I always hate myself for scheduling a deep tissue massage while I am in the middle of it, remembering to breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth, as my mom always advised when I had a boo boo, while intermittently noting, “Wow, that’s tender.” And by “that’s tender” I mean “WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME AND WHY? WHY WHY WHY? MOMMY, HELP!!!”
Apparently my sternocleidomastoids (the muscles that allow you to spread your bottom lip out wide, as if you were making a face to indicate “Yikes!”) are extremely tight. This is how my massage therapist ended up squeezing a fistful of my neck in his hand with a vise grip. If my neck starts sagging someday, at least I know who to blame. (I use SPF 15 lotion every single day on my face, neck, and upper chest).
I had a revelation during my torture session massage, however. The Fuelary, where I go for sports massage, could expand their target market. Right now, they cater to athletes, offering deep tissue massage, muscle restoration therapy, an ice bath, recovery boots, chiropractic, and probably other services of which I am not aware. Why not reach out to expecting mothers, too?
All I could think of during this massage was childbirth. I could barely tolerate the massage. It might have been the longest hour of my life. Dare I say birth seemed manageable in comparison? Yeah, the massage was that bad. So hopefully that means it worked.
To be honest, I don’t regret not having taken any formal childbirth classes. I just don’t feel there was anything I could learned that would have prepared me for the experience. And when it came time to push out the baby, my body just did what it needed to do; kind of like when you need to sneeze or cough- you just do it. No one had to tell me “PUSH! NOW!” like you see on “A Baby Story” (you’d be surprised how much TV I actually watch, considering we don’t have a TV). But I digress.
On race day (Saturday!!), we’ll know for sure whether the massage was worth it or not. Please feel free to track me via text message, Twitter, or Facebook updates by signing up here. My bib number is 4315. I once read that sick people who are being prayed for get better faster than people for whom no one was praying- even if they weren’t aware a prayer was being said for them. How cool is that?
So even if you read my blog from time to time but never comment and don’t actually know me (Anybody Out There???) go ahead and track me! It will help me run fast even though I will probably unwittingly give my well designed and expertly executed training (and the massage) all the credit.