Massage Therapy

I’m experienced in the massage scene.  I’ve gone to spas, salons, chiropractors, and resorts always in search of pain relief.  My shoulders are super tight, and I’m a jaw clencher.   Add a touch of scoliosis, and it all adds up to a 10 on the tension Richter Scale.

I got a call from my friend Kaye and she told me about a massage she’d just had. She’s only had a couple of massages in her life and wasn’t necessarily a fan.

She called me on her way home and said, “Michelle, I just experienced something really extraordinary. If all massages are like this, I’ve really been missing out. You have to go and see this guy and tell me what you think because it was really amazing. Here is the number, ask for David.”

That’s a challenge I am eager to take.

I am able to get an appointment in just a few days. 

The building is nothing special but when I walk in the door, I see a comfy looking couch and a path of afternoon sun streaming in through a large picture window.  To the left of the couch there are about 20 different varieties of wild and healthy houseplants reaching toward the sun and creeping on the sill telling me that the light and the energy here is good. 

I take a deep breath; it smells like yoga and it feels like a bohemian grandmas living room. 

I feel shy, which is unlike me.  I never purposely book a massage with a male therapist.  I always preferred a woman.  But I am here to see David, and I am curious.

He comes around the corner from a back staircase that I didn’t see when I’d come in.  He smiles a small, quiet smile; like he knows I am fragile.  He’s not young, yet not old.  His whisper of gray hair and glasses that sit low on his nose suggest that he’s not new to this. 

He says we are scheduled to be in the room in the basement if that is ok with me.  I am here for the experience, so I agree.  He leads me down the stairs to a lovely area sectioned off with heavy drapes for privacy and ambiance. 

There is a long side table with incense, bells, and statues.  There are singing bowls in the colors of the chakras under the daylight window and a low massage table in the center of the room. 

 David asks me the health questions on his form and I sign my consent.  I tell him that I may be small, but I am tough.  I’m not here for a foofy tickle rub, I want deep tissue excavation of the bag of rocks in my shoulders.  I want to be sore the next day, I want therapy. 

He nods his head.  He is very unassuming in a white light, almost guru kind of way. 

He turns to the side table and lights some incense then asks me what level of heat I’d like the table set to.

“High,” I answer.

I notice his necklace, his bare feet, and his wide legged cropped pants.  He looks like masculine peace.

He tells me to undress to my level of comfort and says we will start with me facing up.  He backs out of the room and pulls the curtains closed.  I hear his footsteps going up the stairs.  I fold my clothes and set them neatly on the chair in the corner, and hide my bra under my shirt on the pile like I usually do. 

I leave my underwear on because that is my level of comfort.  I quickly climb onto the table and pull the sheet and blanket up around my neck. 

The table is heating up quickly and I am feeling like a kid spending the night at a new friends’ house.  I pretend to relax while I take some deep breaths and I say a prayer to the universe.

“Bring me the healing I need through the hands of David.”

After about 5 minutes he comes back and asks from the other side of the curtain,

“Are you ready Michelle?”

“Yes.”

He touches my arm over the blanket and whispers, “I’m going to gently raise the table.”

I hear a humming noise and feel the table whirring upward.

The music is gorgeous.  I hear flutes, rain beads and warm tones that roll over me like waves.

I decided before I came here that I was not going to talk during the massage.  I have made the mistake of becoming friends with my therapists and while that is very nice, the constant talking keeps me mentally in the same place that I was when I came in.  This time I want to meditate, heal.

The room is pure peace, David takes a deep breath in and a long slow exhale.  I feel warmth around my forehead, he has not touched me yet, but I keep my eyes closed.  I think he is doing some energy work on me, and I welcome it. 

He sits behind my head, and takes another deep breath, so I do too. 

He places his right hand along the side of my face and does the same with the left.  He is barely touching me; he is holding my head like a child.  He is breathing and running energy. 

His thumbs begin to trace lightly across my temples, over my eyelids, and meet at the bridge of my nose.  I feel heat moving across my forehead, he draws his thumbs back across my eyes so slowly I can barely sense their movement.  Something is opening, leaving me. 

