Touch is the first sense through which we experience the world as infants and this is where I begin. The technique I use a combines gentle massage and passive movements (when I move the limbs). This approach has evolved from my experience of the Alexander Technique, and physiotherapy.
The Alexander Technique is not an easy approach to describe with words. It involves changing habits of movement and posture, and noticing the thinking that produces response patterns in our bodies. Working with a person to release their abnormal patterns of tone can allow for a change in energy, pain, emotional health, body and self image.
A person lies on his or her back, fully clothed, with the head on a paperback book, and a pillow under the knees, or the knees bent. I always start by gently easing the head away from the shoulders by drawing my hands from the base of the neck upwards and behind the head. Hunching the shoulders up and pulling the head into the neck, are common tension patterns. I continue with massage to the neck, base of the skull and scalp, gradually beginning to move the arms and legs passively, in ways that help to release tight tissues.
Foot massage is optional and can be very beneficial. The passive movements or massage, that the patient finds most useful, are repeated, helping a person to feel long, wide and open. Effects of gravity, repetitive activities, age and fatigue, cause our spines to shorten and we hunch shoulders round our chests. This exacerbates neck, back and shoulder pain in particular, and interferes with breathing. Usually, at the end of the session, I will describe to the patient the changes that have taken place while they lie quietly and visualize these changes. For example, “Notice your shoulders have dropped away from your ears, and notice the gap between the arms and ribcage”.
It is valuable to develop this awareness of the use of the body, the tone of the muscles, the position of the joints and the freedom of the breathing, to prevent future problems. If I use mobilization, electrotherapy and exercise without this re-education, sooner or later a problem recurs, fails to get better, or shifts to a different part of the body.
An advantage of a whole body approach is that in addition to a reduction in pain, people tell me a further problem, of which I knew nothing, has also cleared up. People say that energy levels are better, emotions are more distinct, or their voices are freer. Their system has become more balanced and the person has learnt to make his or her own changes, and I am no longer needed. If pain or another problem recurs, the person will have some understanding of what they need to do to send it on its way.