Reflexology Demo FSMTA 2019

well the folks feel like they're in the right places you'll hear little things like that like so I just hit my ten-year anniversary in bodywork like ten years in practice yeah okay opportunity a lot of blood sweat and tears in those ten years so you'll hear me say little things that are just like catchphrases that I've just purified over the years so if you think something's funny like definitely ask me okay so let's start with some let's start with some practical if you cannot see and want to see please come yeah gather around the campfire children feel free to stand up join us feel free to stand up sorry my hands are a little bit chilly okay so when it comes to reflexology on the feet I always start with the solar plexus and the adrenal reflexes those are kind of like my pulse points for the body and then I'll also put three fingers on the dorsal pedal pulse so any of you who have an Ayurvedic background or any TCM background you can actually take pulse through the feet interesting you know you wanted to fuse some modalities together it's a great way to start the session just getting the client acclimated to your touch but also the idea that you can get a lot of information from these first two points if when you're on the the adrenal reflexes specifically yeah what do the adrenals do they produce cortisol yeah they're the they're the 3 s's sex hormone salts and sugars so when we look at the adrenal reflexes help like palpation wise if you feel those reflexes and all you feel are like too hard nuts maybe the person is a little bit stressed out yeah maybe you need to do a little bit of extra TLC on them instead of just ramming headfirst right into the tissues ok so once we have our initial kind of feel for it always make your client comfortable and wrap their foot in fleece - like how I did that this is a little little extra there and then I'll start with just some really nice relaxation techniques what we want to do from a relaxation technique standpoint is we want to feel how the bones are not violating scope of practice of course but from a from a technique standpoint we want to see what is the muscle tension that's present is the talus moving correctly are the ligaments hyper mobile yeah and then we want to create a little bit of circulation we want to do a little bit of fluff we want to make sure that the client feels comfortable without invading their space but can you also see how as I apply this technique like her whole body is jostling yeah this isn't just a foot technique people this isn't just something that you would do to the feet because it's a nice spa modality the nerve endings on the feet truly connect to everything in the body so when we access those things it allows us to work with digestion work with sleep work with not just the muscles on the feet but the muscles systemically throughout the entire system yeah then we're gonna use the alternating thumb pressure to start walking the reflexes alternating thumb pressure or finger pressure known as thumb walking is the foundational cornerstone of all reflexology everywhere yeah it's an alternating pressure so it's kind of like a caterpillar inching along yeah a lot of clients will ask me from a reflexology standpoint if reflexology tickles because it's on the feet yeah but because we're using a thumb walking technique and not a glide or something superficial we're not lighting up those nerve endings in a way that feels unattentive instead with every press we're allowing the body to take feedback and say with that down press how you doing release move to the next place how you doing release oh there you go there you go she's doing great ladies and gentlemen then we go to the toes and the toes represent the head reflexes yeah so when we look at the when we look at the extremities not just the feet but hands face and ears as well we have the toes which represent the head and neck space we have the fingers which represent the head and neck space we have the forehead which represents the head and neck space and then we have the crest of the helix of the ear which represents the head and neck space all reflexes that are available to you during a session yeah so don't think that you only need to work with the feet in order to do reflexology reflexology is just as easy to integrate into a full body massage as any other modality any questions so far thoughts yes that's a great question this is where we get into some some nuanced theory so bear with me as we go down the rabbit hole just a little bit but I think that you're advanced enough to where we can take it yeah so reflexology is not a press button fix issue modality yeah Lyn smile and she knows she's heard that so many times for me but it's not as simple as pressing the reflex for the head and getting rid of a headache yeah we don't know where that headache is coming from it could be a headache that's related to hormones it could be a headache that's related to digestion it could be a headache that's related to hip impingement or the neck yeah not just the actual head but in the neck so when it comes to working the reflexes not only do you not not only do you not need it's a double negative to work the toes and the fingers and the top of the ear and the forehead to activate it but reflexology theory states that when we work the nerve endings the body then has control over that impulse so when I'm working the head and neck reflexes a client may feel it in their lower back because the body has taken that impulse created what's known as a feedback loop and then decompressed the lower back because that's where the greatest point of tension is but if you think that getting rid of the headache is just about mashing the head reflexes as hard and as often as you can that's treating the body like a meat suit and not an intelligent organism yeah so whatever is accessible to you if you have access to the fingers work the fingers but don't just limit yourself to that that again press button fix issue mentality of somebody has an issue here so I'm gonna press that reflex and therefore I've done reflexology with all of my clients I always treat the entire extremity it's not just one reflex that I work with it's all of them because you never know where somebody's holding their pain you never know yeah I had a client today who came in to