Happy Mothers Day! This picture is of my Grandmother and some of her sisters who all babies at the same time. This was about 1933 when times were much tougher than today and proof that people found a way to carry on.

Remember the gift of Massage this Mothers Day. The Summit has several great gift certificate specials available such as buy 3 hour massages and get one free. Call 435 628-5000 or stop by to get yours.
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Many of my clients had massage with me at the Summit Athletic Club and were impressed and please by the amenities and atmosphere we were able to show them at our new location. Make a point to come this month, you'll love it!
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Somato Emotional Response

During a recent session with a client of mine, she related that her husband had been meaning to come in and see me again but was “grieving” over the passing of a close family member. I explained to her that he needed to come in and see me now because we have a tendency to store intense emotions in our body during times of stress and that massage could assist in the releasing process so that those emotions don't have to become “injuries” that we have to recovery from later on.

The Upledger Institute which is well known and respected for it's work in developing “Cranial Sacral Therapy” was one of the first modern day health modalities to recognize the lasting effects of emotions in the body and coined the phrase “Somato Emotional Response”. We see these effects all the time, for example, I'm sure at some point you have noticed that nearly every President of the recent past has turned dramatically Grey haired after a short time in office. Or another example, is the “will to live” factor that medical doctors have found can be the most important consideration on how well a person recovers from a major surgery. We all know too well how worry can cause you to lose sleep, increase or decrease appetite, even cause aches and pains throughout the body.

Our emotions are a powerful force. Often a client may have an emotional release during a massage session (laughing, crying etc) for no apparent reason other than the release of emotion stored in the region being worked on as a result of some unresolved trauma or injury. Whether it's being physically beaten, or an auto accident, or a major illness; most often the trauma we experience comes at highly emotional charged times in our life. Often the emotions flood at us during our healing and rehab time.

The majority of my clients see me more for emotional release than from recovery from a physical injury. It is very true that most people get a massage to release stress that has been building up from day to day challenges. Stress is defined. For most of us stress is simple anxiety which is a mild form of fear. It might be fear of losing something (a job, investment, relationship) you can learn more about stress by visiting www.stress.org. . For most of us, we carry stress in the neck and shoulders, we even categorize life's troubles as carrying the weight of the world on our shoulders or life's annoyances as the proverbial “pain in the neck”. Partly it's because of the way we are built with forward vision and hands that are designed to work in front of us with that forward vision (binocular vision as opposed to a horse or fish with side vision orientation). We drive, type, text, push a mower, grocery cart, baby stroller all out in front of us. This shortens the chest muscles and elongates the back muscles particularly those between our shoulder blades (Rhomboids).

When we get tired of walking or standing we can “take a load off” by sitting and giving our tired feet a break; but when do we give our poor neck a break from balancing that bowling ball of head that it supports all through the day until it's time to “hit the pillow”? And the most unfortunate problem is that the body interprets stress as an repetitive injury that it must protect us from further and future damage. When the body perceives damage it begins to build up tissue as a protective measure. This accounts for callouses on the hands and feet, and is worse cases can be seen in cauliflower ears, Dowagers hump just name a few.

My point is, if we let the external and internal stresses wear on us it can have long term effects on us not unlike the sandstone cliffs around us taking on shapes of spires and arches from long term erosion. Massage is an extremely effective tool to beat back the wear and tear of gravity, emotional stress, and injury. Most of you can agree that today's media has focused on becoming fear mongers. Whether it's the economy, swine flu, armed conflict in faraway places; news coverage seems to focus on stimulating anxiety and fear. It's what sells and it's all about ratings and circulation, even those who claim to give you “fair and balanced” coverage don't really spend much time on good news, so where the balance?

We are all like the client who wants to put off feeling good while he's grieving and supposed to feel bad. Think about this, are you letting fear dictate when you should or shouldn't take care of yourself? Are you waiting till things get better to feel good or do you need and deserve rejuvenation, balance, energy, healing, and strength to fight against the forces attempting to erode your quality of life?

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