The Anatomical Exploration Begins!

Thank you for taking the time out to read this posting today. This is the beginning of a journey into the basics of anatomy - an exploration into the subject that all holistic therapists and their clients can stand firm on. Anatomy is our link and our method of communication, which means we should make sure we are talking the same dialect throughout these blog postings.

Why do we need to know about Anatomy? Because we need to move our bodies! 

The journey that we are about to take together will be filled with questions, opinions and beliefs, that all make a rich tapestry in our relationship as we get to know this vast subject. This being the case please do comment on each posting and start a conversation. This is all done to empower you as the client and the receiver of Body-Work so that you can understand the process that your therapist is taking you through. Don't be shy - get in touch!

I work in the U.K and so my view of anatomical learning is very much based on the experiences we have here in England. It would be great to hear from people who have trained in Anatomy across the globe so we can compare and expand that knowledge.

In the U.K Body-Workers are often trained through small private institutes or vocational colleges. Over the past five or so years there have been moves to take Body-Work training into Universities, but at the moment the vast majority of therapists will have studied in a college style environment. This is a fantastic place for people who are not classic academics, (which I am not!), and they are safe places for students to learn rudimentary human anatomy. When therapists leave their basic massage training, they walk into the treatment room knowing the basics of the human body and the systems of:

• Endocrine (Hormones)
• Vascular (Heart and Blood)
• Lymphatic (Immune System)
• Respiratory (Breathing)
• Skin
• Muscular
• Skeletal
• Nervous 
• Reproductive
• The Brain

The way that the systems are taught are in isolation, thus the modules in the class room are broken down into easy sections with little cross linking. The merging of ideas may happen with muscle and skeletal as they are seen as connecting tissue, but many therapists I have spoken to literally had the isolated systems explained. 

Notice that fascia, the connective tissue that I have been very excited about on this blog for the past few years, is not taught at all to new Body-Workers and that is saved for advanced teaching. Further concepts and the art of looking deeper into the systems of the body are taken up by a few Body-Workers here in the U.K who want to further their knowledge.  

I spent a year looking at the muscles and bones in the body, and got very good at Latin in the process, and I do believe that they are great part of the body to study and perfect as at the moment we are in a place where the 'Classical Anatomy', (of which we will look at in the next blog), still rules the roost. Also, clients are happy talking about muscles, their functions, the stretch and contraction. It's a great first step along the journey. 

However, I think we become too comfortable with this simplistic look at the body and there is a need to start looking at our amazing bodies with a wider lens. 

Meridians and the Eastern anatomy and philosophies are not touched upon at college, (or on this blog); it is left to the therapist to decide which path they want to take. Either they take the Clinical and Sports, or the Eastern Medicine route. Personally, I truly believe that it is best to stick to the one that is chosen for a good few years. If it took Leonardo Di-Vinci a lifetime to get to grips with the Classical Anatomy, I am personally not going to try to master both road maps!

On the next part of this Anatomical Journey we are going to talk about the Classical Anatomy, which we work with everyday in the Body-Workers Treatment Room. We will take a quick glimpse at the history of Anatomy and what that knowledge has brought us.

Take good care until next time!

An Anatomical Interlude

Hello, and thank you for waiting for the next episode in the series on the Shoulder Cuff. I have had a

week to ponder on how to present movement for you and describe the relevant anatomy and hit across a stumbling block; Integrated Anatomy needs an introduction!

I am finding that I am often describing movement, trigger point pain and pathologies in terms of muscle and bone, which is great Classical Anatomy fare. However, I no longer believe it is the right was to talk about the way our bodies roam across the planet. We need a more holistic language.

The result has been to create five new videos for you to watch over a cup of coffee and enjoy. They will be posted, along side written blogs, over the next two weeks. The subjects will be:

• An Introduction To The Anatomy Series
• An Introduction To Massage Anatomy In The U.K
• Classical Anatomy - Our History
• Integrated Anatomy - Holistic Anatomical Language
• Movement

If you would like to get in touch, please do! Your ideas and comments are always the inspiration behind the work that I do. Twitter, Google+, Cornerstone Therapies, and the YouTube comments box are all great places to put your ideas forward. 

