And we’re back......
We’ve had some great contributions to the newsletter this month - thank you very much to all of you. Hopefully you’ll learn something new and be inspired!
As always at The London Massage Company we are thinking of new ways to raise standards in the industry and bring you something different. At the moment we’re working on a set of ‘Guest Workshops’. We’ll bring in guest tutors who are experts in their fields to deliver one-day workshops in keeping with our existing advanced one-day workshops. First up is Fascial Release Technique with James Earls, 28th September 2009 in London. He’ll be teaching you practical techniques that can be applied to various parts of the body which will give you a greater understanding of the principles involved in fascial release. You’ll come away with a better visual sense of what the connective tissue is and its variations as well as its role in supporting the body and how it adapts to compensations and stresses.
We are also launching our Massage Teacher Training Opportunities. We’ve had some great feedback over the years about our dynamic approach to teaching which leaves students juiced up and ready to go out into the world with some fantastic new, advanced skills. We’ve also had many a conversation with therapists who would love to teach massage in all its forms but find that when it comes to teaching massage, the teacher training qualification alone doesn’t really prepare them for a full-on practical massage workshop.
These wonderfully encouraging words, combined with the need of therapists, has inspired us to trial our Teacher Training Opportunities.
It gives people the chance to earn CPD points (10 for one days assisting), whilst getting a feel for teaching, or making days with us part of their Teacher Training qualification.
We’ll provide each assistant with clear objectives based on the day teaching and a form to fill in should they wish to submit their experience for CPDs. If this interests you, or anyone you know, then be in touch.
Now it’s time to grab a cuppa and see what other therapists (and Jane) have been getting up to..........
Life as a Sports Massage Therapist in the Alps,
by Laurie Cooper
I qualified as a Sports Massage Therapist in November 2008 and had a job as a Sports Massage Therapist in the Alps with an English company called Pamper off Piste lined up for the winter season in the French Ski Resort of Courchevel.
My sports massage course gave me confidence in becoming a working therapist but above all my tutor Jane gave me a real passion in my subject and I couldn’t wait to get out there and start treating clients. I enjoyed every subject within the course and felt I came away fully equipped to make the most of my new qualification.
I completed my season in mid April and I’m now back in London looking to pursue my career here. I’ve now had time to look back and reflect on my time in Courchevel and I see it as an excellent, worthwhile and somewhat interesting experience for many reasons.
I was treating clients with both Holistic and Sports Therapy requirements and I feel I used my skills in a very beneficial way to help my clients get the most out of their ski holiday. My clients were hugely varied, from those who were experiencing their first massage to those who have a variety of treatments at home on a weekly basis, then from those who had been skiing twice a year for twenty years to those who were new to the mountain scene and booked a massage as they were unable to walk without feeling the effects of the days activity.
As a newly qualified therapist I was determined to go straight into practicing, and working in the Alps proved to be the ideal situation. I was treating between 15 and 20 clients a week and really feel I’ve now got true massage hands. I feel I now know how to communicate with a vast array of people and have learnt that as a practitioner the importance of client care and correct communication. As I was working as a mobile therapist I was treating clients in their chalet or hotel room. I was responsible for having everything required to carry out the treatment, ensuring the client was safe to receive a treatment and taking payment at the end. This initially was terrifying; my first week was very stressful and not particularly enjoyable. This combined with driving added to my stress levels, navigating the mountain roads when having no clue where you’re heading and snow falling heavily from the sky took it’s toll and there were moments of wondering what the hell I was doing! Luckily I had seven great housemates who were all going through the same emotions and we all picked each other up and soon my confidence was on the way up and I started to love my job.
Then there was the fun part of my Alpine experience, hitting the mountains and learning to snowboard. After three weeks of getting to grips with my new life I took a week’s course in snowboarding. The initial three days were painful, frustrating and mainly spent on my bottom or knees. I really started to sympathise with my clients and gained insider information on what parts of the body really needed some TLC after a day spent with my feet bizarrely strapped to a bendy piece of wood. At the end of the week I was starting to feel I was making progress and getting the buzz and bug for wanting to go steeper and faster.
The following weeks were spent getting out first things to practise, practise, and practise so I could join my experienced housemates as soon as possible on the more
demanding red and black runs.
This proved no chore, waking up to blue skies, bright White Mountain tops and crisp fresh air was enough motivation for me. The views and scenery were magnificent and certainly a healthy place to clear and freshen your mind. The whole thing became addictive, Living with other therapists,
including a Physiotherapist and Osteopath gave me the chance to learn new techniques and skills and has encouraged me to look into further courses now I’m home to further this knowledge.
Living as a seasonnaire in Alps comes with a work hard, play hard attitude and after four months, although having had an amazing time I was ready to come home. The social life is manic and you can hit it hard seven nights a week if you can cope with it, I soon realised that once to twice was enough for me! Going straight into a job after my course was daunting but definitely the best thing I could have done. I love my new profession and all that I can offer people. There is something very rewarding when a client gets off the couch and tells you “That was the best massage I’ve ever had”
I now face a new challenge of building a client base within London, I am confident and passionate that putting in the hard work will get me there and I’m very, very excited about it.