It needed to go.

David takes another deep breath, his face is close behind me, he smells like fresh air and snow. 

I hear the quiet pump of the oil and he places his hands on my shoulders.  He slides his thumbs over the bumps that cause me such discomfort but does not use pressure. 

He is assessing, feeling, breathing. 

Keeping his thumbs on my shoulders he moves his fingers over my collar bones and into the valley that lies where my shoulder and collar bone rest together.  He presses into the tissue; increasing pressure with every back and forth, ever deepening his reach into the areas that hold me in a sleeve of compression. 

I begin to float away.  I feel the power of his hands, the tenderness in the pain.  I am hovering in the sweet spot where one ounce more of pressure would be too much and one ounce less too little.

I have not said a word.  He is reading a map that I did not draw for him, yet he sees it clearly.

When he reaches an area that is in need, he senses it and stays.

There are times when it feels like there are two people touching me, he moves like silk and connects the strings of his web in a tapestry… one hand on the arch of my foot and one squeezing the palm of my hand.

He takes time to squeeze and stretch each finger, connecting dots deep in the palm of my hand and it is the most intimate thing I have ever experienced.  Tears roll down my cheeks as I write this. 

I have turned over onto my stomach now, and his palms push into my lower back and his thumbs knead up the sides of my spine and up my neck.  A twist of his wrists and he is running his open hand down my arm and spreads his fingers to match mine as he passes over my wrist, palm and fingers with a pressure that feels like he’s holding my hand and letting me go at the same time.

He is connecting areas of my body that have been disconnected for 20 years. 

He is weaving the cells just under my arm together like a fine silver chain as he imperceptibly pumps more oil and draws it down the entire left side of my body connecting seamlessly to the sole of my foot.

He drifts around the table, sometimes I am not sure exactly where he is, but I don’t open my eyes because a spell has been cast.

My mind is swirling, sinking, floating, flying.  I feel beautiful, I feel worthy, I feel at home within myself.  I see a vision of a long green leaf rolled up tight growing from the center of a beautiful tropical plant.  It reaches taller and taller and then slowly, perfectly unrolls into a full, gorgeous leaf.

“This is me,” I think.

Knots of tension that have taken years to root and grow are being tamed and groomed and skillfully removed.

I am changing.

I have never had a man touch me for more than two minutes without expecting something in return.

It is not lost on me that I am paying this person to work on me.  He would not be there if not for his profession, and this massage was 100% professional in every way. 

But I also know that there is a reason I have come here that is far beyond the phone call from my friend.  This man, this one man, is erasing years of pain caused by men without saying a single word.

When the massage was over, David rang some beautiful little bells and brushed his hands over the blanket that covered me as if to bring me back into the room. 

“Take your time getting up, Michelle.  I will meet you upstairs when you are ready.”

“Thank you so much,” I whisper, not sure if he could hear me.

“No, thank you,” he says.

I lay still for a few moments and sat back into a yoga child’s pose on the table.  I take some deep breaths and slowly sit up.  I get dressed and go upstairs.

David stands next to the desk with a glass of water, smiling.  “How do you feel? 

I began to cry.

He takes a step towards me, and I reached out to hug him. 

There is an unspoken hug rule. If the person you are hugging starts to let go, you let go too. 

He did not let go. 

“What you do is so special,” I whispered.

“Thank you so much Michelle.”

After several minutes of us hugging each other, we both let go at the same time.

I wiped the tears from my face, and so did he. 

I put on my coat, get into my car, and cry.  I sob like a child; I can barely catch my breath.  I cry all the way home, sometimes wailing.  I still cry every time I think about it. 

I had been asking myself the same question for 15 years.  Am I broken?  Can I ever love again?  Is a marriage that is more like roommates enough for me for the rest of my life?  Has menopause and trauma killed the part of me that was able to be intimate, loving, free?

After all of my analyzing of that two-hour session, I still don’t know if I can explain exactly what happened that afternoon.

But I do know this… 

I am not broken.  I am worthy of love.  I am capable of love.  I am a beautiful person inside and out.  There is a morning sun rising in my heart.

I just had to let go to find it.