Tag Archives: stress relief

Stalking those Darn SCMs

The massage client who can’t turn the head, the headache that arcs over the ear to the ridge of the eyebrow, the sensation of steel cables squeezing the anterior neck: These are all signs of those darn sternal-cleido-mastoids.

We massage therapists see these symptoms frequently, and I have made a hobby of asking other therapists how they try to free the dreaded SCMs. There must be dozens of techniques, dozens of approaches, and yet I still seek one method that won’t make a client levitate.

Lucky for us, clients with taut SCMs are so miserable they will tolerate our fingers making an attempt to unwind these two-headed sticklers. They will try anything to get the eyebrow to stop pounding.

My first experience with unlocking SCMs was with a fairly invasive technique I learned in school: Lifting the sternal and clavicular heads of the SCMs together, on one side, and sifting the TrPs between thumb and forefinger, careful to exclude the pulsating nearby artery.

Well, that does work, but my experience with clients leaving skid marks led me to believe it might be better to learn a softer approach.

It does help to lift the head and shorten the side being palpated by turning the head to the opposite side. An MFR technique I tried to lengthen the SCM from short to long with pincing fingers also left me cold. If the client has any fear of neck constriction, this technique will make it a full-blown phobia.

One time I encountered a client who had survived an attempted strangulation. These SCMs had gone over the moon to protect her. There was no way in heck I was going to lift, sift or pince while twisting.

A class with Erik Dalton saved my hands on that one. He showed, with his usual complete relaxation, a non-threatening way to cross one hand over the front of the neck, palpating the anterior edges of the SCMs with soft finger-pads. The other hand, from behind the head, brought soft finger-pads to the posterior side. A few moments of light touch and patience, the SCMs unwound. No twisting necessary, and no skid marks.

Believe me, that client was able to enjoy a good night’s sleep for the first time in a long time.

What about the chronic phone holder? With today’s tiny phones, and with the old-timey, clodhopper phone handsets, many people have ground in one tight SCM. This pattern creates one-sided headaches and can persist for years. Enough stress and people come in looking like they are holding an invisible violin in their neck.

Well, when challenged, I look to topical magnesium lotions to help. Magnesium oil from seawater stings cut skin so it can be used only if the area has not been shaved. Otherwise, Epsom lotion. A light coating and then leave the client with that side in a light stretch while doing arms and legs.

By the time I return to the neck (20 or 30 minutes) the SCM at least knows it can stretch. If it lets me, I will do whisper-light TrP release on the surface followed by lymphatic circles toward the thoracic duct at the clavicular notch. You don’t have to get fancy, however, light Swedish in direction of the duct works also.

I send clients home with instruction not to turn quickly or whip their heads to either side. Use a little heat if sore. And hold the phone to an ear only looking straightforward and holding the phone in the opposite hand.

There are probably a many more good SCM secrets out there. Anyone?

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If This Bicep Could Sing….

When a massage therapist has been working for a while, it can seem as if some body parts are talking during the session. Well, not verbally, of course, but spinning a yarn, letting it hang, somehow bringing their troubles up on the table.

Hey, we touch folks know verbiage and the written word are not the only ways we communicate, and the muscles sometimes give me what almost sounds like a wail. Kind of like the people who can hear colors instead of just seeing them.

Well, sometimes a client is bliss-unaware of what the muscle is saying and in me finds an audience. Like a good therapist, I listen. Last week this bicep had a certain ring to it, like it had been overworked, wrung and pressed. It had a field of adhesions running the length right past the inner elbow. This muscle was hot, thread-y and tired.

I was doing my best to open up the circulation, which created some good faces on my client. I mentioned to my client that what I “heard” was almost like a song.

Hyperextension Blues, by Bi-Cep.

I woke up this morning,

Ba-da-da-dum (Muddy Waters?)

Elbow extended again.

Bad-da-da-dum

No hope of performing,

Ba-da-da-dum

Feeling totally un-Zen….

Now both my heads are twitchy,

Bad-da-da-dum

I don’t know how I can move.

Bad-da-da-dum

It makes my throws off pitchy,

Bad-da-da-dum

And my body hates to lose.

I got the hyperextension blues

Hyperextension blues

I got the hyperextension blues

Hyperextension blues.

Well, I fixed the rhymes a bit, but you get the idea. My client and I had a good laugh about the bicep blues, and she told me not to quit my day job. Isn’t it fun when the body tells its own story?

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Playground Moves

We massage therapists see a lot of people seeking relief. If it isn’t the upper back and neck, it is the lower back and legs. I’m a fan of giving people something they can do, on their own, to loosen up.

Most people go from doing a lot of movement in their salad days to increasingly stiffening marathons of driving, sitting or standing as they grow into their occupations. My loosen-up moves are an attempt to get some wiggle back into the muscles and joints we freeze up with age.

Like most massage therapists, I freely steal moves – giving credit of course – to multiple disciplines. My go-to sources range from Tai Chi Ch’uan, Yoga, Pilates and Hula to Islam. Give a girl credit for observation.