see me and as I was working there was a left side hip issue that I was addressing and all that person felt was their heart space opening from an emotional perspective yeah I was releasing the hip reflex but the body took it into a very subtle space and so if I were to say no that's wrong I was in your hip reflex not your heart reflex that's invalidating their experience yeah and we don't want to do that either does that answer your question hood kind of a roundabout way to do that yeah oh there she is she went to the other side of the room okay so here's a fun little here's a fun little tip for you so if you have a little bit a little bit of reflexology knowledge just enough to be dangerous yeah and you're wondering how to work with reflexes that you feel texturally are different yeah you're working through the feet or the hands or the face or the ears and you feel that spot and you're just like what is that nonsense yeah so I've just found a spot on her liver reflex yeah and so what I've done is I've stopped I've stopped my alternating pressure I'm holding that point and I'm allowing the body to tell me what it needs yeah I'm creating that sustained feedback loop through static pressure so I'm applying pressure about a 3 out of 10 nothing aggressive because I don't know what's in this in this hypertonicity yeah I don't want to go overboard but I also don't want to be feather-light I want the body to talk to me seriously but not enough to where it feels like I'm dominating the conversation and then as it tells me whether or not I can go deeper or not it just released me from that pressure so I can now move on and that's how you would treat a point is when you when you're walking and when you're feeling you're looking for those areas that just feel different then you're holding those spaces letting the body adjust and then moving on with the session that's called point work yeah other thoughts from the audience questions comments concerns you get you get into your own rhythm yeah it's it's also really interesting because it depends on the client as well certain clients I'll find myself like zooming through without really thinking about it and then other clients it's like I'm walking through mud it's super slow but that's that's very based on the client but it's not like I'm counting in my head the only counting that I'll do is when I when I encounter one of those points yeah I'm giving it about 30 seconds here's another one I'm giving it about 30 seconds give or take if it doesn't give me some sort of feedback or response then I'm moving on yeah because I may I might have felt something there but the body says no no need exactly yeah it's very similar anybody who's taken like a trigger point work you listen to that spot you don't try to Barrel in you don't try to you know approach it timidly like you approach it like an intelligent body worker you ask it what's going on and if it has something to say you listen but oh we got some lower digestive gurgling and I was just over the lower digestive reflexes fun stuff so sometimes it does work that way but when it comes to look Oh hold on so that's that's gonna be another conversation okay did I answer your question perfect to ask well on anybody so if a foot feels completely locked down that's why we start and stop with the relaxation techniques to get things moving yeah so there is a little bit of a massage element to it just from first circulatory purposes but instead like a lot of people think reflexology is similar to acupressure and it is but it isn't yeah so from especially with my school of reflexology I'm teaching my my students to work via the zones yeah so we're working in line with each toe multiple times kind of clear in that space so it's not just finding the stomach reflex digging into that reflex and holding that one spot it's an entire zone yeah in that zone what we would call horizontal zone three it has vertical zones in it so it's like a grid system that we're kind of pushing things and clearing things out very similar to how you would clear a lymphatic pathway yeah but instead of just thinking about it as oh this person's tighten the next so let's unwind the neck okay we're done with the neck and now let's move to the shoulder the shoulder is in just the reflex that you press you have to get all the connective tissue as well what if somebody has upper digestive issues which are contributing to the hunched over you know that that chaotic tendency we want to be sure that we're not isolating the reflexes and that we are doing more of a holistic routine that we are getting some ankle range of motion in there that we are getting things to loosen up that we are getting into the cuboid notch that we are getting into not just the not just the toes themselves but the metatarsal spaces yeah we're getting all of this to open up not just the individual reflux you have a comment from one of our live viewers oh hi love you um so you speak to the client for a response or just feel the foot just feel the foot um and this is my personal standpoint there are other practitioners who practice differently but when when I'm on the table I don't want the practitioner asking me how I'm doing every five seconds you know if you feel something as a practitioner and I'm snoring my brains out yeah it's it's not appropriate at that point to wake the person out of their state and say you feel that you know that's that's not okay yeah so my approach to reflexology is I tell the client look if you have questions you can always ask it's not going to disrupt the magic but at the same time your only job is to relax and breathe yeah you don't need to tell me anything because if I hit that spot your body's gonna react it's gonna jump yeah and I know what that means I don't need you to tell me ouch that hurt and then ask me a billion questions about what is that reflex am i dying you know I yeah is it cancer but so from my personal perspective what I like well now you can't see their their foot so I'm sorry this is what's gonna stay it's gonna stay naked naked don't look so from a from a technique standpoint I let the client be during the session but that's also because I have a background in foot reading or foot assessment so when a client comes in what they put on their health history form we all know that clients lie yeah we all know