I look forward to this topical interlude and hope we can work together to rustle some great ideas and move our thinking together along this journey. 

Rotating Shoulders - The Anatomy Blog.

A photo of an illustration depicting
the back muscles. 

There have been a couple of occasions over the past week that have allowed me to revisit a part of the shoulder that can cause a bit of confusions, pain and general bother; The Rotator Cuff.

This part of the shoulder held me in amazed wonder when I worked on a project with two fellow therapists in St Andrews University at the Integral Anatomy week I attended with Gil Hedley in July. During that week a Physiotherapist student also shared his work on the shoulder with me, clearly showing the muscle and fascia relationship within the joint. Over the past weekend I had a great time looking at the text book theory of Painful Arch Syndrome when a colleague asked a couple of questions that I wanted read up on. So this blog comes from quite an intense look at the shoulder area in general!

Clients will often come and visit me with grumpy shoulders and there is a general sense that the shoulder isn't working so well. The range at which they can move their arms can be sticky, pain can be felt when the arm is moved in different directions, or when I ask them to resist pressure on movement. Also, clients can feel as if they are suffering from pain around the wrist, elbow and deep into the upper arm or across the shoulder blade, and after looking their symptoms up on the internet often self prescribe problems such as 'Frozen Shoulder' or 'Carpel Tunnel Syndrome'. In this blog I want to really break the pain that can be felt by the four muscles that make up the Rotator Cuff and see what we do to help lift some of the confusion that it has.

So let's get going! 

The Rotator Cuff is made up of four muscles; Supraspinatus, Infraspinatus, Subscapularis and Teres Minor. All hook into your shoulder blade (Scapula) and into the upper portion of your arm (Humerus). They are all deep muscles, sitting under the topical deltoid and trapezius. 

Supraspinatus gives the head of the Humerus bone stability and also gives you movement of the arm. When you take your arm out to the side, it helps to initiate the movement and then raise it above your head after your deltoid muscle has got you to about 90 degrees. You can find Supraspinatus lying deep in the top of the shoulder blade in it's own little groove called the Supraspinatus Fossa, flowing under a bridge of bone called the Acromium to then attach to the arm. 

Trigger points can often be felt if Supraspinatus gets grumpy and the pain is commonly at the back of the arm near the top (Posterior Deltoid) and then it goes across the shoulder blade (Scapula). It can also go down the back of the arm and can then skip the elbow reappearing in the wrist. 

An example in External Rotation

Infraspinatus lies deep in the dell of the shoulder blade called the Infraspinatus Fossa. It's thin and wide and the main job it has is to externally rotate the arm, as well as stabilize the shoulder joint (Glenohumeral Joint). Because of it's shape, if you are to place your hands over a shoulder blade you are guaranteed to be on it, but your intention has to be deep to the superficial muscles. 

This time the Trigger Points will be felt going down the outside of the upper arm along the humerus and you may also notice them right at the edge of the shoulder blade near the spine (the spine of scapula). Many people report that the pain is worse when they are sleeping on the other side when this muscle gets grumpy as well as pain rearing it's ugly head down the thumb side (radial aspect) of the hand. 

Teres Minor is small and often forgotten about, lying as it does on the side of the shoulder blade, jammed in between it's bigger neighbors. However, it may be little but it is powerful working right along side Infraspinatus when you externally rotate your arm. 

The Trigger Point pathway for Teres Minor is very localized and sits just into the back of the arm and can be a very deep ache. It will often be worse if there are trigger points in the Infraspinatus, so the two not only work together but should also be treated together to enable you to regain ease of movement. 

An example if Internal Rotation 

Subscapularis is one of my favorite muscles! It's tucked away, only peeking out when the arm is moved in certain ways and in massage I find it a very satisfying area to treat. It sits in the front of your shoulder blade and this anterior aspect means that it is sandwiched between  the ribs and the shoulder blade. It's the opposing force to Teres Minor and Infraspinatus, enabling your arm to internally rotate whilst still maintaining the integrity of the shoulder joint. It's not often looked at or treated, so don't be surprised if your Body-Work Therapist takes their time over a few sessions to release it all out for you. 

