massage therapy journal

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BABY KNOWS BEST

Fields instructs massage practitioners to look for a slight color change when working with Caucasian children, and a slight indentation when working with non-Caucasians.

And let the baby give you feedback. If your touch is too light, the baby will give you signs that he is not comfortable, she says.

Dont err on the side of too much pressure, though. Make good contact, Ramsey says, but dont drag on a newborns skin. You have to be very careful with the pressure amount, agrees Griffith. There are no broad strokes with a babyits all very delicate and precise.

The infant will give you feedback, typically through signals, such as putting an arm up when you reach for his or her face. This means no, says Takikawa. Eye contact, or lack thereof, is another signal. If an infant doesnt make eye contact with you, it means Im not ready for direct connection, she says.

Respect these signals. If an adult turns his head away, you dont rush around to the other side and put your face into his face, Takikawa says. You wait for them to come back and make eye contact.

Simply slow down the massage, or your pace. The first time Takikawa worked with an infant, when she reached out and touched the infants head, the child threw up her arms and hit Takikawas hand away.

I felt like a complete idiot, she says. I took my hand back and thought, Im a terrible therapist. But I overcame that quickly. Instead, she said to the child, Im so sorry, I think I put my hand up to your head too quickly and you werent ready for it. The infant turned her head back and made eye contact.

Treating the infant with respect will get you the best results, agrees White-Traut Approach the child as you would approach an adult, she says. Talk to the baby first. Specifically, use the childs name, and alert the child that someone is with him or her. Then, she recommends saying the following: Are you ready for your massage? Or, Were going to do your massage now.

Observe the childs response. A baby who is looking away from you or avoiding your gaze, or pushing away, frowning or crying is a baby who is not enjoying the massage and should not be receiving one.

Wait it out. If you never get the go ahead from the infant and you sit without making contact for a whole session, you will have given that infant such a gift, Takikawa says. Many babies have been really hurt at birth, and the idea of having a professional touch them can be terrifying. You dont make it less terrifying by overriding their signals of fear. You get past it by acknowledging it in a respectful way.

Instead, keep talking and see if the child can come back to you. Make sure that you introduce different stimulations one at a time. Use a gradual progression, so the child can accommodate a new sensory stimulation, says White-Traut.

Make sure you also tend to the parents needs, especially since babies pattern their nervous systems on the mothers and those directly affecting the mother.

Its better for human development if infants are surrounded by a state of peace, Takikawa says. The greatest service you can do for a baby, she says, is to help the mother settle in her body. Just having the mother sit there and breathe with you. Or look at her every five minutes and make eye contact, or ask her how shes doing, or touch the mothers foot with yours and ask her to take a breath, Takikawa says. She may not get it the first session, but by the third or fourth, shell be releasing with the baby.

Youll benefit as well. For one thing, the skills you learn can be transferred to nearly any of your clients.  Everything in infant massage is transferable to an adult, says Ramsey. For example, she used the same techniques on a man going through job stress. Its a very protective form of massage, she says. He was too tense to be able to take in all the variety of massage strokes that are stimulating to muscles and the nervous system. She even swaddled him, tucking him in a sheet. And elder massage is simply a spin-off of infant massage, she says.  

Perhaps most profound, however, is this: Infant massage becomes a spiritual experience for everyone involved. I teach listening touch as part of my [infant massage] workshop, says Ramsey. Its about using your hands like ears to pick up all kinds of information.

First, youll feel the temperature, she says, the softness, the moistness simple data collection. Then it happens. Babies listen with their skinthey listen to your listening.

They begin to give back, she says.

Try it for 10 secondsreally listening with your hands. Its a blissful experience.

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