Ep. 41 - Massage Therapy's Role in Post-Surgical Recovery with Matthew Gavzy

Unlock the secrets of integrating massage therapy with advanced physical therapy techniques in this enlightening episode of the Handcrafted Therapy Podcast. Join Julie Alexander as she hosts Matthew Gavzy, a licensed massage therapist and physical therapist assistant with an exceptional range of expertise. Discover how Matthew bridges the gap between these two fields to empower therapists to step up their game in medical massage practices. 

Matthew dives into his passion for massage therapy and explains how he utilizes his physical therapy knowledge to enhance therapeutic outcomes. He discusses unique educational offerings that equip massage therapists with the skills to communicate effectively with healthcare professionals, understand surgical procedures, and implement advanced taping techniques. Listen in as they explore the challenges and triumphs of working with professional and amateur athletes, plus the importance of mastering anatomy for credibility in the medical community. 

Whether you're a seasoned massage therapist or new to the field, this episode delivers practical insights and inspiration to elevate your practice. 

In this episode, Julie and Matthew discuss:  

• Building trust with clients through sports massage 
• Educational courses on orthopedic procedures and stability taping 
• Bridging communication between massage therapists and doctors 

View extended shownotes here 

Contact me for a free sample:
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Visit our store:
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Plano, TX 75023

Contact me for a free sample:
email - info@handcraftedtherapy.com
text/call -  972-658-7722

Order it online: handcraftedtherapysupplies.com 

Visit our store:
3303 North Central Expressway #240
Plano, TX 75023

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Transcript

Ep. 41: Massage Therapy's Role in Post-Surgical Recovery with Matthew Gavzy [00:00:00] 

Meet Matthew Gavzy

Julie Alexander: I'm julie alexander. I'm very excited to have Matthew Gavzy with me today. Did I say your name correctly?

Matt Gavzy: Yeah, Yes,

you did. Thank

you. 

Julie Alexander: Perfect matt, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Matt Gavzy: Oh,

Well, let's see

My my background is in physical therapy as a physical therapist assistant, and I'm also a licensed massage therapist here in New Jersey. Uh, I also currently sit on uh, the board of directors for the National Certification.

For the 

Julie Alexander: you're the one who knows how to say all the letters correctly

Matt Gavzy: Even I get them times.

Julie Alexander: We're always on here going I don't remember.

Matt Gavzy: It's some days are more challenging than others.

Julie Alexander: That's right. 

Matthew's Journey into Massage Therapy

Julie Alexander: So how did you get your start and I'm assuming you got PTA first and then Alpha T? No.

Matt Gavzy: actually, I was a massage therapist before I became a PTA. [00:01:00] So I became a massage therapist. Was it 30 years ago now? And I was training a lot for competitive tennis. I was a tournament tennis player at the time. And I started doing or getting body work. To help me

And my body

for for training and everything

And my first degree is actually in economics.

So I have a bachelor of science in economics and I noticed things in the early two thousands, honestly, about where the economy

was

And seeing things that wasn't necessarily comfortable with, so I figured, you know what, Yeah. I'm really playing with people's disposable income when it comes to doing the

type

of massage work that I do.

And I said, I need something more stable, and I thought about getting my msw or going alternate route as a teacher or any number of And it [00:02:00] just seemed that becoming a physical therapist was the next logical step in the type of massage work that I was doing.

put myself through a PTA school. And a couple of years later, you know, the

market crashed and the economy

tanked a little bit in 2007, And so that's how it all started.

Julie Alexander: I have a question.

Matt Gavzy: Sure.

Julie Alexander: What's MSW?

Matt Gavzy: Oh, masters of social work.

Julie Alexander: Okay. Thank

Matt Gavzy: Sorry about that. That's okay. I asked the dumb questions because people will be listening and going, I don't know what that So, you know, I figure there's at least one other person out there that's going to go, I don't know what that means.

Julie Alexander: means.

Absolutely. So, um, your passion lie?

Matt Gavzy: My passion actually lies in

the massage world.

It

really does. I mean, I use therapy as a way of

enhancing my massage.

but my passion is absolutely in the massage world. [00:03:00] Absolutely. There's no question about it. I would give up the physical therapy world to really do

massage on

a full time basis.

I mean, I had a full

Impact of COVID-19 on Matthew's Career

Matt Gavzy: time practice before COVID happened.

