Somatic Bodywork
The somatic bodywork techniques are designed to correct soft tissue problems involving muscles, ligaments, tendons, myofascial muscle coverings and repetitive strain injuries. Injuries can produce scar tissue and cause muscles, fascia, joints and tendons to adhere to bone and muscles. Fascia can lose its suppleness and no longer slide smoothly over other tissues. Muscle, ligament and tendon fibers can separate, twist and become unconsolidated. Tense, stuck or mispositioned muscles can impinge on nerves, produce chronic pain and restrict movement.
The bodywork work that we practice combines myofascial release, soft tissue corrections and tissue fiber realignment. Myofascial release removes adhesions in the fascia. Soft tissue corrections involve assisting soft tissue to move back into a position of superior mechanical advantage after adhesions have been removed. Often muscles and other tissues will move to work around the malfunction caused by the adhesions. These corrections speed up the recovery process and help prevent new adhesions from forming. Connective tissue works better when the fibers are aligned and consolidated. By using less force we can be more precise and work as deep more forceful methods but to a finer detail.
I have been trained to use sensitive touch to find and correct most soft tissue problems. The results are not only more effective but less painful. We can treat people with well developed musculature that make it difficult to work deep muscles as well as people with fibromylgia or other pain sensitivities. Pain will sometimes be cause by nerves being trapped of restricted. Some of our work is specifically designed to work directly on nerve problems. This is gentle work that requires a balance of anatomical and enervations knowledge together with a heightened sensitivity to the nerves themselves.
I also work on bones. Sometimes bones with have minor structural issues that do not show up on x-rays but are significant enough the the body senses that the muscles attached to the bones can not pull as hard as on uncompromised bone. Bones rebuild themselves based on the bodies own template that is understood to be sensitive to pressure. Medical science does not understand the mechanism fully but the osteoblastic activity use to build bones is known to be responsive to pressure. While I do not understand this mechanism either, I believe that my techniques stimulate this osteoblastic activity because they produce produce otherwise unexplainable results.
For much of the work, the patient often will not feel muscles releasing . If I am doing a lot of body work it is often easier done over clothes because you may have to assume positions that are difficult to drape modestly or involve moving from position to position. Finding problems with specific musicals deep within your body with a light tough requires good palpatory skills. Working through most clothes is not a problem because clothes are just another layer to deal with when working deep muscles.
For example, the psoas is a very important muscle that often needs work. Because it connects to the inside of the spine and goes through the pelvis and the attaches deep within the leg to the femur. It is difficult to access if you use conventional massage techniques. This is especially true with people with strong abdominal muscles. Even under ideal conditions it is difficult to access more than a portion of the muscle. I can work the psoas from the back through the spine and pelvis. This allows us to not only separate it from other muscles like the iliacus and diaphragm but also to work the separate attachments to each vertebra. It also allows me to work the psoas major and psoas minor separately. Similar techniques can be used for other hard to access muscles.
These techniques can not only be used for people with serious medical problems but also by itself or in combination with other techniques to provide a very pleasurable massage.