Actions for Anti-Racism in Wellness Studios: How Bodyworks DW is Stepping Up

 

We’re committed to anti-racism in wellness. Below are some steps we’re taking to make that clear.

Here’s What We’ve Done So Far on Anti-Racism in Wellness

Fair hiring practices

Bodyworks DW has always used fair hiring practices. What this means is, we review applicants based on their qualifications and experiences. We find that it’s best to put the focus on the ability to do the job. You end up with a diverse staff of people from all walks of life.

Anti-Racism in Wellness: Our Statement of intent

Back in June, our C.E.O and owner David Weintraub made a statement on racial injustice, inequality, and anti-racism in wellness. He outlined how the company hopes to be more vocal on these types of social issues. In it, he states “Black lives matter. Period, end stop.” and highlights our plans for change. You can read the entire post here.

New anti-racism bullet in our mission statement

We’ve added an important note about being anti-racist and anti-sexist to our mission statement. Generally speaking, if you’re a human and are in pain, our goal has always been to help you by providing massage therapy with long term solutions. In order to ensure we deliver the best possible care as healthcare providers, it’s important that we set biases to the side. We strive to both promote anti-racism in wellness and diversity in our workplace and create a known safe space with intentional anti-racist and anti-sexist policies. Read our full mission statement here.

Anti-racism in Wellness Pledge page

Speaking of our anti-racist and anti-harassment policies, we’ve added a page to our website that describes this in detail. We want to make sure staff and clients alike know Bodyworks DW is a space completely intolerant of ignorance. Click here to read the entire pledge.

Actions For Social Change

If you look on our website and click on our page titled Actions For Progressive Social Change, you can see the list of organizations such as the ACLU that we support and proudly donate to regularly.

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Post Massage Self Care: How to Take the Benefits of Medical Massage Home with You

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.

 

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How to Avoid a Stiff Neck and Back Pain During Your Flight: A Guest Post by Chiropractor Brent Wells

1.      Use self-massage

If you’re experiencing neck or back pain during your flight, you can also try giving yourself a massage. An easy way to do this is to pack a tennis ball in your carry-on and use it to massage your shoulders and between your lower back and the seat. A tennis ball is all you need to really loosen up your muscles. Many airports offer massages, and it can be tempting to get one before a flight. However, this will only help a bit at the beginning of the flight and disappear by the end of it. Instead, try getting a professional massage the evening that you land. You’ll wake up refreshed and ready!

2.     Try to sleep in a natural position

It can be difficult to stay comfortable during your flight. Try not to twist or contort your body as you’re looking for a good position to rest. As much as you can, sit with your seat reclined and your body aligned. Here’s where a neck pillow can really help to keep your spine straight and forward as much as possible.

3.      Order your favorite beverage and snack

Stay relaxed by ordering your favorite beverage and snack, so that you can enjoy the flight. Stress can be a major factor when it comes to back pain, so do whatever stress-free activities you like. Stay relaxed, watched a movie, enjoy a snack – whatever makes you feel comfortable.

4.      Upgrade to first class

If you’re really struggling with pain on a flight, you can also try to get upgraded to first class, where the seats are wider and more comfortable. You can do this by using your airline points, paying more or bringing a doctor’s note that explains your back condition. Find a way to get a more comfortable seat. Sometimes the investment of first class can make a huge difference to your pain.

5.      Stay hydrated throughout your flight

It’s easy to get dehydrated on a flight. Be sure to ask for water, or bring an empty water bottle through security to later fill with water. For a long flight, it’s important to continue to drink fluids. This will prevent your muscles from getting stiff or tense during those long hours.

For your next flight, follow these nine tips to keep your neck and back pain away. If you struggle with neck and back pain on a regular basis, you should also consider seeing a chiropractor. A chiropractic clinic can give you professional medical advice about whether you need an adjustment, as well as creating a care plan that involves massage, diet, exercise, and supplements. Don’t just cross your fingers that your pain will go away, make an appointment before your upcoming trip. 

If your trip takes you to New York City, book a professional deep tissue massage in Midtown or the Financial District with a highly trained massage therapist at Bodyworks DW Advanced Massage Therapy.