And then I lost everything. lost my massage job. I lost my.

My physical therapy jobs wound up

working in the covid hospitals New Jersey

during that

time as a way

of

making ends meet. So the passion is truly in massage.

Julie Alexander: What is your what's your favorite thing about massage therapy?

Matt Gavzy: You know, I don't think anybody's ever asked me that. That's a

way to

throw me a curve ball off the top.

What is my

Julie Alexander: you what my 

favorite

thing is while you're

thinking about it? 

Matt Gavzy: Yeah, Maybe I'll just use your

answer.

Julie Alexander: So

my favorite thing about massage is that we can learn as massage therapists, how to really nurture and care for someone and get them through some really difficult [00:04:00] physical problems without too many discomforts or too much pain.

And not a lot of you know,

massive

reconstruction kind of work, like surgery and drugs and things. So that's my favorite thing about it.

Matt Gavzy: I don't know.

Maybe I should just copy that answer and go ditto.

Julie Alexander: You can totally steal that answer.

Matt Gavzy: I'll you

I'll save that later for you.

Julie Alexander: There you go.

Matt Gavzy: for a class

of someone if somebody asks me that. Julie says her favorite thing. I'm just gonna use that. Actually I think my favorite part about doing massage is it's very close to that actually.

I mean, just, when my daughter was, Dancing at college just last year

and

my wife and I would always go to the performances and we showed up

and I always carry a first

aid bag with me in my car,

doing all the sports massage and helping my daughter and all of her dance friends and everything

And we

got To the venue [00:05:00] school and everything and my daughter comes running out of the stage door and she says, The director needs to see you and your bag on the stage now.

and I was like,

Oh, okay, what's

going on? So I

get up there and and she has an injured dancer

And

he needs to be able to perform. So,

The best

part for me is that high that I get. Being able to work with somebody in that moment to be able to get them to do what they need to do,

like

an athlete or a dancer or anybody else who's got that pain, injury, whatever, and I can get them what they need to do and then be able to help them afterwards or send them off to the right

person, you know, after they get to do their athletic endeavor.

So that

for me is the

best part that high that I really get being able

to do

that. So that's my [00:06:00] best That's my favorite

Julie Alexander: That's awesome. That's gosh, it gives me a little bit of performance anxiety, just thinking about like somebody asking me to fix somebody right before they have to go on stage. That's pretty You know, adrenaline rushing kind of stuff

And not stuff that normal massage therapists really have to deal with.

You know, most of the time we're in like a spa setting and it's calm and relaxing, not like,

hurry up,

we

need to treat this person.

Matt Gavzy: Yeah it's a great feeling. I just last year got to do the eight, 10 swimming and diving championships with LaSalle University out here in Philadelphia.

and

I had the opportunity to work with them. And again, you know, they're getting tired over the course of the week and I have to keep them going, you know, as the massage therapist and,

the coaches put a lot of trust in me and that, that is

just such a wonderful feeling that you never take for [00:07:00] granted Appreciate it. that other people trust you and your skillset to

help them.

What, you know, what better feeling is there?

Building Trust and Gaining Experience

Julie Alexander: But you've had to develop that trust, right? You don't just. Get it overnight. You have to gain that trust. And I'm sure you've worked for them for a long time and helped a lot of people before they just trust you. Right.

Matt Gavzy: Yeah, I mean, you know, everything that you do in the past leads up to the present.

You know, there are people who believe in that. I mean, so I've done,

I've

been, the the industry has been very

kind

to me, honestly. I mean,

I got

the chance to do the Olympics and the Paralympics in atlanta and the i've done work with the avp pro beach volleyball players and both professional tennis uh, Organizations the atp and the wta

know, So all of those things are all those local running events and everything all of that kind of leads you up to someone, somebody takes a look and says [00:08:00] well What have you

done? How

can we trust you and know, help them understand what you've done. trust

you still have to earn it. still have to earn it, but it helps to open a door about,

you know, that it definitely does. It helps

to open a door, but then it's up to you to step through and have your skills ready.

Julie Alexander: You know, I want to mention something to our listeners, cause one of the things that I really like about my podcast is I talk about how you know, practical ways to grow your own business and what you can take away from this and something that just made me think about it with you, Matt, was You know, we really have to brag on ourselves on what we've done.

