage 2002
LMT & Owner
Connie has personally given thousands of massages that included medical, insurance work, PIP’s (auto accidents) and relaxation. She is excited to share what she has observed, learned and mastered in the massage room.
Voted Best of Central Kitsap Massage Therapist 2013 & Small Business of the Year Award 2016