David
Weintraub, LMT and owner of Bodyworks DW, writes about post massage self care
and how you can take the benefits of your medical massage home with you. Stay
ahead of your pain!
Medical
massage in New York with a NYC licensed massage therapist should
be a regular and valuable part of your self care routine. Let’s face it...New
Yorkers are not known for doing things gently. We work long hours, slam weights
at the gym, and then maybe hit back to back yoga classes. And while this
additive approach to health does have it’s benefits, it’s not restorative. Our
bodies need time to heal. To help with that, here are some of our best post
massage self care practices to take the benefits your medical massage home with
you!
A great
medical massage helps to relax both your muscles and your nervous system. It
gives your brain time to switch out of your sympathetic nervous system (fight
or flight!). And engages your parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest)
in a way that has benefits for long after the massage.
In a
perfect world we would all get massages every other day and feel fantastic 🙂 Given the
reality of time and money this is simply not going to happen. However, there
are plenty of practices you can take on to extend the great results of your
massage between sessions. These will assist you in feeling great, allow you to
go longer between massages, and help keep you from getting injured.
Post
Massage Self Care: Practices to take the benefits of medical massage home with
you
Lying
Down with Your Feet up on a Chair
This is the
number 1 homework assignment we give to all of our stressed out massage
clients! It’s super easy, and it’s a great excuse to chill out a bit every day.
We spend so much time sitting that our muscles get locked up tight in a sitting
position. Which helps us to sit, but is terrible for just about everything else
we try to do.
Lying down
with you lower legs on a chair puts us in the same position as sitting but
without needing to hold ourselves up in gravity. It passively shortens our
psoas muscle (main hip flexor), quads, hamstrings, and calves. When you shorten
a muscle but don’t make it do any work it gets to completely relax. It usually
takes 4-5 minutes for your nervous system to chill enough to truly let go of
your muscles. We recommend doing this for 5-8 minutes every night before bed to
help you get a really good night's sleep.
All of our clients who have taken this
practice on notice huge results in about 2-3 weeks. Decreased
low back pain or tension, better sleep, easier mood.
