A clinical reality check for massage therapists Do you have bloating? Puffiness? Low energy, poor sleep, stubborn weight that won't budge? What if a massage therapist could manually move fluid through your tissues and solve all of it? If you've been on the internet recently — or inside any massage therapy community — you've seen some version of this pitch. Manual Lymphatic Drainage has become one of the most aggressively marketed modalities in our profession, flooding therapi

In massage school, I was taught that one of the main benefits of massage was helping the body flush toxins: pushing fluid toward the heart, reducing burden, and helping the body heal faster. The body knew what it was doing, we just had to assist it. I also was taught that massage squeezes stored lactic acid out of muscles and into the bloodstream. That’s why you feel so good afterward, but might feel sore if you don’t drink enough water to flush those toxins out. It was a sim

When I was first hired as a massage educator, the school I worked for required us to take the MBLEx. See when I went to massage school, you didn’t need a license to work. You barely needed to prove you had education. I saw many job listings that said “will train”. However, between then and the time I became an educator myself, the career field had changed. Our law required massage therapists to prove they had at least 500 hrs of education from a licensed school, various other

It stimulates proprioceptors and can inhibit over activation in chronically tight muscles. I love the metaphor that massage is teaching your muscles how to be, how to get out of unhelpful cycles. By adding stretching, we can help that muscle find a better state. Add stretching before massage and see how much better the muscles respond. It feels good. Clients who are chronically “tight” get a huge dopamine release when that feeling gets relieved. It’s like finally scratching

You’ve seen that tik tok. You’ve read that Facebook post. You attended that seminar. You realized that a lot of what you learned in massage school was not correct, and now you aren’t feeling confident in your practice. I’ve been there. It can feel like the rug has been pulled out from under you and you aren’t sure what to say to clients anymore, you aren’t sure what techniques are okay to use, and you don’t know who to trust. First things first: take a deep breath. No serious

Determine the requirements in your state and/or city. Currently 45 states have state-wide licensure and each state has different requirements. In my state, Oklahoma, we require massage therapists to be licensed with the Oklahoma Board of Cosmetology & Barbering. You must have a transcript of at least 500 hrs from a school that is approved through the Oklahoma Board of Private and Vocational Schools. You must also pass the national licensure test for massage therapists, the MB