Laurie Cooper, Sports Massage Practitioner
Equine Body Work: Sports massage and therapeutic bodywork for horses
by Oonagh Bannister BSc (Hons), EBW
I have been working as a full time sports massage therapist, therapeutic body worker and healer since 2002. Originally I qualified as a therapist for people with a Health Sciences degree at the University of Westminster. At the time I was living in London and stayed until 2006. Following my move to Cambridgeshire I added to my qualifications by training as an Equine Body Worker with Equinenergy at Writtle College in Essex. Having embraced country life fully this felt right. I have
always loved horses and in recent years enjoyed riding in Hyde Park on a regular basis. The training course was extremely thorough but nothing could have prepared me for the wonderful rewards that would come from working with these animals. I am humbled by their wisdom and sensitivity, they just get it!
Anyone who is already a therapist or has received sports massage knows how much this can help with pain reduction, stress release and much more. Apply the same principles to the horse and the specific benefits include; improved motion and stamina, better temperament and improved disposition, ability to reach full training potential and achieve optimum performance. In the same way people look for that extra performance from sports massage it is the same for our equine friends. Improvement in stride length can enable horses to cover the ground quicker which helps give them an edge in racing, cross country and showjumping.
People benefit from massage by getting better tone in the muscles and improved range of motion. For horses this improvement of tone can lead to strength and gymnastic ability which can improve dressage performance. Marathon runners have long known the benefits of pre and post event therapy and it is the same for endurance horses and their riders, being fitter through training and massage therapy increases stamina and helps to prevent repetitive strain injuries. Horses can gain immensely from receiving sports massage as an adjunct to good training methods, correct saddle fit and well maintained feet. There are many parallels that are common to human and equine sports performance and principles from human research studies are now often used to relate these proven principles to sports horses.
In my experience the most valuable benefit is the prevention of injury and health maintenance. Keeping the muscles flexible and in good working order decreases stress and strain on the joints, tendons and ligaments in much the same way as in people. Since the horse has little muscle below the knees and hocks the many long tendons are anatomically susceptible to possible injury.
Massage really keeps horses in better shape and once any initial problems are resolved they are easier to keep right than people.
Before any treatment the person responsible for the horse must get permission from the veterinarian for sports massage, this is a legal requirement. A typical session will last 50 to 90 minutes and includes observation of posture and conformation with gait analysis. During the massage the horses reactions to treatment are very honest and immediate. This does sometimes involve moving very quickly out of range of teeth and hooves! The techniques are primarily
effleurage, petrissage and friction with tapotement used for a full body massage. Although I practice different therapies, sports massage in particular can help both horse and rider immensely. I am continuing my professional development with equine myofascial release at present, also with Equinenergy I work throughout Cambridgeshire and surrounding counties offering a mobile therapy service for both horse and rider.
Please contact me to find out more or to come and watch me work on horses. Please also see my websites for full details of all therapies available: www.energyheal.co.uk &
www.energyhealequine.co.uk or call 07930 464123
Oonagh Bannister
Exhibition
by Jane Johnson
Last week I found myself walking along a long curved corridor in a cylindrical sanitorium, doves cracking their wings on the air outside as they tried to find roosting spots above the windows, mis-shapen skeleton specimens in class cabinates to my right. This was a video installation, part of the exhibition on art and madness in Vienna at the Wellcome Collection here in London. I particularly liked the photograph of the 'Mechanotherapy Rom" c1905 in the Purkersdorf Sanatorium in Austria, with its wheels and pulleys that looked more like a laundry room than a place of therapy. It was common in 19th century Vienna for people to spend time in hospitals for recuperation from conditions such as mental exhaustion, where doctors prescribed 'rest, diet and technologically enhanced physical therapies.' Some of these technological therapies were on display. I shuddered at the 'electrotherapeutic cage' which was apparently painful but which physicians believed to help increase general metabolism and helpful in cases of hysteria.' There was an exercise 'mechanotherapy' chair, that put me in mid of the hair-cutting contraption the inventor (played by Dick Van Dyke) created in the film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, which he takes to the travelling fair and pedals away on, accicdently shaving a monk-like circle off the top of some poor pundits head, which steams away beneath the circular tin cutting bowl. This mechanotherapy chair was designed to 'bring the body and nervous system back into balance.' I don't know about you, but I have my own ideas about how best to bring my nervous system back into balance, and it doesn't involve leather foot straps.
Perhaps one of the best exhibitions I have attended of late was Bobby Baker's Diary Drawings: Mental Illness and Me. Diagnosed with a personality disorder these 159 paintings chart the artist's journey from diagnosis to recovery. Every doctor, psychiatric nurse, ward 'sister', psychotherapist and art therapist dealing with patients such as this should see this exhibition. Trained at St Martin's School of Art, Baker's beautiful, funny, weird, and inspirational paintings, taken from her many art journals are an amazing insight into how one person felt at the 'patient'. Every one different, every one evocative and personal. Wild splashes of colour, streaks, Bobby curled in foetal like position on her bed, withdrawn for the world, scary faces, laughing faces, moments of sadness, fear and anxiety, moments of joy, elation and hysteria. Technically accurate in form and composition, perspective and tone I marvelled at the skill of this artist, able to paint and document her inner feelings. Unable to take my eyes from the walls and the progression of amazingly colourful images, I suddenly came to the shocking brevity and blandness of a single picture, so out of character with the others, a child-like attempt in the centre of the page.
Beneath the picture the caption read, 'the art therapist today suggests I yet again paint a mug'. Guess what the picture was of?
Jane
See you next time!
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