How Does a Massage Help Muscles?

Muscle Relaxation

Back Muscles
Have you ever felt those unending cramps in muscles you've never used? Or, did you injure yourself and found it hard to regain strength in certain body parts? Or, have you spent long days in the office of typing and signing forms, turning your shoulders into cement bricks? If you've ever felt any pain in your muscles, it may be time for a massage.

Muscles are responsible for supporting and causing movement in your body. The nervous system sends signals from your brain to your muscles, causing them to tense up or relax as your brain sees fit. There are often pairs of muscles, such as your biceps and triceps, that alternate contracting and relaxing. Muscles can be as large as your entire thigh or as small as the ones responsible for making you blink. Muscles, as you see, carry a lot of weight and responsibility.

Sometimes specific muscles may become overloaded with work for any number of reasons. If you spend a lot of time signing and stamping documents for hours on end, your arm and neck muscles could cramp up, or feel super-tense as if they were always in the "on" position. If they do this quickly, your muscles are having a spasm.

Applying massage techniques to tense areas stimulates blood flow and loosens up those muscles. Massaging involves various forms and techniques. Acupressure involves adding pressure to specific nerve centers for extended periods of time. Swedish massage uses long, heavy strokes from the bottom to the top of muscles. Deep tissue massage can involve someone's hands or even feet adding tremendous pressure to large muscle groups.

When a massage therapist is skilled in any of those techniques, he can target specific problem areas and give great relief to damaged muscles. Scar tissue relief is one reason that people seek massage therapitss. Scar tissue forms and binds on muscle fibers that were injured or had surgery performed on. It isn't always replaced with healthy muscle fibers. Every time the same muscles are injured, more scar tissue forms, continuously layering and restricting movement. Performing deep tissue massage techniques helps move that scar tissue out and free up movement. This benefits athletes because they often injure the same knee, ankle or other body part repeatedly.

If you're pregnant, you may notice aches and pains in places like your ankles and hips since you are supporting two (or more) living bodies. Massaging those supporting muscles can ease the burden of pregnancy as your baby grows bigger and bigger. Massaging can prevent edema during pregnancy as well. Even a basic massage on a pregnant woman can relieve the anxiety of bringing new life into the world.