Q: How do you feel about massaging women?
A: Most of my clients are women. I feel that I’m able to give a good, therapeutic, intuitive massage. I’m not judgmental of women’s bodies; I treat all of my clients with the respect they deserve.
Q: And how about massaging men?
A: In my experience, men who ask for a male therapist usually want deeper tissue massage, which is great for me because that’s what I like to do! Deep tissue focuses on the therapeutic aspect of massage. It’s a major part of what I do.
Q: What are your feelings about being a gender minority in the massage world?
A: I look at my job from the perspective of a massage therapist, not from that of a man. Unfortunately, massage therapy is still confused with intimacy, which it is not. It’s assessment, it’s treatment of soft tissue injuries. It’s an hour on the table working on your muscles. It’s therapy. Your therapists sex has nothing to do with it.
Q: What would you say you focus on during treatments?
A: Pain is often what brings clients in. I always address pain first – it’s a symptom that shouldn’t be ignored. Once the pain goes away, I focus on function. If the body isn’t functioning well, pain is always around the corner.
Every April, I pull out my Slo-pitch ball bag. Curse at myself for not having done it in October… Curse some more because that’s where my shirt went, or my favorites socks…. and then….curse some more because I left everything in the bag wet…. OOOOPS! I start the process of airing out the equipment, oiling up the glove, make sure there is a ball for every league, 11 inch for ladies, 12 inch for mixed. My warmup balls, one heavy, one regular weight. My bats are all cleaned up. My cleats cleaned and sprayed to rid of the smell. That’s my routine.
I am a full time athlete only part of the year, because I only play ball from May to October. But, during my season I go all-out. I play on 3-4 teams, leagues and tournaments…. then the rest of the year is for rehabbing nagging injuries that happened during ball season.
BUT… this year has been a little different. This year, instead of worrying about old injuries or worrying about a tweak here or there, I have been very worried about a new injury. One that impacts my game so much, that I have pulled myself from my line ups, just so I can rehab it to play in the year end tournaments. One that prevents me from lifting heavy objects, or thinking about how might I move my body during a treatment so I don’t feel this discomfort I am constantly feeling.
I am often asked “who takes care of you?” and jokingly I reply “I get around”. The honest truth…I struggle to even get my own treatments at times. Until recently! I have had to make it a priority to get in and get treated. And I’m not being easy in just finding any therapist to treat me, I am being very specific in who I see. I fully believe in Myofascial Release and how everyone needs it and that it will help everyone. I also know the people I work with are awesomely gifted in what they do. So in the past four weeks, I have been seeing my fellow colleagues here at Whole Therapy and some other MFR therapists here in the city, and I have also been self-treating!
4 weeks in a row, I have focused on getting someone else to touch and treat me. And 4 weeks in a row, I have focused on treating myself. Two weeks ago, after a great treatment and some self care that night, I felt a shift. I woke up for the first time and the pain wasn’t a burning sensation in my forearm and elbow. For the first time, I felt a good heat in my elbow rather than a horrible one. I’m feeling less nerve pain and I can hold my own coffee mug (you all know how much I love my coffee!).
My lessons are many this year…I need to take care of me (so our #ChangeOneThing challenge could not have come soon enough)! I need to make the time to get my own care even if I have to push something else aside to do it. I’ve always been a believer that no matter what it costs, we should take care of ourselves. This ball season, I feel it has cost me a lot; I have missed out on playing the sport I love with the people I like most. I have even come to the point that I don’t want to play ball because it hurts too much and my play has been impacted.
I am not invincible. I really need to practice what I preach about self-care and maintenance. I really have to be that athlete that gets treated regularly because my fascial restrictions have prevented me from doing what I love to do.
So my first #ChangeOneThing is to look at my schedule and put treatment into it for the whole rest of the season. That’s happening today.
What step are you taking in the name of positive change?
Tara Hagan-Fields is an RMT with Whole Therapy. Tara is a Women’s Health Specialist and Myofascial Release Therapist. She focuses on the body as a whole and teaches you to do the same. More about Tara here or find me on Facebook Tara Hagan-Fields RMT
So you’ve gone and hurt yourself, huh? You’re a gung-ho weekend warrior with a twinge in your back and aren’t sure what to do about it. This isn’t unusual.
