Hand Reflexology

hello I'm David W from J college and today we're going to be doing hand reflexology um it's great for impromptu treatments it's absolutely wonderful for first aid and it's especially good if you've got a client that's got anxiety or if they've got emotional uh issues at all hand reflexology treatment can be done either face to face if you kind of imagine that we've got a table between us it can be done side by side so if you've got a friend and they say oh I've got terrible headache and you're thinking oh come and give me your hands and I'll give you a bit of a treatment and you can then work on on your hands like this it's also really good if you got a client if you imagine that they're lying in bed and you can't reach over to get to the feet and that's going to give you really bad back but you can do hand reflexology while they're lying in bed what we're going to be doing today though is we're going to be working on our client in a lafuma chair going to lean hel back just here and the first thing that we're going to do is to check her hands a look at her nails make sure she doesn't got fungal nail infection but actually what she's got today is some Gorgeous Nails on so there we go make sure they're nice and clean and Helma washed her hands before we started here so now we are good to go for a hand reflexology session so when we start a reflexology treatment I like to check that the hands are okay they clean uh they've got no abrasions no lesions and there's no fungal nail infections can make sure everything's okay that we can go ahead so we're going to start putting a little bit of lotion on and then we're going to hold our client hand and this is a position that I like to call Heart to Heart CU my hand heart reflex is now in touch with my clients and we're just going to gently stroke get the client used to the feel of [Music] touch this will then just relax the client and get them ready for for what we're going to do and we're going to start with some finger puse as you can see I'm pulling from right at the base of the hands so that the whole of the phenol prominence and the finger is getting a nice pull move over to the next [Music] finger lovely long luscious PS now we're going to take two fingers at a time so that we can get to the long finger the pressure is actually coming onto the long finger not onto the index finger at all really but this way you can still get the pull right from the base of the hand so we've swapped hands now onto the ring finger still keeping those long pulls all the way from the base of the hand and now onto the little finger just going to turn the hand over so you can see what I'm doing here so you can see the principle of getting that really long long pull so now we're going to do finger rotations go back to the [Music] thumb rotating both ways we're holding the finger from the first joint and this will give a feeling of security but also of being able to get that Mobility that you want in a nice finger [Music] pull finishing off with the little [Music] finger now we're going to do a wrist Flex now it's important that when you're doing a wrist Flex that you don't have your hand in contact with the client's hand you can see here that it's just my fingers interlocked with my client's fingers this allows for the maximum amount of movement in the wrist so we put a rotation on it [Music] now so right round under rep piece so we're going to do a Palmer press so squeeze in and then squeeze off so push in with the wrist squeeze off with the holding hand then we're going to do something called breaking chocolate I love teaching reflexology using cakes and sweets so we're going to push the thumbs in and squeeze round so we're making the palm of the hand just collapse with what we're doing working from top to down and now we're going to do the same thing but with a different technique so we're coming across with both the phenol prominence of the hands the fingers are squeezing up underneath and this really opens up the metacarpals nicely I'm going to show you what we're doing by tilting the hand showing the underneath view to this so it's the that same technique so you can see it from both [Music] angles and this just feels absolutely lovely it really relaxes the hand nicely what we're doing now is tapping the meridians warming these up as we have six meridians that run in each hand now then we're going to squeeze on the start of the meridian points and this is just squeezing either side of the nail bed tiny little rotation just to activate the meridians little rotation just there squeeze on again squeeze on again and squeeze on [Music] again now because the Meridian points go through the wrist we're going to tap right the way around the wrist as there is a convergence of the meridians in the rest and then we go back to Heart to Heart just to finish off with a strike so we're going to work the Metar PS and open up the inter Coastal muscles this is going to help with respiration and it's also brilliant for stress and what we're doing is working three times for each line that we work between these metacarpal bones As I push in with my two index fingers I'm also pulling apart a little bit so it's working down each side of the metac [Music] Carol Now we move into a technique called the snow plow if you imagine that