Benefits of Relaxation Massage

Do you understand the benefits of a massage? I'll show you how massage benefits you in two major ways:

• Better health and well being
• Less pain

How important are the benefits of massage therapy? According to Tiffany Field, Ph.D., founder of the Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami’s School of Medicine, "[These benefits] put massage in the same category with proper diet and exercise as something that helps maintain overall health." (Newsweek, April 6, 1998)
As you read through these massage benefits, remember that not all types of massage or all massage therapists offer all the massage benefits discussed. Relaxation massage is very different from massage to treat injury or improve alignment. Know what you want, and ask potential massage therapists if that is what they offer.

                                                                                   

Better Health and Well Being

Better health and well being give you the ability to live your life to the fullest. You feel great and have the energy to meet life's challenges and pursue your interests. Massage benefits your health and well being in many ways:
Stress Relief
Massage reverses the effects of negative stress by bringing about the relaxation response, which includes reducing blood pressure, heart rate, respiration rate, and the level of stress hormones (such as adrenaline and cortisol) in the body.
Massage benefits your ability to monitor stress signals and respond appropriately by sensitizing you to your body and improving your body awareness.
Better Circulation                                                                                                                                                                Massage benefits blood and lymph circulation. Good circulation is vital to good health. Your blood and lymph carry nourishment to millions of cells throughout your body and carry away the waste eliminated from the cells. Massage increases the flow of blood and lymph, encourages better exchange of nutrients at the cellular level, and promotes detoxification. This process is important because the "future you" is determined by how well your cells regenerate themselves.
Increased circulation also helps both prevent and relieve muscle tension—lack of circulation can lead to chronically tight muscles. In turn, chronically tight muscles impede circulation and do not receive enough nutrients.
Easier Movement with Less Risk of Injury
Massage relaxes tense muscles, enhances tissue elasticity and flexibility, and increases range of motion in joints. This makes it easier for you to move and pursue all the activities that you want to pursue. And you are less likely to injure yourself because a less tense and more flexible body is better able to handle any movement you make, even the sudden, unexpected ones.

And More Healthy Massage Benefits

• Massage strengthens your immune system.
• Massage improves sleep patterns. Sleep deprivation is a major problem and the cause of many accidents.
• Massage promotes deeper and easier breathing. Shallow breathing means your body is not receiving the optimal amount of oxygen, which causes your health to deteriorate.
• Massage reduces anxiety and mental stress, creates a calmer mind, increases feelings of well-being, and relaxes you. All these massage benefits increase your capacity for clear thinking.
• Massage speeds recovery from exercise by helping remove waste products from muscles.

Less Pain

Another massage benefit is relief of muscle aches and pains. Aches and pains adversely affect your health and drain away energy that you could be using to pursue other activities.Massage for chronic pain can break the vicious cycle of pain, where pain leads to muscle tension, reduced circulation, and restricted movement, which in turn lead to more pain. 

Muscles contract around any painful site to protect the area. If pain is resolved quickly, muscles relax. If pain persists, muscles can become habitually tight.

Sometimes tight muscles press on nerves, causing tingling, numbness, or more pain. Massage therapy helps by stretching tight muscles and by stimulating the nervous system to relax muscle tension.Tight muscles reduce circulation, letting waste products accumulate, which can leave you feeling fatigued and sore. Plus waste products can irritate nerves, causing pain to spread.

Massage therapy releases contracted muscles and increases circulation. As massage relaxes the nervous system, blood vessels dilate to increase blood flow. Waste products are flushed away and replaced with oxygen and nutrients.

Areas with poor circulation often develop trigger points—highly irritable spots that refer pain, tingling, or other sensations to other places in the body. Trigger points respond well to standard massage techniques.

Massage Stretches Muscles and Improves Movement

Eventually, the body lays down connective tissue in any contracted area with poor circulation. While helpful for healing injuries, this natural reaction can "glue" muscles and their connective tissue coverings into a shortened state. The stretching and kneading of massage therapy softens and lengthens connective tissue.

Summary

Irritating waste products, painful trigger points, and shortened muscles make even simple actions difficult and tiring. As your capacity for movement and exercise decreases, you lose the most important means for maintaining good circulation throughout your body, risking pain in new areas.

Massage for chronic pain helps restore normal movement by releasing trigger points, removing waste products, and stretching shortened muscles. Also, because you feel better after a massage, you may find renewed energy and motivation for physical activity.

To set up your relaxation massage with me ( Awilda Olah) please call Wellspring Studios to schedule 330-487-5423.  First 5 new clients to schedule will get $20 off regular price of one hour massage ($70).  Please mention you seen this on the blog for discount. 

Namaste

Information from bellevuemassagetherapy.com