The Trigger Points spring up around the back of the shoulder blade and the back of the wrist and you may be having problems in taking your arm away from the body (Abduction) as well as external rotation. Unfortunately trigger points can cause such a problem that some clients can experience a subluxation when the head of the humerus comes away from the shoulder joint (Glenohumeral joint). 

There is your anatomy and I hope you have enjoyed it and it's clear for you to understand! I'm sorry that I could get any photos of the muscles, but I am going to work on getting that together for next time so you can see it all in context. 

Next time I'll take you on a tour of movement and I hope that will start to really fit all the dots together for you so that we can start working out how you can work on the area safely at home and what you can expect from your Massage Therapist during your treatments. 

As always with the blogs that I put together for anatomy and massage the information is aimed for clients to understand, not therapists! I want to make it clear that these posting are in no way a diagnostic tool and should not be used as such. If you are in pain and need help, always consult your general medical practitioner. I would also direct you to the blog posting Pain Patterns Explained as it will tell you how I approach soft tissue and the theory of muscle based pain pathways.

No part of these blogs can be used or quoted without written permission from the author.

Reference book used for this blog: 

Trigger Point Therapy for Myofascial Pain; The Practice of Informed Touch. By Finando, Finando. Published by Healing Arts Press, 2005

My Massage And Anatomy

Sardinian beach, my feet and books.

Many of my clients have had a common grumble - I've been away a lot lately.

In June David and I went to Italy for a month of sun with revision and last week I got back after a trip to bonny Scotland at St Andrew's for Gil Hedley's Six Day Intensive Human Anatomy course.

At the weekend I was asked by a client "What is the point of going away to learn more anatomy?". It was a fair question, especially after they have put up with me going off on training courses for the past six years!

I think a lot of people still believe that massage is just a case of rubbing skin with oil or treating muscle tissue with a hit-or-miss effect. In truth the basic massage training is rudimentary when it comes to the atlas of the human body. There is part of me that would argue that a lot of the anatomy that is taught is following principles that have been unchanged for the past 400 years, even though science has shown us that the maps that we rely on need to be revisited and redrawn.

My passion for looking into new parts of our  'inner space' is something that drives me to further my knowledge so that I can bring new delicacies to the treatment room for you. However I am not an Academic, (something that became very clear to me as I was going through my B-Tec Level 6), I am a clinician. On my Twitter Feed last month there was a conversation about the one thing that made a difference to the treatments that therapists offer. My answer was anatomy and there were a few people who said that I was wrong saying, among other things, that it's the therapist's hands, a bit of luck, good teaching and excellent professionalism are the marks of a good therapists. All their answers were correct as well and I would strive to attain them in almost equal measure.

For me, the continued search and application of living anatomy makes me tick and is the thing that I see change my treatment approach time and again. The more I see, the more I realize that I don't know, the more I try to answer the questions that confront me, the more I search. It is an unending relationship that I have between my love for the mystifyingly beautiful, alive and heart led people that I treat on a daily basis and the anatomy of the human form.

Without the Academics and Scientist's passion for research we would still be stumbling around in the dark suffering deaths from Small Pox. Instead we are able to live through so much illness thanks to to the forward march of medicinal information and come out the other side of sickness ready to enjoy and embrace new days, fresh with the feeling that we can go forth and change.

I don't think research should stop with the search to find new medication and I am continually thankful to the research grants and funding that is given to the people who are searching to answer questions about how we are formed.

Massage has always been shrouded in mystery with many people asking 'Does it work?'. The simple answer is 'Let's find out!'.

As for studying Anatomy, I think you should expect nothing less than your massage therapist to know
how to navigate around your body! I will continually seek to develop my understanding of it in all manner of ways, purely because I think the text books can give us a basic layout, but you can't beat learning from the true form.

