Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Health and Wellness > Alternative Medicine
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 11-03-2008, 07:35 PM
 
Location: Central Maryland
102 posts, read 383,916 times
Reputation: 54

Advertisements

Rolfing is one of the most practical and rational of the "alternative" health subsets. It's descended largely from osteopathic technique, AFAIK. I'm a fairly junior Rolfer, trained in Munich, working in the US. Of course the bodywork made a huge difference for me personally. It's funny how much a person can evolve, when they feel good. 8-)

There's some really neat research going on: www.fasciaresearch.com

Rolfing (a trademark term held by the Rolfing Association) has been in the process of refining its technique through the years. I was taught to find the "stuck places" and get my clients to move through them. A very soft touch can seem like a lot of work. Sometimes it is intense, and sometimes the issues held in the body emerge, but sometimes it's just stuck tissue 8-).
Give the Rolfer a call, most of them are glad to talk to you or give you a little demo for little or no cost.

Here's some information for everyone:

structuralintegration.info » A Reference Blog on the Science and the Experience of Structural Integration
Rolfing Training at The Rolf Institute of Structural Integration W-4
Guild for Structural Integration
IASI Online - About IASI
Anatomy Trains | KMI | Welcome!

Disclosure: I am a Certified Rolfer practicing in Maryland.
Moderator cut: No posting your website or soliciting allowed E D "Edge" Gordon

Last edited by Suzet2262; 11-03-2008 at 08:57 PM.. Reason: soliciting business
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 11-04-2008, 06:04 PM
 
Location: Central Maryland
102 posts, read 383,916 times
Reputation: 54
Default Disclosure/Moderation

Anyway if you have any bodywork questions, feel free to ask. I've been a massage therapist (Trigger Point/Travell & Simons) since 2000, worked as a contractor and program administrator (volunteer) for the Army for six years in Germany, got certified as a Rolfer there and worked with Germans and Americans and anyone else who showed up on the Grafenwoehr Training Area (www.grafenwoehr.army.mil) from 2002 to 2008. If I don't know, I'll know where you can find out.
PM or here, whatever. My goal is to educate the public.
I'd be surprised to earn a penny in the process.
;-\
Now, if you didn't vote, go do it!

ED Gordon

Last edited by LadyRobyn; 06-29-2009 at 12:10 PM.. Reason: commenting on moderator action...
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-04-2008, 06:06 PM
 
2,222 posts, read 10,624,240 times
Reputation: 3328
Quote:
Originally Posted by sgresident View Post
This is all very interesting. There is a rolfer in the st. charles area and I have been considering this form of therapy. I always seem to have the most tensed up neck and low back ever. I cannot get things to "let go" no matter how much I try to relax and stretch etc. my chiropractor has massage therapists that help for a bit, but the sessions are only 25 minutes. and whatever i have done to myself, i need some serious help to undo them!
You need an hour massage, nothing less. And try all the massage therapists until you find the one you like best. Their techniques are all very different and so are the results.

If your chiro can't do the hour, then find someone else. I have never heard of 25 minute sessions.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-05-2008, 06:51 AM
 
Location: Central Maryland
102 posts, read 383,916 times
Reputation: 54
Default Massage and Bodywork

Quote:
Originally Posted by Beth56 View Post
You need an hour massage, nothing less. And try all the massage therapists until you find the one you like best. Their techniques are all very different and so are the results.

If your chiro can't do the hour, then find someone else. I have never heard of 25 minute sessions.
I had a great chiropractor in Austin TX who turned patients over to a massage therapist for 15 mins before adjustment to get patients loosened up and deal with soft tissue issues. 25 mins would have been great!

Beth is correct, you don't normally get a full nervous system "let-down" in 25 minutes. An hour is much more effective.

If you think about it, it's the nervous system that is really causing the tension. The software (nervous system) controls the hardware (muskuloskeletal & visceral systems). This is why so many people swear by meditation. Others of us prefer someone else to do that for us 8-) .

The rhythms and movements of what most people in the West accept as massage (Swedish, after Per Henrik Ling) are designed to sedate the nervous system(depending on sports or relaxation modality).