So, you know, it's might not come easy to you as a humble person. Most of us are very empathetic and, you know, have a lot

of humility,

but. You know, it's important, especially when you're building your business to brag on yourself and don't feel like that's a,

You're patting yourself on the [00:09:00] back and, you know, Oh, I'm so cocky.

That's

not what

this talking about. We're talking about brag on yourself, show off your skills, prove that the person that's trying to hire you is able to put their trust in you with what they want to pay you for. Right.

Matt Gavzy: Yeah. And I, you're absolutely right. It's

 Challenging for me at times to, to brag on myself as I'm sure it is for many of us.

You know, we're not salesmen. You know, we're not good at that. You know, we prefer to let our hands do the talking as it were. Sometimes you do have to say, Hey, you know, this is what I've done. This is who I've worked with and, and do some

of that bragging that

It's still a lesson I'm learning.

And it's still something that I'm working on, especially when it comes to my educational stuff,

you know, learning how to,

you know, promote myself. That's a challenge for me. And I have lots of friends who are going no, to it. And I'm like 

Julie Alexander: this friend is going to say the same thing, because you just [00:10:00] segued perfectly into our next topic, which is your education. So I'm going to give you the opportunity to show off your new bragging skills and talk about your your platform. What are you teaching?

Why should we listen to you?

That's a good question. Oh 

Matt Gavzy: oh, my goodness.

Okay. So let's see. Currently I have a number of That I have available. I

have

an orthopedic procedures and post surgical

precautions class.

It's not a hands on class, really talking about after somebody's had, you know a joint replacement surgery or a complex shoulder surgery How do you work with that patient in terms of communicating with the physical therapist, the doctor?

The

patient?

And understanding what the surgery itself was and how it's done because your patients, your [00:11:00] clients, and I use the term patient and client interchangeably. So you'll hear me flip and forth on that. They don't know what happened underneath They see a scar, they see a, you know, a band data portal or whatever, but they don't understand what's happened underneath this underneath the skin.

And, it's up to us to really understand

that so that Yeah. when the doctor puts precautions on them, things that the, that the patient shouldn't be doing for a period of time, it's up to us to understand that

and it's up

to us to be able to still work with that patient so that we don't do any harm to the patient

to the surgery.

So I've of built this niche, I guess, in that I am trying to do. And and put together those things that I know as a physical therapist assistant that I think a massage therapist should know.

So it's kind of

bridging that [00:12:00] gap between the two industries. And can we put a hold on this really quick?

Somebody rang my doorbell.

Julie Alexander: Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Gavzy: Give me a, quick, quick

time out. Okay.

Julie Alexander: Yep. No problem.

Matt Gavzy: Be right back. 

Sorry about that. It was a salesman. Go figure. apologize as the guy's like standing outside my house going.

Okay. rewind and start that from the beginning now. 

Julie Alexander: Yeah. So the

question was, um, you are instructing, what are you instructing and why

should we listen to

you?

Matt Gavzy: Oh, okay. 

Julie Alexander: Still a

tough question

Matt Gavzy: a tough question. 

I've had all this time to think about and it's still a tough question.

So, So, what I'm trying to do is know, as a physical therapist assistant and a massage therapist, I kind of live in two different worlds there is are things that I learned as an, as a therapist assistant that I did not learn as a massage but there are a lot of things that I know that I [00:13:00] really believe that a massage therapist should know, especially we're going to move massage into a medical based or a medically oriented direction.

As

one direction, you know, and there are many directions for massage to take, but

we'll focus on this one for now.

So, you know,

What

I'm trying to do is massage therapist that information. And

I have a class called orthopedic procedures and post surgical precautions and it talks about. Those things like the surgeries, you know, total hip replacement, total knee shoulders, total shoulders.

Rotator cuff surgeries. talks about the surgeries. It talks about what's really happening underneath the skin because patients and clients, they don't know what happened. They really don't and they're going, why does this still hurt? Why is this taking so long? It was They don't

have a good understanding

and doctors.[00:14:00] 

really don't explain it well.

Whether they choose not to or they feel as if they don't have the time. And so I think it's important for us to be able to understand what those surgeries are because we do get a lot of those patients who have had surgeries. And who believe that massage can help in their recovery and it can, but then it becomes our responsibility to understand.

What's happened underneath the skin and to understand and

have conversations with.

physical therapists and the doctors to understand what the precautions are. In other words, those things that a doctor doesn't want the patient to do for a specified period of time, so that the surgery can take and heal and everything else.