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Does massage therapy really work? The newest scientific research on Massage Therapy

 

How we Use the Newest Science in our Sessions

At Bodyworks DW, a top rated massage therapy studio in New York NYC, our therapists stay abreast of peer-reviewed, current research. These science-backed findings are integrated into your sessions. They also help to provide insight into the pain or discomfort you are feeling. 

The best massage therapists are able to understand scientific literature as it relates to human anatomy. And be able to explain it to you in simpler language that is easy to understand. 

Bodyworks DW therapists are ready to help you find out if massage therapy could be a positive factor in your life as well. The goals of the best massage therapists in New York City are to help you achieve your personal health and life goals. If you see a Bodyworks DW massage therapist in Midtown NYC or in the Financial District, you can be confident you are receiving the highest quality care. 

Would you like to schedule a professional massage with a top rated massage therapist in New York City? In addition to our original Financial District location, you can find the best massage therapist near midtown west now too–our new studio here just recently opened! Contact Bodyworks DW today or click on the button to book online at our massage Midtown or massage Fidi studios!

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Does massage therapy really work? The newest scientific research on Massage Therapy

Massage therapy and other holistic health care practices are gaining traction in health care. As they become more popular, so too does the push to support the observed benefits of these practices with scientific research on massage therapy. 

When it comes to the human body, things get complicated and murky pretty quickly. We know a lot about the body. But there is likely much more about its workings and operations that we have yet to uncover. There has long been a large and ever-growing body of empirical and anecdotal evidence in support of massage therapy. Now, massage therapists are looking for these results to be backed by hard science. 

The use of precise massage therapy protocols to measure and show best results are gaining greater interest. We now have a wave of small-scale studies that examine massage therapy in highly specific contexts. The scientific research on massage therapy has begun!

Massage therapy organizations such as the American Massage Therapy Association (AMTA) are working on getting massage therapy accepted as a standard form of health care (hello, insurance companies, we see you…). Getting massage therapy to be covered by insurance the same as other practices will largely depend on what science has to say about it.  

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How has sports massage in NYC benefited our clients?

Competitive athlete? Weekend warrior? Recreational fitness enthusiast? At Bodyworks DW, we work with a wide variety of active individuals. Our therapists provide custom-designed sports massage sessions focused on helping you maximize your activity enjoyment. This can include sessions for injury recovery, injury prevention, tune-ups and maintenance. Sports massage in NYC for active people and athletes is hardly a luxury – it’s an investment!

Sports massage for athletes provides targeted, therapeutic treatment tailored to the bio mechanics and physical needs of the athlete. In other words, it’s not going to be like your typical fluff n’ buff spa massage 😉 You’re going to be moving around a bit for analysis. You and your therapist will be working together on increasing range of motion and unwinding injuries. And you’re going to get some homework!

Curious how a sports massage for athletes in NYC might work for you? We’ve taken some of our most common client-athlete cases and given you a run-down of how a sports massage could benefit each one. Keep reading more to dive in!

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Advanced Massage for Stress & PTSD Part 2: How to Identify if you have Chronic Stress or possible PTSD?

 

I’ve had a lot to think about in my experiences both working with PTSD clients and also living and working through the last year of covid-19 crisis. The following is theory based on anecdotal data and a lot of scientific reading. Yes I’ve seen it play out with hundreds of clients but I don’t have the time or resources for a true scientific study. So I want to make that clear. But I think it’s a useful paradigm to try out and see what insights it may give us about ourselves and our stress.

We really like to convince ourselves that we are very evolved, and in a lot of ways that is true. We build fantastic machines that perform relative miracles to anything we could conceive of in primitive times. Intellectually, most of us understand that we need thoughtful solutions to modern problems. Including working together as a team on projects that improve our safety and daily lives.

However, a lot of the older nervous system programming shows up under stress and can cause a reversion to our less evolved selves.

10,000 years ago, most problems required a physical solution. Think about pre-tool making. You either gather fruit and other edible plants, or physically catch, wrestle, and kill your food. Or both. In order to hunt (or avoid being hunted), you needed three basic skills: hiding, running, and fighting.

These three skills show up in all animals as instincts and we are no exception. While most of us have learned to largely tame them, they still show up in small and medium ways.

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Video: Great Exercise to Rehab an Old Ankle Sprain

Transcript Including Detailed Instructions for Old Ankle Sprain Rehab Exercise

DW: I’m going to show a quick foot retracting exercise that I give to a lot of clients to rehab an old ankle sprain or to help find better balance in their feet.