'Each drawing in an anatomy book is based on an average version of the structure. The sum of these images is a "totally averaged"collection of parts representing no one, no body. Release the need to be, or make someone, that 'no body'. The someone that you are is far beyond average - totally unique. Revel in that! 
The average in principle is unattainable, but you can definitely accomplish being you.'
Gil Hedley

Holidays At Home - One Week To Go

You have planned your holiday at home; tickets are booked, days at home have been planned and lunches with friends are in the diary. You are all set to go! But there are a few finishing touches that you may want to spend some time thinking about and putting into action so that you are all set for your home-based-vacation.

This is a good time to say that from the very beginning that this series has been created for adults on their own, or with partners. I feel children's holidays have a lot of air time and I hope in this series to give the adults some TLC!

Dress To Impress
Your wardrobe is normally set up so that your most used clothes are nearest to you when you open your door. Take an hour to sort out the work and pleasure clothes - popping the work based outfits to the far side of the wardrobe and the bottom draw so that you don't see them through out the holiday. You don't need the visual stimulus and reminders of normal life. You wouldn't see them if you were going away, so why see them when you are on your Holiday at Home? Sort out day and evening outfits so that you can just reach in, grab what you want to wear and enjoy some colour! With your workout guide in the diary you can also place your gym and swim gear into bags so you are all set to go without a fuss. You could also sort out your accessories so that your work based ones get a break and you get to enjoy the others for a bit.

Feed Your Body
Why not put your body on a bit of a holiday? With all your treatments planned, your Personal Trainer booked, your time in the pool organized or the DVD's ordered, why not look after yourself fully by clearing out all the toxic rubbish from the house and filling the cupboards with food that will help you replenish your inner self? This holiday is all about you - getting you to a better place rather than just staying in a rut at home. With a week before your time off, you have a great opportunity to write out a fantastic meal plan, list all the ingredients and order them on line or get them from the store. The extra nice bits can be picked up at the Farmers Markets. It will probably take you a gentle evening to plan this part, but it is well worth it so that you know you are making the most of your vacation for your total body wellness.

Finishing Touches
With just a couple of days to go, make sure the house is in order. You have taken a month to go through it, making sure it is all sorted out so that you don't have to spend your time off doing mundane house-work, so now is the time to really enjoy it! A few ideas are:

• Wash towels and make them fluffy 
• Put fresh candles around the house
• Make sure you have all the nail varnishes, bubble baths etc in the house so you can enjoy them
• Stock up on a couple of new books and fresh magazines
• Make sure the laundry is all done, ironed and put away
• Put all work based stuff in a box and put it neatly under the study table so you don't have to look at it. 

And Enjoy ...

You have worked really hard to get yourself and your home organized so that you can have a real vacation. It takes more time to organize a Holiday At Home than it does to book a pre-packaged deal on the net, so be proud of yourself for doing such a great job! In the week before your time off, enjoy the haircuts, waxing, pedicures and manicures with a spring in your step knowing full well that you are about to enjoy one of the best holidays! It will be one to remember and I can assure you that all the preplanning, excitement and anticipation will all be well worth it. 

I hope that you have enjoyed this blog series and that it has given you some helpful tips and hints about how to make time on your own or with your partner fun whilst you are based in the place you love the most - Your Home. 

Over the next couple of weeks the blog will be offering up some new ideas on anatomy and treatments, so keep a close eye on the up coming posts!

Get in touch with me through the Cornerstone Therapies Website! 

Holidays at Home - The Two Week Marker.

Welcome back to the Holiday at Home series! If you are using this blog series to help you plan your vacation, then I hope that by now you are really looking forward to some rest and recuperation based in the comfort of your own home.  

This is a good time to say that from the very beginning that this series has been created for adults on their own, or with partners. I feel children's holidays have a lot of air time and I hope in this series to give the adults some TLC!

I hope that after the last blog post you have been able to make all the bookings that you need to with your holistic therapists, personal trainers and hairdressers and have been able to craft out a plan to make you feel special and relaxed, as well as restored and energized. 