you're pushing a load of snow in front of your [Music] fingers come back down again and as we get to the wrist we press into the wrist joint this is great for working area is that suffering with odema so now I'm going to work between the thumb and the index finger right up to the point where you can feel the two bones of the thumb and the index finger meet now this point that we get to it is also the large intestine meridian point 4 now this is is contraindicated for pregnancy but it is a fantastic reflex point for anybody suffering from pain so you just get in there and have a good old roll around so what we're doing now is the Palmer aspect of the hand so we're going to hold the hand flat we want a nice flat canvas to work on we're using the hand to create this flatness and we're going to Now work on the trapezius round circular motions as we push in we're going to push right into that trapezius muscle and because we're working in a line we're going to do three repetitions so good positive contact on the reflexes so we're now going to work the respiratory system so our lungs which are found in the heads of the metacarpal here if you can see the line that I'm just working down to the crease in the hand that shows us where the diaphragm line is so we're just working down as far as that and again because we're working on a line between these metacarpal heads we're going to repeat it three times just to make sure that we've got got everything worked efficiently and again I'm putting a slight rotation on you can see that sort of circular movement some working down there you can knuckle as [Music] well and when you're knuckling you want to use the corner of the knuckle that creates a smaller surface area which means you don't have to push so hard but you still get that good positive contact I'm now going to do the diaphragm and we're going to use the index finger for this pulling back up towards ourselves underneath these metacarpal heads you can see that uh as I walk along here with my finger I'm placing my thumb on the fingers of my holding hand and this allows me to create just one point of contact which is really important so that the client knows exactly where you're working and of course you can knal if you [Music] wish this should create a lovely satisfying deep reflexology treatment good combination of fingers thumbs and Knuckles going to do the shoulder reflex now and of course if you want to you can knuckle as well lovely sweep across that shoulder reflex very often crun shap shoulders are showing signs of tension and stress and strength this is a great way of working them out and with the hands it can be useful to bring the hands up into this position so that they are then copying the same shape that you would do with the feet so you can now find the organs such as the liver and you can locate them nice and easily pop your working finger or thumb on the reflex you want to work on turn the hand back down and you can now work away the client will never guess that you have perhaps got a little lost or whatever you could didn't know where the reflex was they'll just think it's part of the treatment but this makes working hands so much [Music] easier and can help if you get confused and lost so we're going to work the liver again a combination of thumb walking or knuckling doesn't matter which you've got a very fleshy hand or a very firm hand knuckling can always be a good idea going work the gallbladder just here and next we're going to work on the adrenal reflex which is located just underneath the index finger just here so adrenals can often be quite Sharp now to the kidneys moving slightly to the right just here and you follow this line down and that is the line that follows from the kidney to the bladder so of course it's now our Ur So we're going to work down here towards the bladder reflex and again cuz we're working your line we do it three times and I give plenty of attention to the bladder itself [Music] now we're going to work the heart reflex it's found just here this is known as theol prominence I'm going to support my working hand by placing my holding hand underneath my client's hand it's working across this when you think that the heart is a great big muscular organ this is the biggest muscular area of the hand it all starts to make sense when you think of the representations between the reflexes and the physical organs one thing to remember as well when working on heart reflexes whether it be the hands or the feet is that we need to remember that the heart reflex isn't just the physical pump that pumps blood around the body it's also the emotional center of our being so if you have clients who are stressed worried anxious about uh situations quite often we can find things on the heart reflex we've also got the waistline guideline now froms along this area just here so halfway across the heart to halfway to the metacarpal underneath the little finger so now we know the area to work small intestin which is anywhere underneath the waistline guideline and I always find working with the knuckles on the small intestine the easiest way to go we don't have to work in any particular direction with the small intestine because of course it goes up and down and left and right so just giving this thorough work over is absolutely [Music] fine