Deep Tissue Massage

Home

Deep Tissue Massage

A deep tissue massage is a massage that works primarily on the deep tissue of your body.

Why choose a deep tissue massage?

Accumulated muscle tension and tendons can be relieved through deep pressure and precise application of adapted movements. The lymphatic system and blood circulation are both stimulated, and your body will benefit by feeling lighter after the session.

Deep tissue is the perfect massage if you have a lot of accumulated tension in your back, legs or feet. Please be aware that this massage session requires deep pressure to be applied to muscles and tissue; therefore, you must inform me about any previous injuries or contusions you have suffered before the treatment.

Furthermore, it is vital to let me know if the applied pressure feels painful or uncomfortable so I can adapt the techniques according to your comfort and well-being.

During this session, I can complement the treatment by applying oils that stimulate the blood flow of your deep tissue, such as Rosemary, Helichrysum Essential Oil or Herbal Balm.

What are the benefits of a deep tissue massage?

For those who regularly work out, a deep tissue massage every two weeks will help your muscles in future training sessions; if not, your muscles will be tight, and your workouts will suffer for those who occasionally work out, once a month should suffice.

Other benefits that my clients feel are:

Better workouts.

Relaxed, less stressed muscles will increase your range of motion during workouts. Your body will be far more efficient at building muscle and burning calories.

A relaxed state of mind.

Research has shown that massage helps lower levels of stress hormones while at the same time boosting those ‘feel good’ neurotransmitters like dopamine, serotonin and endorphins.

Better sleep.

Regular deep tissue massage will help you feel good and sleep better due to less pain and a boost in serotonin.

Eliminate pain.

Deep tissue massage will remove the knots from stressed, overworked muscles and connective tissue (fascia) to alleviate immediate and chronic joint and muscle pain. It also promotes faster healing by increasing blood flow and reducing inflammation.

Improve overall health.

In addition to benefiting muscle and tissue health, deep-tissue massage positively affects your overall health by decreasing blood pressure and improving lung function.

How much is a deep tissue massage?

A relaxing massage in Nice ranges from €130 for a 1.5-hour session to €180 for a 2-hour session. A 1-hour session can be booked, but a minimum of 1.5 hours is recommended.

How can I book a deep tissue massage?

Easy! Click here to book me, and don’t be shy to let me know your needs. Every treatment is tailored to your body’s needs.

Do I need to bring anything to my deep tissue massage?

Not at all! Only yourself, and let me know which oils you would like me to use that stimulate the blood flow of your deep tissue.

Recommended time: 1h30

More information about deep tissue massages

The outer tissue of the body is the skin. The skin has multiple layers culminating with a layer of body fat, where we usually store extra fat reserves.

You can also accumulate fat in other areas, like around organs, but that happens only if you are obese and seriously overweight. Otherwise, the place where you gather body fat is under the outer layer of the skin.

Under this layer of fat, we find the “deeper tissue”: muscles, tendons, ligaments and fascia. In deep tissue massage, the primary focus is on the muscle tissue.

Muscle tissue functions like a power plant, burning nutrients in its cells to generate movement.

Most muscle tissue is moved consciously (arm, legs), whilst others are not (such as the heart muscles and muscles, which assure organ function).

Muscles have a sponge-like texture because blood and lymph flow goes into the cells to enable the exchange of oxygen – carbohydrates and bring nutrients to make them work. Imagine your muscles as a sponge, just more flexible, maybe like a sponge made of rubber. In a massage, you squeeze and clean them precisely like a sponge.

Muscles have a common brain. If you are relaxed, all muscles relax to a certain degree. This is why I always work on the whole body in my sessions. If you feel stiffness in your legs and I work only on the legs, for example, the stiffness will come back shortly after your session. If we work on the whole body, the information about how to feel light and relaxed (your natural way of being) is transmitted to all body muscles. Maintaining this sense of lightness and flexibility for a more extended period will be easier for you.

About deep tissue muscles

Tendons & ligaments

A tendon attaches a bone to a muscle and acts like a rope that links the two to transmit and assure movement. The tissue is somewhat flexible but a lot different from muscle tissue.