that what they come in for may not be the real source of the issue so from a technique standpoint I'm not really concerned about what they want sounds a little cold but I'm more concerned about what the body is trying to say I'm more concerned with whether or not somebody like like I had a client come in the other hey and I said so how's that how's that constipation doing yeah because I had mentioned it afterwards after our session and they said you know Sam I have to apologize because I might have been really rude the last time because I called them on their constipation yeah because the digestive reflexes were very dry very receded very cracked and I'm like that if that was the colon like ain't nothing passing through there easy I'm sorry you know so I advise them on kind of what's going on constipation wise and what can we do dietarily in order to move that around you know are you seeing a nutritionist about that and they kind of shut down and so at that at that meeting today the client said look I'm I'm sorry if I was a little bit short but I have had chronic constipation for the past 12 years it was just the first time that I have talked about it openly I'm like I know but thank you you know so it's it's one of those things where when a client comes in and they're they're asking you to kind of keep them in the loop or they want to know what things are that's that's great and I love and engaged client but I really want them to enjoy the experience and not think they have to be all up in their head about it yeah yes of course shoots the energy towards healing instead of I'm sorry so that were to okay right yeah totally so working with a network of holistic care providers should be our first priority as massage therapists period not just from a reflexology standpoint so now we're in the next spaces and she's got a really nice point here so we're gonna hold that I'd mentioned dieticians I work very closely with a couple chiropractors in the area I have neuro somatic therapists that I refer out to I have some raw furs that I refer out to I have some mental health counselors that I refer out to like especially if we see some pretty intense stuff with the nails indicating some mental blockage yeah some mental emotional aspects that are maybe causing some of the deeper patterns of pain to manifest yeah I'll ask them in a very polite way you know who's on your healthcare team yeah or have you considered going for an additional test I had a client which was a dramatic case but this is a good way to illustrate it is she she kind of fell off the face of the earth for a couple months and then came back and she said Sam do you remember when you told me XYZ yeah and I'm like no hon I have no idea what I said and she said well I didn't understand what you said at the time and I had no symptoms at the time but you told me just enough to where when I did get pain in that area I got it checked and there was a benign growth yeah so that's the kind of work that we do as reflexologist says were we're like a feedback mechanism we're telling the part where advocate for the client like look this is what I'm seeing in the reflexes does this match with what you're feeling and can I as a limited scope healthcare professional encourage you to take better care of yourself whatever that means yeah if that means going for massages more regularly if that means you know speaking with a life coach or a work coach - maybe transition out of a stressful job which is maybe causing or contributing to a little bit of the acid reflux situation or you know whatever it may be but I think that from a reflexology standpoint the manual therapy is just the first part of the discussion yeah and the second part is having having the conversation with the client to assess wellness goals and to say you know if you're meeting those goals great but if you're not how can I best guide you or serve you in the direction that's most needed oh no not at all um reflexology is great from a physical standpoint because this is what I get to do all day if anything I feel like a little sluggish because it's sitting and it's not moving sometimes like when I do hands went on when I will do hands in a second I do hand standing because I just I can't bear to sit down anymore but in terms of like feeling drained or feeling lethargic regardless of what your energetic background is you know I think that reflexology is a little bit easier of a modality to navigate from a physical but also from an energetic standpoint because it's a very low pressure modality you're not trying to inflict healing on the body yeah which is both easy on the hands and easy on your joints as therapists but also were we are enjoying the benefit of the relaxation just as much as the client is we're connecting with the client who is on the table experiencing the work yeah that's what happens when you have a powerful nervous system modality like like reflexology or like a craniosacral yeah the the relaxation benefits are are both client and therapist so I think that that's it's a lot easier than when I was doing massage yeah yeah so reflexology is not regulated by the state of Florida which is great for everybody in this room not so good for the profession so when it comes to getting a reflexology certification schools have different requirements yeah the national standard right now with the reflexology Association of America as a 300 hour certificate with at least 60% hands-on in classroom hours yeah but then like I've had students in my program that they apply for a massage job and they're told to just check a box if they do reflexology and they learned about it in school even though it was just a DVD that the teacher threw on to you know give them an intro and they do it you know because a foot massage is easy right and that's that's kind of the mentality in Florida so reflexology isn't regulated like massage is regulated so in order to achieve certification it depends on where you want to go yeah with me so it's a 300 hour certification based on the national standard so I teach my students one weekend a month for 12 months it's a year-long program and that's one weekend normally the third weekend of every month and then you submit 50 hours of our long foot reflexology documentation and you get your certificate nine to five both days yeah but all that's