Massage therapists learn many ways to push on trigger points and stuck areas. I’ve often wanted to see if pulling on these spots would help open them up.
Yet, of course, we are taught that pulling is bad body mechanics. Massage therapists who pull rather than push don’t last long on the job. They develop carpal-like syndromes and spinal issues very quickly. Pulling also draws energy from the client toward the therapist, a big no-no.
In thinking about these issues, I have been looking at two techniques that allow a massage therapist to “pull” without fear of injury. One method is quite old. It is called “furling,” and allows gathering skin, often with adipose and fascia, between the fingers to release adhesions and increase blood flow.
Ida Rolf added some lift to furling, calling the technique skin rolling and introducing a way to loosen sections of abnormal tightness, adhesions and scarring.
The way I have seen these techniques used is to furl or roll away from the therapist, often over a large area of muscular dysfunction such as the lats, or over the shoulder or hip rotators.
But the true act of pull has eluded us therapists, until the introduction of massage cupping. Once sort of exotic, cupping classes have brought the method to more therapists. In this technique, the therapist uses soft silicone cups and massage oil. The cups are compressed slightly to create a light vacuum along lubricated skin.
The vacuum area moves with the therapist’s hands, following muscle, fascia or lymphatic pathways. I have found the cups to be intensely relieving to a large number of conditions such as sluggish lymph, scarring, scarring with adhesions, etc. The simple act of gently lifting the skin activates lymph movement.
Lots of “stuck” tissues found in fibromyalgia, repetitive over-use and traumatic injury seem to respond well.
As my long-distance-runner client said: “Boy, this treatment really sucks.”
