I think every college has one - a Quad. A central place on campus where students meet, hang out, play football, frisbee, or whatever else. I seem to remember at least walking through the quad to get to class or the dining hall on the beautiful Salisbury State University campus - which is now known as Salisbury University. On occasion, I met up with friends there, but I'm pretty sure I never played frisbee or football.
I'm also pretty sure that there were meetings going on in my quads before last night. Quadriceps, that is. Without knowing it, my muscles that run from the knees to the hips must have formed a HUGE knot. I had felt something like lumpiness above my knee, but didn't think all that much about it.
For the lecture, we went over some concepts about working on muscles on both sides of a joint to get optimal benefit from the massage. For the bodywork section, we learned how to use the forearm and elbow as the "tool" to work the muscles. Using these "tools," no matter the size of the massage therapist, he/she can get into some deep tissue by using body weight. Molly demonstrated on one of the Teacher's Assistants (TA's) and then we changed clothes and got to work on our partner for the evening.
As I worked on my partner, Jenna, she had a Somatic Emotional Release! She started laughing and giggling and she couldn't figure out why. We got to see our first release. I even raised my arms in the "triumph" celebratory move that I was the bodyworker who did it! I continued with the deep tissue structural work with my forearms, elbows, and fists, working on moving muscle and breaking up knots that I found in her back.
Then - it was my turn. She began the work with me in the supine position - which is on my back - and dug her forearm into my quad, working down from the hip to the knee. I thought I was going to jump up from the table! On the pain scale of one to ten, I was definitely at a seven. She could feel the muscle moving underneath her forearm and I felt like my skin was folding over, and in reality, it was the muscle. That was the first leg. Then, she moved to my other leg. I was definitely coming off the table then with the pain shooting up to an eight and a nine. Knowing that it's good for me, I stayed on the table.
She worked on the rest of what we were assigned - back of the legs and the back. By the time I got off the table, my legs were seriously loosened up and I didn't feel as much tightness or lumpiness above my knees anymore. Wow!
Now I would like to really get these quads worked out, I know there's more in there.
When I got home, my husband was actually awake, and I got to show him a little of what we've been learning in class...the deep tissue structural work. He wasn't expecting that - he was thinking more of the fluffy stuff. He yelped a little bit and told me his pain level was at about a five. So I put more weight into it, being the good wife I am. Does he really know what he's in for as my guinea pig?
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