available online as well you have two questions you're presenting to and the other is do you get reflexology treatments cool so I am presenting to the best FSM th after the floor [Applause] so the FSM ta stands for the Florida State Massage Therapy Association so I'm located in Tampa Florida for all of my international viewers and this is the Massage Therapy Association for Florida our local chapter here in Tampa where I live and in terms of getting reflexology I am lucky to have a very very helpful list of students who are willing to work at me work on me at any given time which is always a plus yeah for me personally though I think and for clients as well know one modality is a is a catch-all yeah so for me personally like before I came here I spent 45 minutes at the gym yeah before I came here I also had a I follow a specific dietary regimen because this body does not build itself but then also from a from a stress reduction standpoint I do yoga I get regular massage I get reflexology I do meditation I do various forms of energy work and spiritual practice that helped keep me kind of aligned so I think the bigger the bigger answer to that smaller question is yes but that's not all that I do and I think that that's important for practitioners as well as clients to understand is that if you want me to fix you on the table you're barking up the wrong tree reflexology cannot press the magic button and take away all of the years of neglect yeah but it can start to set you on the right direction with a little bit of relaxation a little bit of helpful coaching post session and you know referrals out to other practitioners that might be helpful depending on where somebody is yes that's a great question and it really came a couple years into practicing with any modality like um actually I'm very blessed here tonight because we have Dwight Byers in the room who is the lineage bearer to the Ingham method and he was actually my instructor which no pressure right and so after their intensive training and mastering those routines and just cramming it over and over I mean I was seeing five clients a day six days a week just staring at the charts on the wall like just trying to bang it into my head like where things were located and what comes next and what the areas of emphasis are and how to do this thing called reflexology and it wasn't until a couple years in where I was like okay I think I got it I think I can feel what's underneath the reflexes and not just worry about doing the work you know but that that takes different time for everybody I think for people who have good palpation skills it might take less time for people who have a little bit harder time with touch might take a little bit longer but this is a craft like this is something that you never really master it's it's not something that you just wake up one morning and you're like oh hit my 10,000 our quota I'm I'm good you know it's something that I'm constantly learning new things I'm constantly feeling new things as well so I think that I got the I got to the point where it's like I'm good like I can own the title of reflexologist like because I feel good about it about a couple years after my training yeah are you feeling my dear right good thank you I can do both things okay listen multitasking Queen here we can record it because if I can get a view of my hand then it'll be a really cool you want to do chair and stepping whatever you're comfortable with I can put it one easier maybe okay so you wanna use that yeah okay so no changes in angles people's yeah sorry where we're going all over the place yep okay so so let's talk about hand reflexology yeah so hand reflexology just like foot reflexology is an easy way for us to access the nerve endings which is what reflexology does yeah so were stimulating the ends of the nerves the peripheral nerve endings and that's what makes the magic were creating those feedback loops but the feet aren't the only extremity that were limited to it's not something where if you're not working on the feet you're not doing reflexology instead we really want to make sure that the client feels comfortable so I have clients all the time who come in to see me like Sam I've heard so much about you I love your work I've seen your videos like 10,000 people have referred me to you but I have a confession that I hate getting my feet touched don't worry about it like we can choose another extremity everything's fine you're okay you can still receive this work yeah a lot of times the the question that I get asked because my clients see the the posters and the charts on the walls is very similar to one of the first questions we got asked do you need to work all extremities in order to get a benefit yeah or is one more powerful than the others and I say no but personal preference is definitely taken into account if somebody just loves their faced getting touched that's what I like to call a nervous system proclivity the body is open in that area yeah it's willing to receive versus if somebody squirms every time you touch their hands or their feet that's not gonna make for a very pleasant session yeah so we want to give them what they feel the best width not necessarily what we as practitioners feel comfortable with does that make sense also my office is over on Gandy and West Shore so I'm by MacDill Air Force Base what happens if somebody comes in without an extremity yeah being prepared for situations like that as in and they had signed up for facial reflexology but they're completely in the middle of like a really bad sinus attack yeah maybe you want to work on the feet instead to pull that tension away from the head yeah so that's the kind of creative thought process that we can do with reflexology and not just being limited to the feet but same thing when a client comes in with carpal tunnel it's so beneficial to work the hands on somebody who has carpal tunnel learn to work the hands effectively and every massage therapist will be your client yes [Music] I always to treat it sensitively and having very candid conversations not like no dude but asking them so how do you want to do this I've had certain students of mine I have not had the privilege of working on a phantom limb but students of mine have where they actually do the entire routine on the phantom limb which they say works like