And. While the class is not a hands on class, there's a lot of information that goes on and we need to up our game. We as massage therapists, we need to be better at And so

that's what this class is about.[00:15:00] 

I

have

another class that talks about

stability taping, right? So,

the last, I don't know, 10 years or so

the massage therapists have really leaned into the kinesiology taping.

So that would include the rock tape, the kinesia, The K tape, the kinesio tape, all of these things. So I'm just going to put it under the umbrella of kinesiology And we've leaned hard into,

it. And,

you know, I

have friends who are instructors and everything,

and

there's a lot of great That kinesiology taping can do, especially for somebody who's active or at whatever point they are in their healing process, but there are times when we get that weekend warrior

who comes

into our office on a Monday or Tuesday, who's played, I don't know, soccer over the weekend or tennis or something, and they come in and they're like, you know, [00:16:00] my, knee hurts and their knee's swollen, or, you know, I think I twisted my ankle.

you can see that their ankle is swollen and we have an idea of what may have happened, but we also know that, you know, if we're into taping, that kinesiology taping may not be the best thing. We want to actually stabilize the keep it from moving until we can refer the person out to their doctor. And so that's what this is about, you know, I do the shoulder, the knee, the ankle, and it's always

expanding the body parts and

the types of taping, but there are definitely times when keeping a joint immobile a period of time is the best thing for us to You know, while the body is going through that acute healing process, we all have those clients who would think of us as their primary musculoskeletal therapist. run off to their primary care first. They don't run off to their orthopedist first.

they come to [00:17:00] us because they trust us and that's the best

part is we have that trust with our clients.

And so we should understand and learn how to be able to do some of

these So again, bridging that gap I have

two ethics courses. One is humanism in massage therapy. So we talk about humanism and the history of humanism. And While we are empathetic and compassionate, but how does that fit into a bigger model, you know, of, and it's not just looking at the person as a I mean, it is holistic in that respect, it's really understanding where this all comes

from how can we really help our patients

On a different

level. So I

talk about that and then I have another

ethics course about sports massage and working with the professional Um, versus the amateur

athlete. So

you're a therapist and [00:18:00] you have a professional athlete and you have an amateur athlete, you've got different

things

that are happening. You know, the professional athlete has sponsorships and coaches and they're making a living off of their body. when you have the amateur athlete, you know, we handle them differently.

You know, they may be a high school athlete. So you have the coach and the parents who are chattering in your ear,

help my

student help my child or whatever. How do we work with that? How do we know where to draw a line and say, you know what?

this

is not what's in their best So, I've I've got that I'm working on a class for gait, gate. Gait dysfunction. So that's going to be a long class. That's going to be like a full 2 day class because we're going to

talk about hands on stuff

and different gait dysfunctions from Trendelenburg to plantar fasciitis and

how that affects gait.

Understanding Gait and Assessments

Matt Gavzy: somebody who's

got knee problems. So

looking at that whole chain and and really looking at [00:19:00] gait and how to break that down and decide

where you need to look, what you want to look at.

we learn about gait in massage school, but we don't learn how to break

that down,

Like a physical therapist does. So that's just one class and I've got others that I'm working on and developing Working with a, a a more in depth assessment

course again, learning

how to do assessments from the physical therapy perspective, looking at the body differently, different quick tests that we can do that they do clearly within our scope, but how to gather different information than what we do now.

So, staying

busy! 

Julie Alexander: It sounds like it

Matt Gavzy: Yeah. Working on a lot of different

things, which is good, because I like to stay that way.

Bridging the Gap Between Massage Therapists and Doctors

Julie Alexander: so I would I want to kind of Present to you kind of a summary of what I see That you just told 

Matt Gavzy: It's a lot of stuff. I, you, You asked I threw it all out [00:20:00] there.

Julie Alexander: Just please correct me if I make a mistake in my, some of my assumptions, okay? So it sounds to me like you're helping massage therapists translate what doctors want to see from us and the services that we give to their patients that are also our patients.

Matt Gavzy: Yes.

That's a really good way of putting it. it's us understanding them they understanding what it is that we can really do and how We can help

know, we always say We can help them We need to prove that and so I'm trying

to do is give everybody those tools

Julie Alexander: I love that you're

setting

up a challenge for us out there. Matt's got the gauntlet set down, folk. Let's, let's see what we can do to help them. I mean, I just love the fact that you are looking at this in a way that makes sense. Because a lot of us massage therapists are [00:21:00] intimidated by talking to medical professionals.

