Tulsa Massage reduces stress, relaxes muscles, improves circulation, and relieves pain. It can also help to heal sports injuries and decrease tension and toxins in the body.
When seeking a licensed massage therapist, it is important to get a personal recommendation from someone you trust. Then, check online directories for the therapists’ credentials and availability.
Stress is a natural part of life, but it can be difficult to manage. Fortunately, massage can help. Studies show that it reduces heart rate and blood pressure, decreases cortisol levels, increases endorphins, serotonin, and dopamine, and improves the body’s overall mood. This happens because the stimulation of the autonomic nervous system triggers the release of these positive hormones. When these hormones are low, it can cause symptoms like anxiety, depression and feelings of loneliness. Massage has been shown to increase the production of these hormones, which can ease symptoms caused by stress and boost your overall mood.
It also helps to reduce the build-up of toxins in the muscles and soft tissues, which can lead to pain and inflammation. When the body’s toxins are flushed away and the muscles relax, it allows more oxygen and nutrients to reach the cells of the body and speed up recovery from exercise and other activities. The feeling of relaxation and euphoria from a therapeutic massage is often accompanied by a better night’s sleep, which can also improve your overall mood and make you feel more resilient to stress.
One reason that massage is so effective at reducing stress is because it activates the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for the “rest and digest” response to stress. Many people experience anecdotal evidence that taking time to relax is restorative, but a new study has found that even just 10 minutes of relaxation can activate the parasympathetic nervous system. This effect is amplified when the activity is combined with massage.
In addition to the physiological effects of massage, it also stimulates the immune system and can help you regain control of your emotions. This is because massage promotes feelings of compassion and caring, which can help you face stressful situations and talk about them with others. This can be particularly helpful in situations involving trauma, addiction, or mental health issues.
As a result of all these effects, massage can be very beneficial for people living with cancer and their caregivers. Research has found that it can increase oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin, all of which can help to reduce the physical side effects of chemotherapy and radiation therapy, as well as the psychological effects of stress.
Relaxes Muscles
The kneading and manipulations that occur during massage can loosen tight muscles, break up scar tissue, and help stretch out adhesions. This increases the flexibility of the muscle and decreases pain by allowing the muscle to move freely without restriction. Massage also increases the blood flow to the muscle tissue, which carries oxygen and nutrients to the muscles while flushing away waste products. This provides your muscles with the necessary fuel to recover quickly after workouts, helps heal injuries and prevents soreness after a hard session in the gym.
When muscles are tight they compress nerves and reduce their range of motion. Massage can increase elasticity in muscles by raising the temperature of the soft tissue, decreasing tone and promoting psychological relaxation. This decrease in tension also helps improve movement and decreases the likelihood of muscle stains, pulls and tears during a training session.
Massage increases the size of the cells in a muscle by increasing their permeability and stimulating protein production. The increased permeability of the cell allows it to absorb more nutrients which speeds up recovery time after a workout. The protein produced by the muscle can also be used to repair any damage caused to the muscle by a hard workout.
A regular massage can help to maintain healthy muscles, particularly before an event. During pre event training, muscles can become tighter than usual to prepare for an event. This can lead to a build up of metabolic waste, which if not removed can lead to injury. Regular massage can help prevent this by improving circulation, removing waste and increasing muscle elasticity.
A massage can stimulate the release of a hormone called endorphins which is known to make you feel good. The feeling of euphoria that is generated from the release of these chemicals can be helpful in relieving stress and anxiety. The release of these chemicals can also help to alleviate any pain by blocking sensations from being transmitted to the brain. This can be useful for people suffering from chronic pain or a flare up of a specific pain condition such as arthritis.
Increases Circulation
The increase in circulation that massage provides increases the amount of oxygen and nutrients delivered to muscles. This enables them to function properly and to recover more quickly after work-outs. Improved waste removal from tissues reduces the build up of lactic acid and other metabolic waste, helping to prevent and treat conditions such as muscle cramping.
Most massage techniques are based around the application of pressure to different parts of the body. Some of these, such as effleurage (skin skimming), are designed to stimulate the lymphatic system and the flow of blood just under the skin. Others, such as wringing and other forms of tissue manipulation, are aimed at increasing the elasticity of soft tissue, improving its pliability and encouraging more effective blood flow.
Another way that massage improves circulation is by rerouting blood from areas of congestion. This is especially helpful in reducing swelling, which can be caused by medical conditions such as diabetes or deep vein thrombosis. In these cases, leg massage can help to re-direct the flow of lymph fluid away from the affected area toward the lymph nodes, where it can be effectively neutralized and returned to the circulatory system.
Other ways in which massage helps circulation include the widening of blood vessels (vasodilation). This occurs during massage when a therapist manipulates your muscles and tendons. The pressure applied by the therapist to the body’s surface causes the vasodilation, as do the warm-up exercises that many clients perform before their massage.
It is important to note that it is difficult to prove whether a particular type of massage has an impact on actual blood flow in the muscles themselves. One study found that massage increased the function of the blood vessels near a muscle, but it also shunted blood from the muscles to the skin’s surface.
This is not a bad thing, but it makes it difficult to claim that massage actually increases circulation to the muscles themselves. It is, however, quite possible that if the trigger points are swollen and stagnant as suggested by Shah et al, then they may have a greater need for and sensitivity to flushing than non-trigger point areas of the body.
Relieves Pain
Whether the pain is from a chronic condition or an injury, massage can decrease the time it takes to heal and decrease the amount of pain experienced. This is largely due to the fact that massage relieves stress and relaxes muscles. This allows the body to better utilize oxygen and nutrients to the injured muscles and tissues, helping them heal faster. In addition, massage reduces the formation of adhesions (tight scar tissue) and decreases inflammation.
When a muscle is injured it sends pain signals to the brain through nerve pathways that become hypersensitive in order to alert the brain of potential damage. Massage interrupts this cycle by sending other messages to the brain that can “close the gate” and block painful signals from reaching the brain.
In addition, massage can stimulate the release of endorphins which are hormone-like chemicals that act as natural painkillers. These help to decrease pain and improve mood.
A common reason people seek out massage is to alleviate back pain. There is a large body of evidence that shows that massage can significantly decrease the intensity and frequency of back pain. In one study, participants who received 10 weekly sessions of relaxation massage or structural massage reported a significant decrease in the intensity of their low back pain and an improvement in their ability to function.
Other types of massage that can be used to alleviate pain include deep-tissue massage, sports massage and trigger point therapy. Therapeutic massage focuses on problem areas and varies the depth of pressure and strokes used to improve muscle function and alleviate pain.
When it comes to chronic pain management, the field of massage needs more research on patient-reported outcomes. Standardized patient-reported outcome measures would enable massage to be more effectively incorporated into the healthcare system and allow researchers to compare results across multiple studies. This will help the massage and CIM community as a whole to provide evidence-based practices and demonstrate cost savings. In addition, patient-reported outcomes would allow clinicians to identify the best course of treatment for their patients and to track progress over time.