a term I I still think that's kind of weird but cool you know in a fun way but yet is you're on your hands totally totally but at the same time but when a client comes in it's always based on their preference and it's the same thing like if a client has a an open wound on an extremity yeah you want to either avoid that extremity entirely or walk around that that area making like pain is never the goal with reflexology it's a nervous system modality so we're allowing the body to receive the work but if the body goes like this yeah it's shutting out the benefit of those nerve impulses and we want the body to not feel like it's threatened actually she had her hand up first yeah sometimes I never I never try to egg a client Ahlan into trying something that they're uncomfortable with but sometimes yeah sometimes it's just about getting comfortable with your touch totally yes yeah yeah and that's where we get into reflexology is a really interesting modality because it treads that line so beautifully between the physical work of massage and the energetic work of different energy modalities so when a client comes in and they they want to talk energy work reflexology fits into that category they feel the sensations they see the colors yeah they get that energy work vibe you know they feel like they've been cleansed that they've been rejuvenated that their energy channels have opened but then you get somebody who goes for regular massage and you get them on the table and they say man it feels like I just got a full-body massage so it's not it's it's a modality that allows us to access those energetic channels without needing to say either you know we're doing something foreign like a TCM or some people get weirded out by that aspect or be too soft like an energy work where people are like there's no way that could work yeah we're still touching yeah so it feels like a massage I got you so it feels like a massage to them but we're actually hitting so many layers of the body because we're accessing the nervous system which connects all systems yes so case studies aren't really the issue um the issue is governance yeah I think that if Florida can get a a unified mission of what reflexology is how it works and get like the Florida Association of reflexologists which was previously fair the Florida Association of Independent reflexologists was just reformed by Karen ball and so we're on the way to start to kind of step up to the plate legislatively again but at the same time it has nothing to do with whether or not reflexology works at this point we need to come together as a community and really kind of put our flag down and that's that's where the issue is but from a from a technique standpoint there are so many studies available right now where reflexology is used so low but also in conjunction with things like acupressure acupuncture copying meditation music therapy things like that yeah so the research is the research is not the issue at this point however if you want to follow people who do have extensive research again Barbara Scott who I mentioned at the beginning who does reproductive reflexology she wrote a book on fertility for reflexology and has an extensive case studies on how reflexology affects fertility as well as the first study published for reflexology was in the Journal of gynecology and obstetrics for reflexology and PMS yeah so a lot of a lot of hormonal based reflexology research but then Sally Kay with her reflux lymph drainage stuff she's I mean she's being accepted she received an award actually for the don't quote me on this the America lymphoma and lymphedema Society something like that sorry Sally sorry Sally I'm a big fan of hers and she's a big fan of mine and we talk about this stuff all the time but she got recognized by an American Institute for the research that she's doing so I think it's the research is there but if we all just come together in the state of Florida to talk about it more intelligently that's kind of where we need to be going okay switch can I everybody try not to move too fast make everybody dizzy exactly okay yeah they're thoughts questions things we want to chat about yeah totally so Henry flex ology is very similar to foot reflexology start with a little bit of warm-up then we move into the walking component the walking component is what makes reflexology reflexology that's what differentiates it from the massage aspect of just giving somebody a hand or a foot massage we won't just stimulate the nerve endings we don't just want to give them a fluffing buff yeah so we're making sure that the bones are moving properly we're palpating the different tissues just before we go into the different areas and then with hand reflexology also all of my routines are available on youtube if you'd like to watch me do the hand foot face and ears all of those are available through the foot was for youtube channel so you can see exactly what i'm doing i record live classes all the time like that but when we when we look at the hands were really opening three major surfaces we're opening the dorsal surface in between the metacarpals yeah which a lot of a lot of massage therapists neglect and I find that the dorsal surface is really where we get those postural muscles for the hands that really open up some of that deeper nerve channel stuff so we're opening up the dorsal aspect then we're moving to the fingers then we're opening up the Palmer aspect which is where everybody loves to receive work all throughout that beam are in those flexor tendons and then we go back to the dorsal surface again because the dorsal surface is just so important but it's the same thing we're doing alternating pressure and getting the nerves to open it's a pretty simple modality when you just break it down to its constituent parts the only thing that makes it seem foreign is that you have done it before so I encourage you if if this is something that you're interested in just go do it try it find some videos on YouTube and get started lord knows there's more there's more information right now on the internet than there was in the first six hour intro class that I took way back when like that instructor had no idea what she was doing I'm serious she threw a book down in front of us she read some definitions and then she told us to go play I mean that was that was