And there's nothing wrong with I understand why you feel that way. We have not been trained to have a communication with a medical professional in this capacity. We don't have the knowledge and you should be a little scared of that because you want people to trust you, but yet you might not have the knowledge to really execute what the doctor wants from and Matt is presenting a way.

To take this information from one of us, not just a, another doctor that might speak over our heads that might not really understand the way we , but Matt, you understand us and know that we might not be able to speak comfortably with their medical doctor or their surgeon,

but

you can help us understand really what's going on and how we can help.

Matt Gavzy: Yes. 

Yeah. That was, I'm going to have to remember all that cause that's really good.

Julie Alexander: Well, the good [00:22:00] thing is it's

recorded and 

Matt Gavzy: me out a lot. 

You're

helping me out so much. 

Julie Alexander: Well, it's recorded now,

so you can listen to it

whenever you want. 

Matt Gavzy: Take my 

notes. Julie said this. I'm just going to steal this.

Julie Alexander: So, Matt, we are working together to get you to come to Dallas, right? So tell us about what we've got working.

Matt Gavzy: Oh, I am

so excited to be coming to Dallas. It's going to be great. March 22nd and 23rd, I believe are the dates that we are looking at going to be in the Dallas area and I'm going to be doing 2 classes. 1 on Saturday. 1 on Sunday. The The Saturday class is going to be the orthopedic procedures and post surgical

precautions class

and Sunday we'll do the stability taping class So I am absolutely so excited

To come down there.

I've never been

to Dallas before, so this is going to be a a real treat for me,[00:23:00] 

uh really looking forward to it.

Julie Alexander: We're excited to host you. You're listening and you need some credits or just want to learn something cool from Matt, please take a look at the handcrafted therapy supply. com website. We're going to have registration Also, if you're interested in Matt's other classes, you have a website they can go to as well.

Correct.

Matt Gavzy: I'm revamping my website. So, but they can always reach out to me via email or my phone. So, my email is bodyworks T. so that's B. O. D. Y. W. O. R.

K. I. N. G s as in sam m as in mary t as in tom@gmail.com. i'm also up on linkedin can look me up there And my cell phone number by all means, please reach out to me via my cell phone. You can text you can call It's always available [00:24:00] to you. It's 2 0 1 4 1 0 7 

Julie Alexander: Thank you so much for that. That's incredible. I mean, We've got this all this incredible resource before us that's providing personal Cell phone number and his email address. So if you have any questions for matt, please reach out to him And man, if you have any questions about the classes coming up in dallas, please reach out to us at handcrafted therapy I am really impressed with Matt, our good friend Maggie troop took his class at the AMTA Tampa national convention back in September.

And if any of you guys know Maggie she is just a rock star of a person. In the massage

and she is a nerd and I love her to death She's our anatomy expert and cbd queen cannabis queen So she took matt's class and she has not been able to stop talking about how much she [00:25:00] just loved it so you know

If

you want to be a rock star like Maggie. And that's what I want to be when I grew up. I hope she

watches this episode and listens to this.

Matt Gavzy: me

too.

Julie Alexander: All right. Anything else you want to share with our listeners or any nuggets of information you've got that, you know, anything else you 

Matt Gavzy: Well, you know, I, you know, the one thing that if you're wanting to work with this population and communicate with doctors, I would tell you to really.

Understand your anatomy and your anatomical terms because doctors and physical therapists talk in those terms every day. It is a second language for them and to understand that is going to go a long way for our credibility as well. if we can at least talk in their language.

using

proper

anatomical

terms,

That's

going to give us some credibility.

Julie Alexander: I agree. I [00:26:00] totally agree. And you know, speaking of Maddie, Maggie, we're working together to come up with anatomy refresher course in Dallas at Handcrafted Therapy. So that should be coming out. Hopefully it'll be before your class, but I'm not sure. We're saying spring right now. So, your

eyes open for that.

You know, it's such a good way to like, I mean, we all forget, like, you know, we're like the backbone, you know, we just forget because we don't really speak in those terms. And I think you're absolutely right. We need to refresh our anatomy skills.

Matt Gavzy: We're so used to talking to our patients, our clients plain, terms that that they can understand that we forget the other side of it, you know? And

Yeah, I mean, the better we can do with that, the better I think we'll be.

