Massage For Natural Pain Relief

By Joshua Bart, LMT

In an age of technical and, at times, impersonal medicine, massage is natural pain relief that offers a drug-free, non-invasive and humanistic approach based on your body's natural ability to heal itself. You can expect multiple benefits when you receive regular massage therapy.

Massage releases endorphins the body's natural painkiller used for injury recovery, recovery from surgery, for help with chronic illness, and to provide pain relief. Massage relaxes and softens injured and overused muscles, and reduces spasms and cramping. Massage increases joint flexibility, and helps to prepare you for strenuous workouts thus eliminating subsequent pains of the athlete at any level. It provides exercise and stretching for atrophied muscles and reduces shortening of the muscles for those with restricted range of motion.

Massage therapy increases circulation, allowing the body to pump more oxygen and nutrients into tissues and vital organs. It stimulates the flow of lymph, the body's natural defense system, against toxic invaders, and increases circulation of blood and lymph systems to improve the condition of the body's largest organ the skin. Massage reduces post-surgery adhesions and edema, and can be used to reduce and realign scar tissue after healing has occurred.

Though there are many forms of massage, they all include long and sustained pressure on areas of restriction which helps the restricted areas of tissue begin to release. All these events and benefits don't happen in one day. Research has shown that the stable results and benefits of massage treatment happen when massage therapy is performed as a regular course of treatment. A chronically tensed muscle tends to maintain that tension, even after the stressful event has passed. After an injury, the muscles and tissues that are injured can become stuck together like glue, which is part of the pain cycle.

Some people think that massage has to hurt to be effective. It does not have to be this way. It's important to be realistic about what one massage can achieve. Many people ask for more pressure, thinking that if the therapist just pushes hard enough, they can get rid of all their knots in an hour. This just won't happen. In fact, undoing chronic knots and tension built up over a lifetime is best achieved with an integrated program that includes exercise, work on your posture and ways of moving, relaxation techniques and a regular program of massage.