you can see me here using the corner of that index knuckle so I can get in good treatment so now we're going to work the ascending colon and then we're going to work the transverse colon so we' got the ilal valve just here coming up halfway between these two points that shows us where the hepatic flexure is and then we move across halfway and that then shows us where the colon would transverse across now we want to work the ear SQL valve first we want to work at an upward motion last thing we want to do is to push any feces back from the ascending colon into the small intestine as allergies can be stimulated if feces is passed back into the small intestine we work along the transverse colon here these um allergies I was talking about this is caused by histamine it's a chemical reaction that is created in the gut a feces getting into contact with digestive enzymes of course we all know what you take for allergies which are anti-histamines so if we stop the histamines being created in the first place we can really help our clients with allergies we're going to work the spine now so the cervical spine runs from the first joint of the thumb to where it joins the hand just there then you got the thoracic which is the joint for here and there and then we've got these next two points for the lumber spine and then sacr and Cox six these last two areas here the technique that we're going to use for holding the client's hand is a handshake thumb rests really really nicely between the first and second metacarpal so it can be nice nicely isolated and you can apply good pressure to the cervical spine what we're going to do is just press down and then the holding hand rocks the client's hand underneath my working hand so let's push in and rotate the other hand push in with my working hand rotate with my holding hand my thumb actually is just being moved by the movement of the rotation [Music] so we do this all the way for the cervical and thoracic spine once we got to the end of the thoracic spine we're going to change we're going to put some rotations on with my index finger the index finger of my holding hand I'm just going to raise so that it clears the rest of the working area and because we're working a line we're going to do this three times so we start again pushing in and rotating pushing in with the with the working hand and rotating with the holding hand and what you want to do is make sure that you are actually working on the bones of the hand don't work on the soft fleshy area of the hand it's the bones that give the representation of the Bony spine so of course if you're not working on the bones you're not actually working on the spine itself of course do our last repetition beinging as is three times now if you're used to counting the vertebrae on the feet it's much more difficult to do that on the hands uh purely because certain areas are so small it's very very difficult to get the accuracy that you can on the feet so we would just work the spine rather than being specific on which vertebrae we working now to finish the spine we're going to hook on so this is hook work pushing in just as if pretend that your finger is a sewing needle and you're sewing through your client's hand and that will then give you the technique that you're looking for [Music] on to the lumber and the coxic and [Music] sacrum to finish the spine off we're going to spread the spinal impulse working across the spine and we're using the soft area of the finger just here this is not supposed to be hard or firm this is just supposed to be a nice way to work when you're working across the bottom you want to work across the spine not with the spine see you slightly Chang changing your angle as you work across that base of the [Music] spine so there we go that is our spine done the next reflexes we're going to work are the shoulders we're going to work from the underside using the corner of our knuckle we're going to sweep up sweep sweep again now I'm holding the hand at a very strange angle here this is for your benefit not for my client normally the hand would be the Palm down we're going to do knuckle circles down the arm and the leg reflexes as we're working a line we'll do this three [Music] times Circle nicely down the fifth metac carple and then what we're going to do is we're going to bring our other knuckle in so working left and right Knuckles together working over the hip and pelvis this is Into The Joint of the wrist now we find the hollow of the wrist the hollow of the wrist on the other side going to rotate in and we're now working on the ovary and the uterus we're going to place a link on this so just lighten up and hold hold the link for a little while and then move on to working the fallopian reflex turn the hand over and you're going to work right the way around until you return to the point that you started at now of course with reflexology when you're working with reproductive organs the uterus is the prostate if you're working on a gentleman the ovaries are the testes and the fallopian that we're working on here is the vast friends it's just the same as it would be on the feet these reflexes double up across the Sexes and again because this is a line we're repeating this three [Music] times and we're next going to go on to work the sinuses so we're going to do squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze all the way along the sinuses turning over so you can have a look at this in Greater detail my fingers are ring line and we're going squeeze squeeze squeeze all the way up now with this finger we're going to click over the P tree going to slide slide squeeze squeeze squeeze [Music] slide on to the index finger squeezing up do this three times cuz it's a line the main pressure on this is really coming from my middle finger as you can see we're crossing over the index finger to get to the middle finger here change hands going to do these two fingers get a better image of my fingers making contact now to the last one and now the little [Music] fingers and then we're going to turn the hand over so we're now squeezing as supplier motion between forefinger and thumb on the side and now on the armor and dorsal surface and then just flick off so again the same on the medial and lateral side three times doesn't matter which way you do you can do it like this as well whichever you find easier three times and then three times dorson Palama third time squeeze off so that you're flicking on the brain the idea of flicking on the brain is to just sort of stimulate it and get the cognitive elements working [Music] better squeezing it in and click [Music] off squeeze squeeze squeeze again lateral and [Music] [Music] medial Palmer SS flick [Music] off and by all means do change hands whenever it gets comfortable for you don't have to keep with one hand all the time [Music] and then ready to flick off there we go so finally we're going to roll over the brain remembering that the fingertips are also help reflexes for the brain [Music] roll over a little finger that's that so we're going to now finish with closing relaxation for this side some cream on always warm up the cream on your hands before you apply it to your client there's nothing worse on a cold day than Cold Cream being applied to your client's skin I'm just going to rub the cream in I can see that I was going up the client's arm as reflexologists do remember we are insured to work up to the Elbow when we're doing hand reflexology so nice gentle soothing sweeps a bit of eage and now we move into a bit of patri with thumbs make sure that you've got uh oil all over both sides of the arm and the hands so I'm going to ring the hand and if I turn the hand over like this you can see what I'm doing with my fingers so the palm of the hand gets a lovely lovely massage but also the dorsal surface of the hand as we can see now getting a good massage and I'm us using the fenile prominence of my thumbs to do that I'm putting my little finger between into my little into my client's little finger little finger between the thumb and now we're going to make some circles lovely little circles and we're going to do those all over the palm of the [Music] hand this hold that we're doing stretches the hand really really nice so the palm of the hand is nice and Tau and it allows my thumbs to be able to get right into the Flesh of the hand and give the most lovely lovely massage now if your clients going oh this is lovely do more if they're not enjoying it a lot of people ask me how long should I do something for well if the client's enjoying it do it for more if they're not enjoying it so much do it for Ls going to get back into some finger pulls and we'll add some rotations onto these as we come off another pull making sure you start right at the bottom as far deep into the hand as you can go to extend that [Music] pull rotating the ring [Music] finger change hands nav so we can get a long pull all the way up that little finger from the base of the hand now we're going to go into wrist rotations again remembering not to actually hold the hand just have your fingers interlocked so you can get full movement of that wrist I'm going to wrap my fingers around and we're just going to be able to have each finger wrapping around your fl's finger and then that will here we go can you see what I'm meaning about that so each finger is wrapped around and now we're just going to pull up so all of the fingers have an individual pull as a client it feel absolutely [Music] lovely so we're going to now finish off by going back to where we started with a heart to heart and with a strength other side is [Music] done so now we go to our client's left hand put some cream on up before we apply it to our client and spread it a little bit and then we start with a heart to heart just just as a hold FL Strokes to do the finger PS remembering to get nice and low on the hand so we got the whole of the phenol prominence caught right from the base of the wrist through to the tip of the thumb and you can see if I turn the hand over just how far down we're actually starting that thumb pull index finger [Music] pull little finger change hands you can see I'm bridging across the little finger to do the ring finger this allows me to get a deeper pull and then a nice long pull on the little finger so we're next going to do a wrist [Music] flexion remembering not to actually hold the hands just with the fingers into lock so you can get that full rotation of movement we're going to do press so push in squeeze off push in squeeze off squeeze off comes from my holding hand after we've pushed in with your fist and