Feeling sore or in pain after your massage? Soreness can be an area of the body that after receiving the massage feels tender to the touch, swollen, or sometimes even bruised. Soreness and pain after a massage can be a totally normal experience. It is even more common than you think.
Some pain and discomfort after a massage is normal. This reaction by your body to the massage is sometimes called “therapeutic inflammation”. Therapeutic inflammation occurs when new white blood cells move toward the massaged area to clean out waste products that have developed over time from injury, stiffness, and more. This can sometimes cause discomfort in the area which at many times may make you feel like the massage therapist did something wrong. Not to worry though; this is just a natural reaction by your body’s innate healing process.
Have you ever had an injury in an area and after a few days the pain went away but it still just didn’t feel right. Maybe you were lifting weights or exercising a few weeks ago and pinched a nerve. You were in some pain for a while and eventually you could bear it, but it’s never felt the same since. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the body healed itself. It just means that your brain has shut down the pain pathways so you don’t feel the pain.
Massage therapy can encourage the healing process which allows you to experience the pain again for a temporary time. Is that bad? Of course, it isn’t. Your body is healing. The massage increase blood flow to the affected area and cleans everything out that has built up over time. This is especially common when receiving a deep tissue massage.
What about the bruises? There are a number of factors that can cause bruising during a massage. First of all, the type of massage can dictate the strength used. If you selected a deep tissue massage or Thai massage, they are more intense and may leave some bruising. Even though it is temporary, next time just select a massage which is not as deep such as a Swedish massage and let them know to go lighter. There are many other factors that can cause bruising such as sensitive skin, vitamin C deficiency, age and more.
Other things that may make you more susceptible to pain and bruising after your massage are smoking, drinking, lack of sleep, and much more. Lifestyle and good health play a vital role in recovery.
So the next time you wake up the next day after the massage and you feel like you got run over by a semi-truck, don’t automatically blame your massage therapist.
Remember, if your therapist has massaged thousands of other people and they don’t get the same complaint, look at other factors as well. It may just be your body healing and that is a good thing. If, however, you feel severe pain after a massage, pain that doesn’t subside or gets worse, make sure that you seek medical attention.
It was possible that you may have gotten a massage from a therapist that wasn’t properly trained. Check out our articles on secrets that massage parlors don’t want you to know and dirty massage parlor secrets exposed to see if the massage parlor you went to isn’t legitimate.
One of the easiest ways to avoid real harm from a massage is to head to a safe, reputable, and experienced massage parlors. Luckily, Happy Head Massage is all of these things and prides itself on its well-trained staff, clean environment, and comfortable atmosphere that makes for the perfect massage. We can’t guarantee that you will leave pain free, but we can ensure you that the soreness you’re feeling is intentional and means that the relief is on its way!