Reflections of Health Massage School Podcast

The Healing Touch: More Than Just Relaxation

• Tammy Cox • Episode 2

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What Are The Benefits Of Massage For The Body?

The transformative power of touch extends far beyond simple relaxation. Massage therapy works as medicine for your body—touching mind, body, and spirit down to the cellular level. Tricia Fraizer of Reflections of Health School of Massage joins us to unpack this holistic approach to wellness that could change your health journey forever.

Fascinating research from the National Institute of Health reveals that human touch isn't just pleasant—it's essential. Studies show infants who receive regular touch thrive, while those deprived of it struggle developmentally. This fundamental human need continues throughout our lives, explaining why massage therapy delivers such profound benefits beyond momentary comfort.

Experienced massage therapists possess an almost detective-like ability to identify problems in your body before you become aware of them. Your system silently compensates for minor issues until they cascade into major problems potentially requiring surgery. From "text neck" (the modern epidemic caused by looking down at phones) to occupation-related repetitive strain injuries, massage therapy provides targeted relief and prevention. Each centimeter your head tilts forward adds pounds of pressure to your spine—a sobering reality in our device-focused world.


Ready to experience the healing power of touch? Your journey toward better health could be just one massage away. Call or text 423-804-3067 to schedule your consultation and discover how massage therapy might be the missing element in your wellness routine.

To learn more about Reflections of Health School of Massage, Inc. visit:
https://www.ReflectionsofHealth.com
Reflections of Health School of Massage, Inc.
1604 Lamons Ln, Ste 207a
Johnson City, TN 37604
423-804-3067

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Reflections of Health Massage School Podcast, where healing hands become powerful careers. Whether you're looking to escape the 9-to-5 grind, earn extra income during college or finally get paid for all those family shoulder rubs, massage therapy could be your next big move. Join us as we explore the power of touch, the path to purpose, and why starting your journey in massage therapy might be the smartest decision you'll ever make.

Speaker 2:

We all know massage feels good, but did you know it also plays a powerful role in healing? Know massage feels good, but did you know it also plays a powerful role in healing, recovery and even emotional wellness? It's more than relaxation, it's medicine for your body. Welcome back everyone. Skip Monty here, co-host slash producer, back in the studio with a very special guest today, ms Tricia Frazier of Reflections of Health. School of Massage Tricia. How's it going?

Speaker 3:

I'm glad to be here. Thanks for having me Skip Going pretty good.

Speaker 2:

Awesome. Well, since you would probably know better than most people, can you explain this to our listeners? What are the benefits of massage for the body?

Speaker 3:

So, in a nutshell, it follows the wellness model of touching the mind, the body and the spirit. So in every aspect of your whole being, massage plays a part, all the way down to the cellular level of your body. You can think of the different hormones that you release when you have joy or sadness, or the different feelings that you have. One thing that I'd like to point out is studies have been done on infants. I believe it was at National Institute of Health, if I'm not mistaken, where they took the studies of infants that were touched versus infants that were not touched, and the infants who were touched thrived and the infants who were not touched did not thrive. And so that plays a part in us as a human being and that we need that touch to be able to exist in this world that we are in. And so that's as far as I know. You know, as far as I understand it and agree with is that that's on the mental level and the spiritual level.

Speaker 3:

And as far as the body is concerned, you know, there are times that I have clients that they come in for a specific problem, or even not a specific problem, and I will be working on something and notice that there's some integrity in the fibers. That's different, that feels different. There's a muscle bundle. They didn't even know it was hurting until I touched it, and so they even expressed that, wow, I didn't even know that that was sore.

Speaker 3:

So there's sometimes that our body will actually adjust to whatever's going on and we don't even know that we've adjusted to it. So we're living with this problem that we have in our body and we don't know that we need to get that problem fixed until somebody's working on it. And if you don't have somebody that's working on it, eventually that problem becomes even more exponentially larger to where it creates more problems down the road to where you then you're going to the doctor for possible hip surgery or rotator cuff surgery or something to that effect. So it does snowball to that level. But think of what you could have done if you'd stopped it when you didn't even know it was a problem.