it yeah but that was my introduction to reflexology and because of that I took that and I used it with my clients and I found out that it worked and then I pursued formal certification yeah so you don't need to have a thousand hours underneath your belt before you do it on people go do it on people yeah that's how you figure out if it's for you and if it works that's a great question only if you violate that natural pain boundary yeah so a client comes in yeah and you hit that point that's really sensitive and then you think oh if this if this hurts there might there must be something there there must be something that we need to work out just like massage theory yeah if the knot is there oh if we just press harder and faster you know that's where pain happens yeah but if your intention is not to harm the body even when we get into the aspect of pregnancy reflexology and pregnancy in terms of causing abortions or triggering miscarriages is a total myth in my experience I've had clients come in to see me literally writing on their health history form get this baby out of me and I have not been able to induce labor and I've tried I've tried it doesn't work that way because if the body doesn't want it to happen it will not happen but if you are not listening to the body and when the body says stop that's when you get into harm territory yeah but you're not gonna royally ask somebody up because you pressed a spot on the foot yeah yeah totally I mean just common body work stuff but it's it's a catch-22 if we use that same logic like what if I hurt somebody then that same barrier to entry is what's gonna stop you from realizing that reflexology can't hurt somebody so we we just want to give you we want to give you enough freedom to say do it try it it works but as long as you're conscious and you're not trying to invade the body's systems you're fine yeah one of my very first one of my very first clients and I tell the story a lot so forgive me if you've heard it before um one of my first clients who came in to see me she had cancelled multiple appointments because she had IBS and when she came in to see me she actually could not lay facedown on the table because of her abdominal pressure and so we flipped thrown her back and I said you know what why don't we just do some reflexology on the feet today and this is before I had certification this is before I had taken any courses whatsoever except that what that one-day intro yeah so I had no idea what I was doing those poor clients and after the session she called me and she said I don't know what you did but I want that every week from now on just that it was like okay okay not only did I not kill her which was a legitimate concern but she loved it and then when I put reflexology on my website I got like five referrals that week because people were looking for the modality they wanted to feel that sensation that frankly reflexology is the best at producing it it drops you down into this altered state of consciousness where the body is just floating in the suspended state of awareness and you're kind of here but you're not here and you feel sensations and you know things are moving but you're not really sure where or why and then you wake up and you just feel like you're a new person and I've not found a modality today that does that exact same thing so I think that when it comes to when it comes to me advocating whether or not you should try it or not try it I err on the side of doing rather than taking the backseat and the color of the skin everything has changed it's really worth just go for it yeah every now and then I tickle the top of his big toe and say this is your brain how does that feel it's fun yeah all the time yeah so plantar fasciitis Morton's neuroma anybody know what a syndactyly is it's where toes are fused together you can't really work on it but it's just something fun that you get to see you when you're in the world of feet it also means somebody is married to their work from a foot reading standpoint so when I when a client comes in most of the time because my clients started calling me the foot whisperer and the name became the brand I get a lot of clients coming to me for not necessarily reflexology but for foot pain and foot issues yeah so a lot of that was me not just taking my reflexology training but also incorporating a lot of my PT stuff a lot of my background in the muscles the bones the ligaments understanding how things are connected understanding why certain pain comes to the surface and then pairing that with the foot reading aspect the assessment aspect of you know if somebody comes in with a Morton's neuroma which is classically defined as a nerve impingement at the distal metatarsal heads yeah but there's no impingement there's no inflammation there's no sign of a neuroma then where could it be coming from yeah thinking critically is is also part of that discussion not necessarily just you know here's my foot fix my problem but understanding as a reflexologist you are a detective yeah you were trying to figure out what the reflexes are saying and what they're saying in relation to what the client is coming in with so there are so many times where a client comes in with one thing and I actually have to coach them on something else we all know how many times clients come in with back pain but it's actually coming from a hip a knee yeah it's the same thing with reflexology except instead of palpating the muscles we're palpating the reflexes and getting a feel for what the body is saying through the extremities as a window into the larger picture of the body right before you paused on that point on my hand I got you're still moving and I got this sensation of almost wanting to pull my hand out away from you yeah and it was just weird it was almost instinctive like I had to really think about controlling it I don't know where it came from it was very interesting and then you stopped it's like okay you know just sharing right and that's the weird freaky voodoo stuff that reflexology does yeah it's it's fun it's like you're reflexology is a modality that allows you to speak thank you that allows you to speak with the nervous system and because we're speaking with the nervous system we get the privilege of doing so many interesting things that a lot of other modalities don't get to do somebody