then breaking chocolate go from top down to [Music] bottom that we going to do same breaking chocolate but the different way using the theal prominence of the [Music] thumb and if you turn the hand over again we can see just how the hand is completely ringed out by my [Music] hands so we're going to tap to W up the meridians [Music] and now we're going to squeeze on the end of each Meridian little rotation as we squeeze just wants to be quite a positive squeeze nothing too dainty or delicate want to actually activate these Meridian [Music] points going to tap right around the wrist just as we did on the other hand and now we're ready so we're going to return turn to the left hand now and start with working the inter coal reflexes we're work meal three times per line [Music] we go into the snow plow just imagine that you're pushing snow in front of you just like a snowplow wood and then you'll get the technique exactly right and then we just automatically go into a wrist press from the snow [Music] PL and then into the living between thumb and finger finger and up to the pain Point put a circle onto that don't forget this is contraindicated if you have pregnancy apart from that it's great for getting rid of pain so we're going to turn the hand over flatten the hand so two two fingers and these two fingers get a nice flat canvas and we get to work on the trapezius and again because we're working in a line going to do this three times nice little rotation as we push [Music] in so now we're going to do the respiratory system so the lungs again remembering to use the lines on the hand as a guide so you can see I'm just working down to this line which represents the diaphragm [Music] line and now we work on to the diaphragm itself pulling back up towards myself you'll be able to feel the heads of the metacarpal as you pull back up you can see again that I'm using my thumb on my fingers of my working hand so that there's only one point of contact being felt so just going to turn the hand up again now so that we can locate the stomach the spleen we're going to now do the pancreas so now we know where these are we can turn the hand back round again and get to work on the spleen now with the spleen I like to work this with my [Music] knuckle I want to energize this make sure everything's in tiptop condition for your immune system the stomach and then the pancreas you can see that I'm just traveling around a little bit another the heart remembering that uh the muscular area of the phenol prominence represents that huge muscle of the heart just nicely she going to crisscross the area don't forget of course that the heart isn't just that physical pump it's also our emotional Center having the hand flat like we are does enable us to get into the reflexes much much easier if you found that giving hand reflexology before you don't get responses just try this you might find the difference we're now working on the adrenals and the kidney and then we're going to follow the crease of the hand down the urer to the bladder I always like to work in the flow of Direction so if there's a flow we want to follow [Music] that so we're now going to locate our waistline guideline so it's halfway between these two points and halfway between the first metacarpal so that's our waistline guideline anything below this is going to be the small intestine so now we're going to work [Music] this it doesn't matter which way you work the small intestine there is no particular flow with it as far as the hand reflexes are concerned or the feet for that matter because the small intestine goes up and down and left and right so finally we're now going to work the transverse colon so we starting under the thumb working your way across the transverse colon now down the descending and then round the sigo flexure so it's starting along it's like an upside down J so we go again because of course we're working with the flow of the colon last thing you want to do is going and push ing anything that's in there the wrong way one last [Music] time and again if you wish you can work this with your knuckle so we're now going to do the spine so remembering it's the grip for this with your holding hand is the handshake thumb fits really nicely between these and as a reminder we've got the cervical from that joint to this joint so just there we've got thoracic from these two joints we've then got the lumber from just that's halfway across the wrist and then the rest is the sacrum and the coxic so let push in and then rock with your holding hand the thumb of your working hand is just moved by that rocking underneath so I'm pushing and rocking and this allows you to create a c shape all around the Bony edges of the hand which means that we get right the way around the spinal reflex rather than just working on one flat surface so pushing in and rocking round and then of course when we get to the lumber area change that to working with the index [Music] finger One Last Time CU we're going to do this three times being as it's a line [Music] so we're now going to do some hook work on the spine remember that uh to get a really effective hooking technique with your finger you want to pretend that uh that finger is like a sewing needle and you're sewing through the skin onto the reflexes you can either use your long