As promised, this blog we are going to look at the two week marker.

With two weeks to go before our Holiday at Home I would advise that you sit down with a glass of something nice and take an evening to surf the web. Personally I find web-surfing time consuming, so I will dedicate an evening to it if I am planning something big, (there is no point kidding myself that it will only take a second!). With two weeks to go there is a lot to think about as far as time off. Look at your diary and see what kind of time you are about to enjoy and plan your days around the theme. Here are a few ideas to get your mind and body well looked after during your vacation. 

Exhibitions
Many museums will run special exhibitions that you may be interested in seeing. If you have found yourself on the train gazing at posters during your commute, then make a list of the ones that are near you and that you want to see. Then you can look them up two weeks before your vacation and see if they are still open. I often find that if I take the time to pre-book my tickets at the museums in London I can get great deals on the prices. Also, I can plan to go either in the mid-morning lull when it is a bit quieter, or I will plan to go with a friend. I never like seeing more than one thing a day simply as I find it too tiring to take in loads of new information and fresh scenes, and I would advise that if you are planing things like art trips, make sure you stick to one a day! 

Be A Tourist
Find out if there is a walking tour that you can take around your local town or city. With a couple of weeks to go you will be able to join ones that are already planned, or you can get in touch with the people who run them and they can maybe organize one for you based on your interests. These are often a great way to see places that are often missed, meet up with new people, or have a private view at art collections. Most tour groups now offer great walks for people in wheelchairs, so all can enjoy what the cities have to offer. 

Feed Your Soul

Have a surf around and see where your local Farmer's Markets are and when they will be on. They often publish lists of producers that will be attending, entertainment and if there will be street food to enjoy. It's great to meet all the people that produce the food that you are about to enjoy and get a sense of connection with the guys who make your milk, as well as their cows! It's great to have a wonder around and try new flavors and ask the stall holders how best to use their wares. 

Crafty
I love going to small art and craft shows. These are often advertised on the web, but also look out for them in the back of craft magazines and the local newspapers. Also, take time out to spend a day with a local crafts person who is willing to show you new skills! Workshops are a great way to relax, get inspired and try new techniques. If you are into dressmaking, gardening, flower arranging, book binding, knitting, bread making ... just about anything really ... take time for a few laughs and spend a day enjoying yourself. 

Gigs, movies and concerts. 
No Holiday at Home is planned without a trip to the movies for me! I love seeing the trailers on-line and getting excited about the next releases. Get a list of local gigs, concerts and cinema viewing times so you can plan evenings out, or enjoy the newest DVD releases at home. 

Friends and Family
As you surf the net, don't forget to ask yourself if you want to share your time with people or if you need to recharge alone. Email those you want to be with and send them links to what you have found that may interest them and get booking in the diary. It's o.k to recharge your batteries alone! I often mix and match days during my vacation with lunches and shows with friends and family and then a day pottering away in the garden on my own, enjoying the flowers and getting back to an equilibrium. 

Back to the diary! 
Now you have your diary pretty much well planned. Each day will be fresh and new, you may be out enjoying yourself with energetic people in the city or relaxing in the garden or local park recharging the inner batteries. Either way, let your diary or wall planner guide you. Without this planning your Holiday at Home will just end up being a long list of housework duties and you will not be blessing yourself or your home. 

With two weeks to go you should be really excited about all that you have planned! With treatments and classes already penciled in, tickets booked, journeys planned and gardens to enjoy, you will be getting ready for the final blog post; The One Week Marker! 

Next time we will be looking at the one week to go stage: Getting your vacation wardrobe together, putting work away, and the finishing touches to your plans. 

I hope you are enjoying the posts as you plan how to rebalance your body and your soul through your Holiday at Home. 

Holiday at Home - Bookings

This is a good time to say that from the very beginning that this series has been created for adults on their own, or with partners. I feel children's holidays have a lot of air time and I 
hope in this series to give the adults some TLC!

After the last blog, you will by now have three things sorted out:

Your holiday time will be booked in the calendar for a month or six weeks time.