Julie Alexander: yeah, I agree. And the more justified our profession will be in the bigger picture of medical [00:27:00] professionals.

Matt Gavzy: Yes.

Yes.

Julie Alexander: Yeah. Matt, I have a bonus question 

Matt Gavzy: Did I have to study for it?

Julie Alexander: Not at

all. a fun question. And if you can't think

of anything, it's okay. We'll just cut it off before this question, but I I'm putting together every time I do an interview, this is a bonus question that could end up in my book deal someday, which I hope to get.

Tales from the Table: Funny and Unusual Stories

Julie Alexander: I'm going to call it Tales from the Table,

Matt Gavzy: Nice.

Julie Alexander: and if you're interested in participating with this, I'm asking each of my interviewees this question or similar question thereof, which is do you have a story that is really quite extraordinary, either funny or disgusting or weird or just something you want to share from the table?

Matt Gavzy: That's

funny. You say you call it tails from the table. because I was actually years ago thinking of [00:28:00] doing something like if my walls and tables could Yes.

The Wow. What would be. What would be the strangest thing? It's, well there's, God, there's been a few, and it's like, how do you like to actually say this

see.

So I had one time

I had somebody come in, she got on the table

and

started working on her

and then

like, okay, face up. And then I moved to her legs and she's wearing like thigh highs And I'm like, no,

this is like not happening She starts like making a pass and doing things

and I'm like no

we're done. We're done.

Oh For the time I had, and I'm, and I am sure that I am not the only person that this has happened to,

Especially to the women

you know, I had that male client who I'm working on

whose hips start

undulating as I'm working on his back

[00:29:00] and I'm like we

need to stop,

Right,

We're done.

a funny story

I had a,

a client who was actually a A mortician.

wonderful

guy,

very nice, very funny. Came to me for a massage. She was, self conscious and everything, and it was having, you know, some personal issues, you know, with his wife and everything. And

you know, very innocently as I worked on him, you know, as I was working, he was getting embarrassed because he was having a

reaction.

Can I say it like

that? He

was having a reaction

kind of know where that's going.

Right.

he was so mortified. I mean, just. he was like,

oh

my God, I'm so embarrassed and everything. And, you know, talked, we worked through it and everything. And I remember one day he goes in, Gets on the table, And I walk in

And already

There's a [00:30:00] reaction

and

and i'm like

stop, like, what the hell is going on? So he reaches underneath the the sheet You and pulls

out a banana he

throws the banana at me. I'm like, that's

funny

That. That's a funny That's

Julie Alexander: I

have one of the funniest

Matt Gavzy: Oh, 

no. Well, we have that what Number two.

He said one now up to two.

Julie Alexander: well

question because I'm just thinking now about our listeners, right? And how most of us are in the industry that work in this industry. Most of us are female. And. You know, when something like that happens and we shut the conversation off very quickly, it might be a little different than what it looks like for you and your client.

So

how did you, what did you say to him and how did you get through that?

Matt Gavzy: mean, we

had had a number of conversations in our sessions, and it wasn't like I [00:31:00] was psychoanalyzing or anything like that. So I was not overstepping boundaries, but he was

just confiding in me

More than anything else, and I you know, you know, I was providing,

That

unconditional touch that we provide as therapists,

And guess for him that.

Kind of opened up an emotional

Kind of floodgate

for him. And again, I know that this has happened hundreds, if not thousands of us, you know, as massage therapists whether you're a male or a female, I mean, and that's you know,

Part of the good provide to somebody, you know, we, it, it took us a number of sessions and and we laughed.

know, and over time, he just

became more comfortable

with

me so that

reaction

didn't didn't happen and he stayed a long time client of mine for years sweetest man ever. Truly[00:32:00] 

Julie Alexander: So there was nothing like, there wasn't like a hard nosed conversation you had about him, like, 

Matt Gavzy: no, when he came in originally, you know, he had hinted

at

some stuff that was

going on in his personal life and so, unlike the guy who was had the undulating hips.

That was a hard That was a hard cut off, you know, I um,

I think trying to understand where he was coming from trying to put a little empathy into You know my

thought process

realizing that he was not looking for anything sexual and the fact that he was so mortified what he you know feeling and dealing with and having this reaction think that changed my Reaction

to it.

