Issue link: https://www.massageandbodyworkdigital.com/i/296580
I t p a y s t o b e A B M P C e r t i f i e d : w w w. a b m p . c o m / g o / c e r t i f i e d c e n t r a l 33 Douglas Nelson is the founder and principal instructor for Precision Neuromuscular Therapy Seminars and president of the 16-therapist clinic BodyWork Associates in Champaign, Illinois. His clinic, seminars, and research endeavors explore the science behind this work. Visit www.nmtmidwest.com, or email him at doug@nmtmidwest.com. TABLE LESSONS "That is quite possible," I replied. "Even the medical definition of pain says as much: 'an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential damage.' 1 The car didn't have to slam into you; the potential trauma alone was enough to elicit the pain experience. The other three people in the car felt nothing afterward because the impending crash did not have the same meaning to them, as they did not have the same history going into the event. Your reaction is perfectly reasonable." "Even though this is embarrassing, I need to confess how terrified I am to let you touch me," Mrs. S. said. "I am very afraid that treatment could make me worse, but I need to try." I assured Mrs. S. that I understood her fear and would do everything in my power to make her feel comfortable and in control of the process. "Where would you like to start?" I asked. "The most pressing complaint I have now is the lack of feeling in my legs, especially the right one," she stated. "I'd like to start there." I began with the lightest of touch, helping her to experience touch as a positive experience and not a threat. After some light fascial work, I applied lotion with gentle effleurage to her tolerance. After perhaps five minutes, I switched to the left leg with almost exactly the same protocol, sensing her relaxing more deeply with each passing minute. Returning to the right leg, I began to methodically trace each muscle of the lower extremity as though I was painting them on a blank canvas. My goal was to provide clear sensory feedback to her somatosensory strip, the part of the brain that creates a topographic map of the body. That map is created in large part by sensory input, and Mrs. S.'s sensory input had been quite compromised. In this application, touch is food for the nervous system, providing the brain with sensory data to help create and update our knowledge of our own body. As I was finishing, Mrs. S. propped herself up on her elbows and looked at me with a big smile on her face. "I feel like I am reclaiming my body. I'm getting my legs back!" When Mrs. S. returned for a second session, she reported that after returning home from the first session, she put on some music and began to dance, something she had not done for many months. "It's like my body remembered how to move again, moving with joy instead of fear," she said. If touch is food for the nervous system, then massage is a feast! Note 1. Definition from International Association for the Study of Pain, 2007. "It's like my body remembered how to move again, moving with joy instead of fear."