Interestingly, Eastern systems tend to move in a more activating pattern.

You can go to: Learn More About Massage to do some research.

I've got a massage scheduled this Thursday. Hoping the practicioner doesn't skimp on the time!
:-)

Edge
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-05-2008, 08:07 AM
 
Location: Wherabouts Unknown!
7,841 posts, read 18,941,331 times
Reputation: 9584
I can easily handle an hour or more of rolfing and similar bodywork sessions, but I'm usually bored to tears after 30 minutes of oiled-up massage. The best non serious bodywork massages I can recall are the 15 minute chair massages, when the massuese gets creative and uses some knuckle and elbow....no oil up needed.

IMO, the hour long session is a marketing gimmick and a convience for scheduling purposes. A session is complete when it is complete! On the one hand, completion sometimes occurs in less than 5 minutes, while on the other hand a session seems barely underway after 60 minutes. Completion has nothing to do with clocktime.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-17-2008, 07:26 PM
 
Location: Central Maryland
102 posts, read 383,916 times
Reputation: 54
This goes back to the counter-question I have to posit whenever a new client asks how long a session is.
I ask them "How long is a piece of string?"

Long as it needs to be.

Meanwhile, most of us in public do need to keep a schedule to keep our clients and ourselves in some semblance of organization, and work around roughly one hour schedules.
I did 30-minute sessions on the Army post, just for intervention work, and only occasionally found the time sufficient.

What can I say, I ask a lot of questions.
8-)
Edge
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-18-2008, 04:44 AM
 
Location: most beautiful place ever
1,869 posts, read 4,014,174 times
Reputation: 1493
Can someone explain how rolfing is done. Is the therapist using their hands or something else? Is it similiar to a massage, in that they work your upper body, back, legs, etc?
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-18-2008, 06:02 AM
 
Location: NJ
23,804 posts, read 33,292,662 times
Reputation: 30646
Quote:
Originally Posted by stoymonkey View Post
Can someone explain how rolfing is done. Is the therapist using their hands or something else? Is it similiar to a massage, in that they work your upper body, back, legs, etc?

Google is your friend
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-18-2008, 08:55 AM
 
Location: Wherabouts Unknown!
7,841 posts, read 18,941,331 times
Reputation: 9584
stoymonkey wrote:
Can someone explain how rolfing is done. Is the therapist using their hands or something else? Is it similiar to a massage, in that they work your upper body, back, legs, etc?
I will comment as a recipient of a Rolfing session. Perhaps edge_gordon will comment as a practitioner.

One thing I especially like about rolfing is NOT having my body all greased up with lotions and oils.

The rolfers who worked on me did not use typical massage strokes, but rather a more focused pressure and movements using fingertips, thumbs, knuckles, and even the elbow at times. Rolfing works a at deeper level than massage, at least that has been my experience. The rolfers who worked on me were extremely sensitive. I let it be known at the beginning that I prefer deep work just below the threshhold where I begin to tense up. As the rolfers perceived the slighest tensing on my part, they would ease up on the pressure ever so slightly and allow me to relax into the pressure. In just a few moments, I'd be completely relaxed with the pressure that casued me to tense up just a moment earlier. Upon my relaxation, the rolfer would sometimes apply a deeper pressure and guide me into a letting go experience at an even deeper level. At the completion of every seesion I'd feel like I was in a pleasantly altered state of consciousness. The world always looks a bit different to me after a rolfing session...in a good way! I always feeler taller and straighter, and I walk away with more spring in my step, and a greater ease of movement. A rolfing session always leaves me feeling more tuned into my body. IMO, rolfing is great work which I highly recommend to anyone who wants to feel more at home in their body.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 11-18-2008, 01:55 PM
 
Location: most beautiful place ever
1,869 posts, read 4,014,174 times
Reputation: 1493
Cosmicwizard, thanks for your personal response, exactly what i wanted.
Roselvr-oh google, never heard of it.... i obviously was asking the question to hear personal responses (isnt that what a forum is about??), if i wanted a generic answer i would've looked it up.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:


Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Health and Wellness > Alternative Medicine
Similar Threads

All times are GMT -6.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top