Massage and Mental Health
It’s the holiday season once again and everywhere you go there is Christmas music playing, decorative lights on people’s lawns, advertisements for holiday sales, and people enjoying the company of loved ones. By all rights, it should be the most wonderful time of the year. For many people, however, that is not the case. The holiday season can be incredibly difficult for people for a wide range of reasons, from grieving a loss to the shortness of days causing an increase in depression and seasonal affective disorder. Whatever the reason, lots of people struggle to get through the holidays with a smile on their face. There is something you can do for yourself to help make this time of year a little easier, though: get a massage.
Massage has a whole host of benefits, but one of the most significant is that it is incredibly good for your mental health. First and foremost, the power of human touch goes an incredibly long way in all people. It is a very human thing to crave physical intimacy with another human being but sometimes there is no way to fill that desire. Massage, even though it is a non-sexual form of touch, can help to meet the need for physical closeness with another person. Touch, sexual or not, releases the hormone oxytocin, the “love” hormone, and creates that feeling of bonding and being connected with a person. While you likely don’t share any intimate emotional connection with your massage therapist, massage helps to relieve the feeling of loneliness that many people with depression experience as a result of withdrawing from their social life and isolation.
Massage also helps with depression because it has been proven to increase levels of dopamine and serotonin in the brain. The lack of balance of these two chemicals in the body is one of the biggest causes for people to experience depression. Dopamine is the neurotransmitter that is associated with reward – anything from accomplishing a task to eating a meal to petting an animal can release dopamine in the brain. Serotonin is more associated with how we process emotions and can affect overall mood more significantly. They both play different roles but the increase in these two chemicals in the body undoubtedly relieves and improves symptoms of depression.
If stress is your problem, don’t worry, massage has been proven to help that also. Even for people who don’t normally suffer from mental illness, the holidays can be a time of incredibly high stress. Studies show that massage can reduce levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, by approximately 30-50%. Cortisol can wreak havoc on your body because it suppresses the immune system causing all kinds of dysfunction, including weight gain, high blood pressure, and increased risk for other mental health issues like anxiety and depression.
For people struggling with mental health, something that often gets overlooked is the connection between mind and body. Massage brings the focus back to how important it is for our minds that we take care of our bodies. The focus on things like calming music in the background or aromatherapy used by your massage therapist helps to allow people to focus on the here and now and be present in their bodies. Bringing attention to the mind/body connection helps people who suffer from disconnects with their bodies such as body dysmorphia or eating disorders as well as schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder.
The power of massage to impact the mind is incredibly important to explore. During a massage, we can let down some of our walls and reap the benefits of physical touch and relaxation. So, don’t let the holidays get you down this year. Schedule your massage with Holistic Massotherapy and Wellness this holiday season and get a little pick me up when you’re struggling with whatever burdens you.