Most of us in some point in our life have had an ankle sprained or two or ten and that causes the ankle almost all the time to roll outwards this way. You have a compensation that your brain does rather than leave your foot rolling out sideways because it doesn’t feel right just walking on the edge. And that is to externally rotate your hip or your knee or both and that allows the foot to fall more that way.

You’ll see some clients will show you this one foot out other clients will show you the other and some show both, right? This is really a long-term compensation for a stuck ankle that never got unstuck. What’s supposed to happen when you walk is that you roll through the ball of your big toe when you come forward that way right and that should stay contacting as the very last thing until you bring your foot forward.

With an old ankle sprain you’ll get some version of this and that big toe never contacts the floor completely. And so to relearn how to do that I have a very simple exercise!

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How to find the right sports massage therapist for you?

What is sports massage and how can it benefit you?

Before looking for specific qualities in a sports massage therapist, it’s helpful to understand what to expect from a session. Sports massage can comprise any of the manual techniques that a licensed massage therapist is trained in. These techniques are performed with the intention of addressing your specific concerns around your active and/or physically demanding lifestyle. 

Often, our athlete clients will come in with an acute injury they sustained while practicing their activity. Such as an ankle sprain or a torn rotator cuff. The therapist will then work to help alleviate pain. Sports massage can decrease inflammation, assist with proper scar tissue formation, and increase range of motion or stability at the injured joint. 

Other times the concern is minimizing delayed onset muscle soreness during peak training times for a specific event. Or promoting recovery after an event like a race or competition. Frequently, an active person is simply in pain or is having trouble performing at their desired level. And is looking for someone to help them determine the root cause of the dysfunction. These are all issues that our staff at Bodyworks DW can help you tackle.

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How Bodyworks DW uses all of these deep tissue massage techniques in back pain massage in Midtown and Fidi

 

Great massage therapy in NYC needs to have a solid arsenal of techniques. And tools to be able to create an effective and thorough treatment plan. At Bodyworks DW, we have regular advanced trainings for all of our massage therapists. These trainings are designed to improve each therapist’s skills in assessing the primary sources/reasons for your pain. Our therapists come prepared with a toolbox full of the best deep tissue massage techniques. 

Back pain is a prevalent issue addressed by massage therapists for many of you. Each of your massage needs and cases are unique. Therefore, each of our treatments are uniquely customized to you. Your Bodyworks DW massage therapist will carefully consider your symptoms, history, routine and movement patterns. Then they determine how to provide the most effective treatment. We are dedicated to finding what will work best for you. So that you can get back to moving more freely and without pain or discomfort. We offer back pain massage in Midtown and the Financial District in New York City. Would you like to schedule a professional massage with one of our highly trained massage therapists? Contact Bodyworks DW today or click on the button to book online at our back pain massage Midtown or back pain massage Fidi studios!

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How has sports massage in NYC benefited our clients? Part 2: Massage for Triathletes & Endurance Sports

 

Competitive triathlete? Long distance runner? Swimmer? Road cyclist or Peloton junkie? At Bodyworks DW, our therapists provide custom-designed sports massage sessions focused on helping you maximize your activities. Sessions can include massage for injury recovery, injury prevention, tune-ups and maintenance. Sports massage for triathletes is hardly a luxury – it’s an investment!

Update April 2021: Massage for triathletes and other endurance sports is especially important right now after months of being indoors! As we all try to restart our exercise routines, we could all use a tune up 🙂

The Triathlete (Distance Running, Cycling, Swimming)

Swimming, biking, running…triathletes are the workhorses of the athletic community. With super long training routines! Two of these three activities are lower body heavy. However, the swimming portion means that your upper body and arms should certainly not be ignored. Great sports massage therapists also understand how important your breath and core are in any of these activities. 

We definitely want to address your chief complaints like sore knees and hips. But we also want to get to the root of why you may be continually experiencing soreness. Or why you are starting to feel less refreshed after your runs or swims. This is often where breath and core awareness come into the picture. Sports massage for triathletes focuses on helping them balance the issues that each discipline causes.

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Guidelines for Vaccinated Massage Clients

 

In response to the latest reporting on the transmissibility of the Delta variant for covid-19, we are returning to our previous masking policy. Going forward, all clients and therapists will be required to wear a mask at our studios both in the waiting area and during treatment.