• You will have decided what kind of holiday you would like: Calming, restorative or energizing. 
• You will have looked around your house and made headway with starting to get it in to shape. 

This blog is going to help with planning your well-being time during your 'Holiday At Home'. 

I have always taken the first two days of my holidays at home to deal with the things that will set me up to feel fantastic during my time off, but I don't want to have them take up time in the middle of the vacation. These are treatments that are great to have and look after you, but you may not feel that they fit into the bracket of things you want to dedicate holiday days to. So, get the calender out and book up these treatments to start your holiday on a high! 

1. Get in touch with your hairdresser. They often get booked up about a month before the time that you want to see them, so get it organized soon. A fresh trim, a re-color, or a total new look will help you set the mood for your holiday. 
2. Make a booking with your Beauty Therapist for your Manicure and Pedicure. You would get these done before you left the country for a holiday and so you should do them just before you Holiday at Home. There is no difference - you are still taking time for you. They will make you feel well cared for and happy feet and toes are always a great thing to enjoy.
3. If you have a regular wax, get it all done before your holiday. You really don't want to be bothering about it half way through your special time off. 

If you are taking a week off instead of two I recommend that you book these for evenings just before your holiday so they don't actually get involved in time off at all. 

Now, these bookings need to be made personal to you as you know whether you would like a calming, restorative or energizing holiday, so use these tips as a starting point and go from there. 

Exercise

 It is important to look after your total body wellness and holidays are a great time to do that. So many people go to Yoga retreats, boot camps, Pilates training, running camps etc. So why not do it from home on your holiday? 

If you are after an energizing time, talk to your personal trainer and ask them if they are available for a few extra slots during your time off. You can concentrate on some high intensity work, muscle training, perfect your running, and get some energy buzzing around. Spend time with them crafting a plan that will up lift you and keep you motivated. The other option is to go to your local gym and ask if they are running mini-courses for adults. At our local pool they offer mini-courses for people to get better at swimming and the gym offers week long morning courses to help with weight training for example. 

If Calming is more your thing, look at your local yoga or Pilates studio and ask if they are running courses or you can book in for a daily session with them in the early mornings. Using the early mornings to work on a gentle form of movement sets you up for your day well and then you have the rest of the time to do other things you want to enjoy. 

If you are like me and work out from home, then get some new DVD's from people you like and make a schedule for the time off when you dedicate time to move a bit more each day of your holiday. You can also mix this with a couple of sessions at the Pilates and Yoga studios, or the gym and pool to make a change, or you can just stick with what you love best! 

What ever you choose to do you need to book it up and make sure it is scheduled into the diary! Studios and Personal Trainers get busy, so you need to make this booking a priority along with your treatments so you are not disappointed when you get to your Holiday at Home. 

Holistic Therapy

As a therapist I know that my diary gets booked up three to four weeks in advance, and so if I am planning my Holidays at Home I know that I need to book my massage and facial appointments with my own therapists at least six weeks in advance to make sure I get time on the couch! 

Massage is great and Holidays at Home allow you to get a couple of extra treatments in. You can mix and match these with relaxing aromatherapy and Swedish based treatments, or you can have a couple that you have never tried before - maybe a LaStone treatment? 

Skin Care Treatments are relaxing and a lot of therapists offer mini-course for skin care so you can concentrate on a particular issue and spend quality time trying to help it. 

Look at what you enjoy the most; massage, facials, reflexology, acupuncture, etc and book it in around your holiday and maybe go for a couple more sessions than normal to make your time off extra special. 

Step back and take a look.

By now you should be able to look at your diary and see a good shape coming together around your vacation. You will be able to see the theme of your holiday and be able to work out if you are going to utilize the mornings for your exercise and holistic therapy so you can get more out of your days, or if you are going to make it a relaxing spa holiday and allow your bookings to make up the bulk of your time. 

In the next blog, we will look at the two week marker: What is out there that you would like to do as far as shows, exhibitions, lunches as well as quality you time.

So get booking and start to get really excited about your Holiday at Home!