do a time check for me 7:38 do we want to take a break or do we want to keep going break keep going okay keep going and we're going okay you are much taller than our last guest so facial reflexology um actually let me have you take off your shoes yeah like you comfy grow so reflexology is not just on the feet it's not just on the hands we can also do face and then we'll do ears necks um when a client is coming in actually a client is coming in for reflexology we need to be versatile with our extremities but then also making sure that they get nice and comfy and cozy wrapping the feet making them feel all nice and warm and comfortable and we've reflexology is not just about treating the reflexes it's also about it is it does tread that like structural like intentional working with foot issues and muscles and bones but then there's also that spa component to it which I find so lovely ok so yes go ahead yeah yeah the only thing that's different with the different extremities is whether or not somebody has has experience with that extremity sometimes my students get so so conflicted with the face in the years because they haven't really gone into the face and the ears so when a client comes in the tissue responds the same it's the same feeling of different texture but what is different is the the terrain that you're working on the reflexes are the same but how you feel them is directly related to whether or not you're you're actually you know the difference between a hypertonic area around the zygomatic bone in a hypertonic area kind of in the center of the poem it depends on what a client expects when a client comes in to see me and they have no expectations I always do an hour on the feet that's what I suggest that's my go-to if a client comes in with specific issues like carpal tunnel like TMJ like tinnitus like you know a neuroma clients look at you weird when they're like I have a foot problem and you're like I'm gonna work your face today it it it just it makes them feel uncomfortable that you're not touching the part that hurts yeah but when a client comes in and they're new to reflexology the feet are a very benign extremity for me to work on and a lot of massage therapists will even skip the feet I know it's a travesty okay so now we're we've warmed up the tissues with some relaxation techniques we're now doing the exact same walking of the zones yeah yeah just one side so we the the face is one but we divide it into left and right so we start with the right side first because if you don't they spontaneously combust try it that's all I gotta say no it's just because I was always I was always trained to start on the right and I just never shook to have it yeah just personal preference I mean feel free to start on the left even when a client has a left side dominant issue I'll start on the right but it's just like again when we're working with nerves the rules are different yeah it's not it's not about going to the direct place of the issue it's about treating the body as a whole not just like if somebody has a left side issue starting on the right side or at the left side and just hammering away on that left side and not touching the right like that's a shame so we want to we want to give the body and the equal opportunity on both sides but then we also want to make sure that we're not neglecting one because we think that it's better to do it this way or that way no I mean it's customizable everything and everything in my office is customizable so when a client comes in and we're we're working with them through the the reflexology process some clients want the air on some clients want the air off I have thousands of blankets at the Institute ready to be whipped out at a moment's notice for my clients who get cold like I do we use hot towels we have eye pillows you know I really go through all the stops to make sure that my clients feel comfortable if a client is pregnant or has an issue where they need to be elevated and make sure that they're elevated but I do use this set up like this is my traditional set up yes no and the reason for that is because how patient wise it gets very confusing yeah so if especially like right now we're in zone three yeah zone three on the right side is home to the liver gall bladder reflex as well as the upper half of that right kidney and the tail end of the pancreas if I were doing both zone threes at the same time stomach is on the Left spleen is on the left of majority if the pancreas on is on the left and the upper half of the left kidney is on the left like my nervous system would just get overloaded yeah and it it would be a rather short session so I kind of want to draw it out but I also want to make sure that I know what I'm feeling which is the same way why I wouldn't work both feet at the same time true yeah and I'm sure that if you wanted to go for it but I'm just saying that I find it better especially because my school revolves a heavy amount on palpation of the reflexes on assessing the state of the reflexes I want to make sure that a client doesn't leave the table without me feeling every square inch with 100% of my attention and if I'm working both sides at the same time that attention is split 50/50 so right now we're in her digestive reflexes on the face so we're just holding that because there's a spot here that is a good question and it brings up the topic of surgery yeah so when a client's body adjusts appropriately to a surgery there is no sign in the reflexes when a client's body is traumatized by a surgery it is 100% red-flagged in every way shape and form yeah but it all has to do with whether or not the body was able to heal from that experience yeah there are clients that I got you there are clients that come in who all I see is just reproductive distress and I ask them I'm like so what's happening in that space and they're like I just never recovered from my birth from my like the pregnancy that I had you know birth was very traumatic for me and so my my literal reproductive organs never recovered from that I've had multiple surgeries I've had reconstructions but for some reason it's just not right and you can see that in the reflexes but then I've had moms who have given birth you know five six times and I'm like I don't know what you're eating so we clear the zones now we're moving on to the