Please note that the below policy is being paused while viral spread of the Delta variant is rising in NYC. If spread reduces back below 1% we will return to the guidelines below.

Updated as of May 24th

NYS’s lifted mandated covid safety guidelines for most businesses on May 19th. In accordance with the newest CDC guidelines. What this means is that businesses now have the option to either continue their existing safety protocols. Or to establish their own. The only true mandates on most businesses are that non-vaccinated patrons must continue to wear a mask and socially distance wherever possible. And for vaccinated massage clients, there are no longer any NYS mandates.

That being said, we are going to gradually scale back our existing covid safety plan. So, for the most part, we will be keeping our existing plan. There are some immediate changes, specifically to mask policy for vaccinated massage clients.

The main change: updated mask policies for vaccinated massage clients

1. You can remove your mask during your massage if you choose to. You will need to show proof of vaccination to your therapist (see #4). If you prefer leaving your mask on, that’s totally fine. Therapists will honor all requests to keep their own masks on.
2. Vaccinated therapists can work in treatment rooms without a mask as long as the client is comfortable with that. Non-vaccinated therapists will continue wearing masks as required by NYS and your safety.
3. For now, masks are still required in the waiting and common areas regardless of vaccination status. The waiting areas of our studios are meant to be peaceful and calming. We want to avoid having clients having to navigate asking each other’s vaccine status. And/or argue over mask safety which is not in line with our vibe.
4. For proof, you can show your therapist your vaccination card OR download the NYS Excelsior App. The app is super easy to use and you can add your pass to your phone wallet.
5. Without proof of vaccination, we’ll require you to keep your mask on under existing safety protocols.

Other changes to our covid safety protocols for both non-vaccinated and vaccinated massage clients

These are minor, but ones that we see as easy to make in the current environment. IE very low viral spread in NYC and continuing to drop.

• Now that viral spread is well below 1%, we feel it’s time to ditch the bulky and uncomfortable eye protection.
• We will be reopening our waiting areas again. We ask that you keep masks on in the common areas of the studios. So for now, no food or drink please.

These are exciting times after so much turmoil! Getting used to these new changes may take time. And that many of you will need some time to adjust. Feeling safe without a mask is a new idea. You can read about just how amazingly effective the new vaccines are here: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/health-departments/breakthrough-cases.html

As the viral spread continues to drop and vaccinations continue to increase we will introduce other changes. Stay tuned!

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Chronic Wrist Pain & Carpal Tunnel Syndrome?

 

In our modern device driven world, wrist pain and carpal tunnel syndrome have gone from rare to ubiquitous. Between typing, holding up our phones all day, carrying bags everywhere, etc. our high paced way of life takes a toll on our vulnerable wrists. Luckily, wrist pain and/or a carpal tunnel syndrome diagnosis does not mean you'll wind up in surgery. With a few lifestyle adjustments, more breaks in your routine, and a series of advanced massage therapy sessions, wrist pain can be a thing of the past for anyone.

Elizabeth Dashiell interviews Senior Massage Therapist Evana Class on Wrist Pain & Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

Elizabeth: What kind of pain do you address in your clientele at Bodyworks DW that you're very successful at treating? 

Evana: I have been really successful at working with clients that have chronic wrist pain and/or a diagnosis for carpal tunnel syndrome.

Elizabeth: How do you tend to address this kind of wrist pain?

Evana: I begin with a range of motion assessment. Is the client able of open and close the hand? Can they move each finger independently, flex and extend at the wrist?

Doing this will tell me which muscles in the forearm and hand are “tight” or restricted. The massage will start at the palm of the hand and moves through towards the elbow on both sides of the arm.

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How can massage therapy help sports injuries?

 

This blog discusses every detail on how massage therapy can help athletes with sports injuries and shares a focus on massage therapy for injury prevention. We have kept this blog short, precise, understandable, and informative to give you the best insight. Within the first section, we discuss a brief introduction to massage therapy and its relation to sports injury. In the next section, we discuss how massage therapy helps athletes with sports injuries. In the sub-divided section, we discuss each benefit, including better nutrition to muscles, quick recovery time, enhanced muscle flexibility, followed by how it helps to prevent over-training. In the last section, we talk about how massage therapy helps prevent sports injuries in the future. So, let's dig in.