Julie Alexander: Yeah, Yeah. 

Matt Gavzy: I think that's why I didn't give it a hard

Cut off and [00:33:00] everything. I mean

look

sometimes the sessions only lasted 20 minutes, you know And the rest of the time was talking or whatever. That's what he needed. 

and I was just

a listening

device. I was just a sounding board for him to talk.

And like I said, I offered no advice or anything else like that, not playing psychologist, but just doing something that we as massage therapists always do, is listen.

Julie Alexander: yeah, I love that. I mean, it's just so wonderful that, you know, it's wonderful and complicated at the same time that we can't separate emotions from the physical body. Right. And so sometimes when we're dealing with well, we're dealing with humans, right. And we're all and our emotions and our physical being are not separated.

They're one in the same thing.

And so you can't

not let the client talk. I mean, you can not let them talk, but

but

I mean, they're going to have [00:34:00] feelings whether you talk about it or not.

Yes. Absolutely. Right.

lot of it's held in the muscles, right? I mean, a lot of those, that emotional

release and like that are held in

the muscle, not to change

Your funny story into something serious.

Matt Gavzy: No, 

absolutely.

Julie Alexander: I think this is an important topic to discuss, you know, and a lot of us deal with these problems all the time depending on where you work and you know,

Like your sit your whole situation. Right. And obviously, and I'm so thankful you shared your stories. Thank you so much for doing that.

'cause you Some of 'em are, I mean, we all get in these weird situations in the massage room. Massage is kind of weird. I mean, you're going to a

strange person

Get undressed to lay on their table so they can manipulate your soft tissue. It's just kind of a strange concept, right? 

Matt Gavzy: Right. It's we were told as what kids, like, don't get into cars with strangers. And what do we do now? [00:35:00] We jump into an Uber or a Lyft all the time. 

Julie Alexander: Yeah, that's

right. that's right. 

I

mean, so, you know, we and because of the vulnerability of our clients, Like being undressed and on the table and face down. What a vulnerable situation to be in. You know, you have to establish that trust somehow so they will continue to come back. That's how you become a successful, you know, massage

therapist.

The Privilege of Working on the Human Body

Matt Gavzy: I've always looked at what I do. And as

what

I do it's, you know, I'm getting to work on somebody's body. And in this world, in this life, that is the one thing that is truly theirs, right? Their life, their body, that is theirs. And I've never looked at it as it was their privilege. To have me work on that. Right.

And all know people who kind of take

that [00:36:00] perspective and

whatever arena it is.

I mean,

I, I

can tell you, I know doctors who are

like that, you know, like, Hey, you know, it's your privilege

that I even found

a spot for you in

My busy schedule.

You know, I always looked at it, you know, it was always my privilege and

my honor. That they allowed me

their world. To

touch their body

like he said, when they're in such a vulnerable state, various dresses of undress under a sheet, you know, power Power differentials, right?

We've always talked about that in massage school. You know, one person is standing one person is horizontal. know, so many things come into that I always looked at it. It It was always my privilege and my honor to

That they allowed me

to

help them

In whatever way, so, yeah and

I've I've carried that through for 30 years in

in all of my practice.

Closing Thoughts and Encouragement

Julie Alexander: That's amazing. I love the reminder of humility that our profession just [00:37:00] gives us all the time.

You know, I mean, asking for it or not, you're going to get it. I mean, one of my favorite things about being a massage therapist is every day I am more and more just in awe about our bodies.

And how incredible this structure is and how little we know right about it.

So I'm just so thankful that we have so many passionate, empathetic, wonderful massage therapists out there. We love you all. Please know that

we are

on your side. We are fighting the good fight with you. And we're wanted and needed even more right now with all the stress that's in the world.

I mean, You know, there's a lot going on and this is not new but it still sucks. So hang in there keep

going,

Check out matt What matt's going on got going on in his in his world if you're looking for some [00:38:00] ce classes Keep him on your radar for upcoming classes

Matt Gavzy: Thank 

Julie Alexander: Thank you matt so much for your attention and your time wonderful No talk here today.

Thank

Matt Gavzy: It was my pleasure. Thank you for Allowing me to share my story with your your fans and everything Your podcast is amazing. I love it. So thank you so much. you so much. 

Julie Alexander: All right. You have a beautiful day. All

Matt Gavzy: Thank you.

Julie Alexander: We're going to stop recording.