finger like I am just here or you can use your index finger use the one that's most comfortable more comfortable it is for you the better the effect for the client but do remember to hook in right on the tip of your [Music] finger and now we're going to spread the spinal impulse using the FX FY part of my index finger this is not supposed to be harsh or deep this is just a spread the spinal impulse so using an upward movement as we go across the lumber and the sacrum and the Coxx of course we want to go across the spine with this not along the spine [Music] [Music] turn the Palm down and now we're going to do the shoulder and you're going to use the corner of the index knuckle again so sweep up nice [Music] sweeps and then knuckle straight into the arm and leg reflexes all the way down to the little Hollow in the wrist at any point if you feel that uh the skin is getting a bit sticky don't forget to put a little bit more lotion on if you need it and we knuckle into the pelvic area both sides so you got internal and external pelvis being worked at the same [Music] time and then we put a rotation onto the ovary and uterus and then [Music] link now we work across the fallopian we're following the flow of Direction with this so we're going from the ovary to the uterus don't want to go pushing the egg back up the wrong way so to speak because we're doing a line we're going to do it three times [Music] so when now we're working the sinuses so we're going to start at the base of the thumb squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze and then a slide over the pitu tree squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze and then let's slide onto the index finger all of my fingers predominantly my long finger is putting the pressure onto the Palmer surface of the sinuses going to take two fingers at the same time so I'm going across the index finger of my client I'm not actually squeezing on it anymore I'm now squeezing on their long finger this just makes it a nice easy way of being able to activate those reflexes swap hands I don't forget with what I'm doing I'm not holding a client's hand like this normally in a treatment I'm just holding with the client's hand on the side so that you can see would undoing client's hand would normally be palmed down and there you wouldn't be able to see what you're doing normally in a treatment like this so now we're going to work the sinuses using the plier technique start with lateral and medial squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze and then Palmer and dorsal and finish off with a [Music] flick turn over for Palmer and dorsal squeezing squeezing squeezing [Music] when you flick off it can sound just like you just clicked your fingers can sound quite impressive it's a really good way of stimulating the brain [Music] reflex turn over for Palmer and planter [Music] a ring finger one thing to remember when working sinuses if you do have a client that does suffer from sinusitis working hand reflexes can actually be even better than working feet reflexes because of course the size reflexes are so large on the hands compared to that of the feet so this is one of those occasions when hand reflexology can be so so much better and more effective than foot reflexology this is also the case with uh people that have got thyroid problems as the thyroid Reflex on the thumb is much much larger than the thyroid Reflex on the [Music] feet okay so we're now going to do the brain [Music] [Music] remembering to do all the fingers as well as these are helper reflexes for the [Music] brain so we're going to prepare for closing relaxation warm the cream before we apply it to our clients skin and with eage movements we're spreading it up the [Music] arm we going to some Petra with our thumbs [Music] turn hand over and do the same again so [Music] eage and a a light pet want to work lightly on the underarm being as we have got Venus blood flow close to the surface of the skin under the arm here can be a little bit more tender than on the back of the arm so turn the hand over and we're going to ring the hand out using a combination of phenol prominence of the thumbs and my fingers underneath my client's [Music] hands turn the hand over and we're going to interlock the little fingers create a flat surface so that my thumbs can get nice and deep into the palm of the hand and we do little circles all over our client's Palm [Music] and now nice big circles just to finish off these little circle section turn the hand over and we're going to prepare to do finger pulls and into a rotation extending this pull right from the base of the hand all the way to the tips of the fingers [Music] whenever it's comfortable for you do feel free to change over hands there's no rule about this whatever is most comfortable for you the more comfortable it is for you as a therapist the better it'll be for the client [Music] a lovely long pull now we can do for the little [Music] finger so we're going to interlock our fingers [Music] a lovely big movement in that rest wrap the fingers around and then pull up little rotation wrap the fingers around and pull up in this way the whole of the hand including all of the fingers has been thoroughly relaxed bring the hand back down into a heart to heart and finish off with some Strokes [Music]