The ground rules are: everything in slow motion, no pain, exhale with effort and keep breathing normally. I practice with my clients so they get the rules in their head and can mirror me. This is also my secret way to get some stretches in for myself between massages.

For example, the hula roll-about allows people to balance abdominal, oblique and back muscles. Standing in neutral, use the tummy, then the side muscles and then back muscles to rotate the hips in a slow circle. The shoulders stay still and the breathing relaxed. If you can do the slow hula, you can swing a golf club.

I like to frame warming moves and stretches not as work, but an opportunity to revive our latent desire to play. Hula hip circles are a blast. When you get a bunch of serious golfers laughing while rotating their hips, you get a serious jolt of fun. And when those scores drop, the golf guys keep coming back….

The back flexion warm-up borrows from Yoga and Islam – start out on your knees on a soft surface like a bed or mat. Lean forward and extend your arms on the surface in front of you, slowly lowering your upper body into a stretch. Just like the Moslem prayer position, and a bit like the yoga child pose. To stretch the QLs, move one hand to the left, while aiming the hips back to the right. Then reverse hands and hips to stretch the other QL.

Heck, that’s a very good thing to do three times a day for your back. Funny how a move associated with a religious ritual can be so good for the body.

What about Tai Chi? My go-to is “Wave Hands Like Clouds.” This move helps people with balance and fluidity as well as peripheral vision and coordination. All you do is hold your palm in front of your face and look at it as you turn from center to one side. As you turn to reverse, you raise your other palm and look at it as you turn back to center and to the opposite side.

Simple yet complex, this move builds core and balance. Hmmmm. Who thought goofing around and playing could be so liberating and healthy?

Please send me some of your go-to play moves in the blog comments section. I’ll steal it, and give you credit, of course. Hula!

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History at Your Hands

We had a wonderful time picking out decorations for my mother-in-law’s 90^th birthday party.

Pink table-covers, birthday lawn signs, a banner and bubble-making bottles, clean fun for all of us youngin’s. We’ll also be running around next weekend picking up a vanilla cake with white and pink frosting, tamales, sandwiches and the “Happy 90^th” balloon. (Surprisingly popular, our cashier volunteered.)

All of which led me to ask Mom Mary the big question: To what to you attribute your long life?

Mom Mary looked at me quite surprised. “I have no idea. I’m just glad to be alive. I wish I felt better, though.”

Ooh-yaah. Hey, with a massage therapist in the family, many people would assume Mom Mary has the feel-good covered. Well, other than the occasional emergency neck or shoulder massage, Mom Mary has begged off the family discount. (Double for blood relatives and spouse, Mom Mary free.)

Yet thinking about it, I have had several older folks who come in for massage regularly. And I am impressed. My oldest client was 103, a World War I veteran. I have given massage services to many people aged 70s to upper 90s.

As a member of the second coddled generation, the lucky ones who grew up with food, dental care, schools and an expectation of college, I get a good sampling of how my elders got into their golden years.

Wars. Prison Camps. D-Day. Epidemics. No food, no heat. No air conditioning. Religious genocide. Ethnic genocide. Is longevity produced by adversity? Or, to put it another way, does that which does not kill you make you stronger?

It makes me wonder how my generation through the much-too-much millennials will fare. Will we prick our fingers on our computers and die? Could we ever be tough enough to skip a gluten-free meal?

I think a massage certificate for Mom Mary is in order, perhaps a pedicure as well. You should get some credit for living long, well and in good humor.

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Tidy Time

With each year end, I like to do two things: tidy up the loose ends of my massage therapy practice and set my sights on the coming year.

Tidy time is important in the visceral sense: make sure my tax stuff and books are at least all in one box, if not organized, all set for the tax man. I also like to get some statistics: How many massages have I done, daily and weekly averages, etc.

An important part of this look-back is to check and see when I have been feeling good or overworked. I can often see some times when I should have done a little less or spread my duties out more.

Gone are the days when I could work straight through an 8-hour spa shift and then see two private clients after hours. I don’t miss that a bit. But when I was foolish enough to have done those things, I learned, as I laid prostrate on my bed the next day, not to do so much in one day. Days off are no fun if they are spent flat out zombie-fied.

Days off for a massage therapist are for stretching, tai-chi, family, errands, the beach, all the things that days off are for. I learned not to work so much that I felt drained.

Another lesson is to not drown in paperwork. If, like my therapist friend, you use a bookkeeping program, you still have to plunk the numbers in. Amazing how many other things you can find to do before doing the books. To save myself some angst, I found a good bookkeeper.

Outsourcing is great for the things you do not want to do. For me, it is the bookkeeping. For others, it might be the laundry. The key is figuring out what you do not want to do, or what you are truly bad at doing, and if you are willing to pay for it.

In hindsight, “outsourcing” is what many of us do when we work for employers. We take a pay cut because we don’t want to book clients, make re-appointments, keep track of permits, negotiate leases. There is nothing wrong in that, by the way. Some therapists enjoy being able to leave work at their appointed time and not keep a to-do list. A lot of us have to pick up kids, make dinner and a host of other things for family.

When I’ve looked back at my year, I then look forward. More about that next blog.

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