We get all kinds of people coming through our doors who’ve injured themselves in brilliant and creative ways.
As I sit here compiling this literary masterpiece, a client walks in with back spasms that are causing him visible discomfort. “How’d that happen?” I say. “I was choking on some long grain rice and coughed so violently that I threw my back out” he replies. Believe me when I say we’ve seen and heard it all. You may find yourself asking “What kind of treatment am I supposed to get?” With all the various types of sprains and strains you may be unlucky enough to receive, where to start can be an overwhelming decision. Here are a few things to consider:
“Yer aff yer heid!”
1.What is your level of pain?
If you’ve got a full-scale broken back, you’re going to want the emergency room and not deep tissue massage. An honest evaluation of the pain you are in/damage you have done is important at this stage. Open wound? Hospital. Arm dangling at a weird angle where you KNOW there isn’t a joint? Hospital. Tightness in the lower back after trying the caber toss for the first time? Whole Therapy! While our therapists are often told that they have magic hands, they cannot perform lifesaving surgeries or repair broken bones. We’ve had people come in to see us that could barely move let alone stand being touched or physically manipulated in any way. Not being a hero at this point and seeking medical attention is best. On the reverse side of the coin, going and waiting in an ER for 10 hours only to have a Dr. tell you to see a physiotherapist isn’t a lot of fun either.
It can be tricky sometimes to gauge the type of potential damage that may have been done after you landed on your back in the middle of the Rideau Canal whilst distracted by that delicious Beaver Tail in your hands. We get that. While it’s always best to err on the side of caution, be realistic. The hospital staff won’t thank you either for taking up their time with a minor scrape or the proverbial bobo.
Now that you’ve determined you don’t require immediate medical attention, you’re looking for some pain relief, rehabilitation, and a plan of action for your recovery. The next step is to..
2. Consider the type of injury.
Chances are, if you’ve rolled your ankle you’re going to want a more rehabilitative and active treatment; most likely a visit with our physiotherapist, or our chiropractors. If you feel the situation is more muscle or tissue related, you could also consider our team of massage therapists.
One of the great things about our multi-disciplinary approach is how perfectly our services complement each other. We often have clients come in for “the double”. This usually consists of a massage treatment to soften you up followed by a chiropractic adjustment to straighten you out! We also double up on the physio and acupuncture fairly often. Perhaps the most effective combination of all though, is the combination of our minds. Each practitioner here will view things in a slightly different way as their training and expertise dictates. It’s common practice amongst them to pick each other’s’ brains for answers to tricky questions involving your rehabilitation. It’s this collaboration upon which the Whole Therapy philosophy is based.
3. What can I afford?
Another thing to consider when booking an appointment is your insurance coverage. Many of you will have private insurance that allows for some spending on different types of clinical services. Maybe you’ve got coverage for physiotherapy but not chiropractic. Perhaps it’s the other way around. Perhaps you’ve only got coverage for one type of service or perhaps you’ve got everything under the sun covered. It’s worth finding out before you call in so that we can better serve your budget AND your needs. That being said, sometimes your maintenance program will continue after your benefits have expired. Don’t worry. We want to see you as little as possible but as much as necessary. That means finding out together what a maintenance plan looks like for you. The initial treatment and following few appointments will likely be closer together, but as you progress from injured to pain-free to functional, the frequency with which you attend will likely decrease. Benefits are wonderful in that they can mitigate the cost of rehab, but they should not dictate the extent of your rehab. Consider this.
So don’t worry. Hurting yourself happens, whether it be from coughing up rice, tossing around cabers, or falling while skating. We’ve seen it all, remember?
Hopefully this information helps you figure out where to start. If you’re still stumped, give me a call. We can figure out together how to get the ball rolling.
Pat Moore is the office manager at Whole Therapy. Pat works alongside a team of dedicated professionals and is here to help ensure that your visit at Whole Therapy is as pleasant as possible. For more about Pat, click here!