You can imagine it like a rope. For movement to be physically possible, the power generated and initiated from a muscle must be transmitted to a smaller structure, which is why tendons are powerful and much stronger than spongy muscle tissue. There is little to do to massage the tendons because of their rope-like texture.

However, some work can be done to improve their function and flexibility in the areas where they attach to the muscle or bone. The best thing you can do is to keep your muscles stretched to take pressure off the tendons. That way, they will be protected from injuries and inflammation.

Ligaments hold joints together and attach one bone to another bone. They have a similar structure to tendons. As with tendons, there is not much work to do on the ligament, but we will work on all structures in a deep tissue massage. Hence, they function better, mainly when the connection to the bone stays soft and flexible.

Fascia is the connective tissue that holds all organs, muscles and the whole organism in place inside your body. Fascia will stretch and become flexible and elastic when worked on in massage therapy, which means it will not tear easily under strain.

Knots vs tension

My clients often ask me, “did you find any knots?”

But what actually is a knot in your muscle?

When you put too much strain, if you over-exercise, if you move quickly without warming up, some of the fibres of a muscle can tear. When they heal again, they create scar tissue. This would be an actual knot. So knots can be treated, but like any other scar tissue, it only changes its texture within about a year. After that, it will not change much and stay as it is.

If you think about a scar on the skin, it’s precisely the same. It doesn’t harm or influence your skin’s function; the skin will be less flexible on that scar tissue, but everything around it functions as usual. You won’t notice any adverse effects, provided it’s not more significant than the healthy muscle.

Similar to a visible scar on your skin, If you have had a huge, deep burn on your arm, then you will experience tightness and discomfort from the big patch of scar tissue, not so much on the tissue itself as it is usually less sensitive then healthy tissue, but the surrounding areas have to compensate for the lack of flexibility so they might feel stretched and may be damaged more easily.

Coming back to your deep tissue muscles:

There are occasionally knots (little scars) that I can find in a massage session, and I will work on them accordingly to break them up if still possible.
These knots are somewhat rare, and it is primarily sports people who have them after they over-exercise or hurt themselves when doing sports.
In almost all cases, these knots are inconsequential for your muscle to function correctly. For example, some people rip a big part of their muscles in an accident. Then they need physiotherapy following the accident because the scar occupies a large part of the muscle and can hinder it from functioning correctly. But this is only the case after accidents and doesn’t otherwise happen.

So what most people think are ‘knots’ in their muscles are actually tense muscles. If you use a muscle, it burns nutrients to work. The cells are little engines that burn, resulting in waste material that is transported out of the body. This process is not disturbed in a perfect, healthy world, where you live in perfect harmony with the earth, your body and mind.

For instance, what you eat creates more waste than nutrition. You drink coffee and alcohol, and you eat meat and cheese. The way your body moves is not as nature intended (you are sitting a lot or doing repeated movements, using your physical body in an unbalanced way).

You experience sensory overstimulation: eyes, ears, nose, and tongue. (I don’t want to put the skin here because, in my opinion, touch is a sense that is not experienced enough for most people). You experience stress.

All these things influence how your body functions and result in stiffening up your muscle tissue in one way or another.

In massage therapy, we stretch and squeeze the muscles; by doing so, we engage the tissue to transport away waste products. Blood and lymph flow ensures that new nutrients and oxygen reach the cells causing the muscle to soften and regenerate, which makes it resistant to injuries. This recharges you with a feeling of renewed lightness and flexibility.

Touch also has a calming effect on the nervous system, easing tension in the muscles (but if you want to hear more about it, read here what I wrote about relaxing massages).

Some additional remarks about joints:

When muscles are short and tense, they add additional pressure on a joint. Joints are naturally filled with joint fluid to function. If the pressure increases, the fluid in the joint is pushed outwards, and pressure is applied to the cartilage, which eventually erodes, causing inflammation.

Cartilage can rub off entirely, and bone and bone rub together in a degenerated joint, which then stiffens up and is painful, meaning it will not function correctly anymore. If you can keep your muscles flexible, your joints will experience less stress and will not degenerate prematurely. Specific exercises can target joint mobility, like circular movements for the knee and shoulder or curving and stretching the spine for spine flexibility.

BOOK NOW

FACEBOOK