Category: therapy

The most amazing massage I ever got was at the JeJu Spa in Atlanta. The JeJu Spa is unlike a traditional American spa in that they have single sex bath rooms with baths of various temperatures. There’s a hot tub, a medium heat tub, and a cold bath. They also have a steam room and heat lamps. Everyone is naked in the baths, which is a little weird for puritan Americans, but you get used to it and it doesn’t seem so strange after a few minutes. In addition to the baths, they have unisex (where everyone is clothed) saunas. There’s a salt bath sauna, a gem room, and all sorts of other rooms designed to draw the impurities out of your system. They also have traditional massages and the masseuses are amazing as they work very hard to get all the kinks out of your muscles. I left after my 90 minute massage feeling on top of the world. It was also after that massage that I realized a massage could engender such a state of bliss that I no longer craved chocolate, pretty powerful stuff.

I was feeling in definite massage deprivation a few weeks ago when I went to the Mt. Prospect Farmer’s Market and got a free chair massage from a Advanced Physical Medicine and Therapy. As he worked on my back, he recognized the muscle tightness and said he thought he might be able to help me get rid of the kinks permanently. I didn’t have a lot to lose as they were offering the consultation for only $25. Since one of my resolutions for the year is to get a healthy body, I signed up and went.

Although I’ve traveled the world and believe strongly in the power of alternative medicine, Chiropractors weren’t something I’d experienced before so it was with some trepidation that I went in for the consultation. I’d heard stories about back cracking and was unsure of what to expect. After some x-rays and examination, the Doctor told me that I had some issues, but he thought they could treat it with adjustments and therapy versus surgery. That sounded good to me so I agreed to come in three times a week for four weeks.

My first therapy session I was strapped down to the table and the doctor went to work stretching the muscles in my back. There’s a spot on my lower back that is immensely painful, but he started working on the muscles and placing pressure on it. Once he’d finished on my lower back, he moved on to my shoulders. He explained to me a muscle knot was a muscle that was in a permanent state of constriction, i.e. the body thought it was working even when it wasn’t. By applying pressure, he was working on breaking down the muscle knot so that it relaxed. The next step in therapy was the actual backcracking and it was uncomfortable as he held my neck and twisted it gently until we heard a cracking sound. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to the back cracking as the position reminds me of action flicks where the hero snaps the bad guy’s neck.

After the manipulation and massage therapy, it was time for the electric stimulation. Electrodes are placed on your back, the area is covered with a heating bad and the electrical simulations exercise the muscles. At first, the electrical simulations felt a little bit strange, but then it started to feel relaxing as the muscles started to relax and the tension started leaving my shoulders.

Despite the relaxation that came from the electrical stim, I walked out of the chiropractor’s in pain as my muscles all felt as if they had been worked over by an 800 pound gorilla. At that point, I wasn’t sure I was going to go back as the pain was pretty intense. However, a funny thing happened the next day, I realized that I had a lot more energy and range of motion and the pain was actually subsiding.

Although the massages and therapy I get at the chiropractor’s are not quite as relaxing as the massages you get from a standard massusue, the results are even more blissful as I’m starting to feel like my body is really healing and I’m going to enjoy a better quality of life long term. The short term pain is more than made up for by the backcracking bliss that I’m enjoying.