Speaker 2:

Early on.

Speaker 3:

That's the way yeah.

Speaker 2:

So what are some common health conditions that massage therapy can help manage?

Speaker 3:

So I have a lot of clients that I see that have fibromyalgia. I've got a few that have lupus. A lot of people have problems with their body mechanics as far as what they do on the daily with their job, and that's that repetitive motion that they do that causes that problem to happen inside of their system, because the body is not meant to do that constantly, over and over again. I'll use this one, for example Working at a desk, your elbows are shortened. The muscles around your elbows are shortened because they're not in anatomical correct position at all times. So they're shortened. Because you're typing on a computer, then you've got what I like to lovingly refer to as text neck.

Speaker 3:

So we have become a society that have our phone attached to our hand, and so when we drop our head to look at the text, then what happens is our head gets off of its axis and I believe, if I'm not mistaken, every centimeter that your head tilts off of your spine is another so many pounds of pressure on your neck. So your head weighs about six to eight pounds give or take, and so think about every centimeter, dr John, my teacher, actually told me many years ago, and I do remember this. He held his arm out, straight out to the side, and he said imagine I'm holding a bowling ball straight out and if I drop my hand down one centimeter, how much heavier did that bowling ball just get for me? And it's the same with our head because it's sitting on a strategically placed spine. You know, we're all wonderfully, beautifully made and if it tilts just a little bit to the side, to the front, however, it puts that much more pressure on our spine and those muscles. Wow.

Speaker 2:

Wow, yeah, well, if somebody's got that condition, if they've got what you said tech's neck or any kind of condition, how often I mean on average should somebody get a massage for the optimal benefits?

Speaker 3:

So it is a case by case basis. I do believe that you know they have that initial consultation with the massage therapist of their choosing and in my years of doing this I've seen it to where we might do twice a week for a couple of weeks and and then we back off until we get you to once a week, and then every two weeks, and maintenance is about roughly once a month to continue when you have a consistent problem that keeps reoccurring because of, for example, your job, or you know you're not going to put the phone down, You're going to continue to text, so it's going to continue to be a problem. So in order for you to have a more quality of life but also be able to do your job, we all have to work then once a month would be where you'd want to end up, but it may be, depending on the situation and how far gone it is. You might have to start out with twice a week or once a week until you can get back to that once a month.

Speaker 2:

Well can massage therapy aid in recovery from sports injuries or surgery.

Speaker 3:

Oh, absolutely. There's several different techniques. We have about 70 different modalities that people use or specialize in, and there are some massage therapists that specialize in sports massage. You'll even know that a lot of sports teams have their own sports massage therapists, even down to, I think, collegiate level. Then, of course, you've got your professional levels. They have those people on staff in order to take care of them. Also, there's massage therapists that go to events like triathlons. I believe the first time that massage was introduced at the Olympics was in 1984. So that's when that started there. And if you're familiar with Michael Phelps of course he's retired now breaks my heart. I love to watch him swim, but there was his last event. I cannot remember what year that was. It showed his back and he was having what is known as cupping down on his back and it was to pull the lactic acid out of his muscles, and that is a technique that massage therapists use.

Speaker 2:

Wow, cupping. Yeah, I've heard. I've heard of that. Well, tricia, I love it Been very informative. We've actually touched on a bunch of deeper subjects. Maybe we can target some of those like sports injuries and mental health, stress, that sort of thing, in a future episode.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. There's all kinds of different trauma that happens to the body and again in the mind, body and spirit. It's just how it presents itself and what you've had to deal with in your life and how we address it in the massage.

Speaker 2:

Gotcha. Well, we'll get you back in the studio. We'll delve a little deeper in a future episode. Okay, sounds great. Have a great rest of the day.

Speaker 3:

Thank you, Skip you too you skip.

Speaker 1:

You too Think you've got the touch. Let's make it official. Call or text 423-804-3067 to schedule your tour and consultation, or visit reflectionsofhealthcom. Your future could be just one massage away and, let's be honest, being everyone's favorite stress reliever isn't a bad gig.