opposite side yeah that's a good question I always I always leave that up to the client the one thing that I want to be as acutely aware of as possible is pain yeah I don't want them on my table either chock-full of pain meds or like gritting their teeth throughout the whole time yeah so the other factor would be if they're cleared for body work and I say body work generally yeah because I don't want them going behind their physicians back if they have an issue saying you know my reflexologist will take care of this I don't want that power yeah I don't want them to think that I know better than their physician so when it comes to a client post-surgery we have to have a conversation you have a question from or commonly what question can you please spend a couple of minutes describing how you document soap notes in a reflexology session that is my least favorite question because I despise notes absolutely despise them the way that I track clients notes is through our online appointment software yeah so I know when they come in I know their first and last name I know the type of service that they had when they had it but in terms of actually charting their progress like a soap note I don't take notes oh my god travesty and the reason for this is a couple fold yeah when I sit down with the clients I would rather treat them like a new client every single time I had so many clients come in to see me where I would bring up the issues that they talked about and I wrote down in that first consult and they'd be like what shoulder issue Mike wait hold on the shoulder issue that was so debilitating that you were in tears last time that shoulder issue like oh no that's that's fine you know like so so what I would rather have a fresh conversation every single time and not be biased and then the second part that is from a legal perspective I don't want my notes showing something that's I don't feel comfortable showing from a scope of practice perspective reflexology is not a biome a viable modality to take into a courtroom you know so if I thought that it would be beneficial for a judge to see somebody came in and I felt such and such in the Lobeck reflexes and the judge not looking at the sheet and being like yeah maybe then I would take noting a little bit seriously yeah but in the state of Florida were just massage therapists with a fancy piece of paper so from a certification standpoint girl can I tell you the amount of notes that I that I did I did a hundred to get certified I did an additional 90 in order to get nationally certified I've done so many continuing at hours on soap notes I'm about to do multiple other soap notes for Sally Kay with her lymph drainage and then Barbara Scott with her reproductive reflexology like I minimize those notes as much as possible but when you're learning they are an invaluable tool yeah because they teach you how to think like a reflexologist but from a day-to-day session perspective they quickly for me and I would rather focus on the fun stuff like doing talks like this see right now I'd still be doing freaking nose just saying it not fun at all else when I know I'm not not yet oh no Sally Sally has the market on that and she teaches it way better than I ever could oh my god the things that the things that she was not supposed to show me that she showed me like with the research that's coming down the pipeline yeah like oh my god well and it's not it's not bad stuff it's just like the things that we're able to see clinically that we can we can look at the lymph moving moment-to-moment without touching the lymph just like to think that we couldn't do that you know 20 years ago but then also just to think from a reflexology perspective that we can prove that you don't need to touch a system in order to affect that system it's just so powerful to just see that on camera yeah but from a from a teaching perspective I specialize in the assessment aspect I like looking at the extremities and seeing somebody's dysfunction right before my eyes I like bridging the gap between physical and mental emotional I like knowing that there is a window into the body through the extremities and that's what I get a kick out of teaching is the foot reading aspect I could teach reproductive I could teach lymphatic I could teach all those things but it wouldn't it wouldn't be uniquely me so I think that from a from an educational perspective my school focuses on feeling and understanding what the reflexes are saying instead of narrowing it down to one specific system where there are so many other teachers that could do that ten times better than I could yes yeah totally um and then they go back to their their terrible lifestyles and I say that with the utmost love and respect for people who are in chronic pain who have been told that they have an incurable disease who have been shuffled to the bottom of the pile medically I know what that feels like and I see the pain on their faces but at the same time reflexology cannot offset the hours upon hours of stress poor eating and lack of movement it just can't there's no way for me to do that and so when a client comes in with fibromyalgia I can like I've seen people in the middle of a flare-up us like especially with RA and things where you can see the red hot fiery like swelling around the joints yeah I've seen that dramatically decrease I've seen people report going from a 10 to a 1 in pain yeah but then they come in two weeks later and they're like back to square one and that gets very frustrating for me as a practitioner and so that's why I incorporate the foot reading aspect so much is not necessarily using reflexology exclusively to say let me help you but based on what the reflexes are saying let me tell you how your body wants you to help you and that I think is a more intelligent discussion that make sense it's just about to wrap up with face we'll do it years in a second I know I'm just so excited you've been waiting unfortunately we're probably gonna have to end the live video cuz we've killed you know it's it's it's we will sign off officially in for the live video and then this will go on to YouTube so thank you all for joining and I appreciate it and then the live video will go on to the foot whisperers YouTube channel so feel free to check that out if you want a replay of our discussion in the techniques