Swedish and Deep Tissue Massage

Peo­ple who want to get a mas­sage are often con­fused between the dif­fer­ent modal­i­ties of mas­sage. They will often ask for A Deep Tis­sue. But what they real­ly mean to ask their ther­a­pist is “I want more or heav­ier pres­sure”. How­ev­er, when you tell a mas­sage ther­a­pist you want A Deep Tis­sue. You may be in for a sur­prise once your ses­sion starts. Deep can hurt and may make you feel sore days after. That is why the CMT is quick to ask “Are you sure you want a Deep Tis­sue”? You may know the dif­fer­ences, but it has been my expe­ri­ence that most do not until they have expe­ri­enced both. But even after that, most tend to iden­ti­fy them as the same, when in fact, most mas­sage modal­i­ties are unique. This is the case with Swedish and Deep Tis­sue Massages.

The Swedish mas­sage involves five basic prin­ci­ples, which include: Giv­ing long and smooth strokes; gen­tle knead­ing of the mus­cles; apply­ing ther­a­peu­tic fric­tion; tap­ping, and pro­vid­ing con­stant vibra­tion. The com­bi­na­tion of these tech­niques ensures max­i­mum cir­cu­la­tion and relax­ation to all sur­face mus­cles. Giv­ing the Masseur the tools to cus­tomize a ses­sion accord­ing to the needs of the client. It is no won­der why Swedish is the most pop­u­lar among clien­tèle and prac­ti­tion­ers. Once the word got around of its unde­ni­able ther­a­peu­tic ben­e­fits. It estab­lished itself rather quickly.

The oth­er very pop­u­lar mas­sage type is Deep Tis­sue. It tar­gets three cen­tral mus­cu­lar regions, name­ly: The neck area, the back, and also the fas­cia (con­nec­tive tis­sues). The mas­sage is called by this name because it is real­ly intend­ed to pen­e­trate deep­er into the under­ly­ing mus­cle lay­ers. The mas­sage is meant to care­ful­ly ease out all those strained mus­cles below the sur­face groups.

As well, many of the prin­ci­ples used for Deep Tis­sue Mas­sage are also present in Swedish, but Deep Tis­sue is rather more force­ful in nature. More­over, this form of mas­sage focus­es on prob­lem areas. This means that it tar­gets the stiff mus­cle regions that are over­ly stressed, rather than work­ing the whole seg­ment­ed area. How­ev­er, no mat­ter how nat­u­ral­ly intense this mas­sage can be, it will not hurt as much as many peo­ple have come to believe. It may be the dis­turb­ing depth at which the ther­a­pist reach­es under the lay­ers with­in the body and the sore­ness after­ward that may turn some away. How­ev­er, don’t ignore this type of mas­sage. Because the fact that it is very effec­tive and has longer-last­ing results is ide­al for some. The results of deep tis­sue can last 4 to 5 weeks, where­as a Swedish will be only 2 or 3. Grant­ed 2 or 3 my be all you need most of the time.
Overall:
1. Swedish is a gen­tler and soft­er mas­sage com­pared to the more intense and force­ful deep tis­sue massage.
2. Swedish is best for those who have very sen­si­tive skin types, that bear rash­es eas­i­ly, most espe­cial­ly when pow­er­ful fric­tion and rub­bing is applied.
3. Swedish is the mas­sage of choice for those who are look­ing to relieve nor­mal stress lev­els from work or home issues. But if you are not up for A Deep Tis­sue. Just ask for heavy pres­sure dur­ing your mas­sage if you feel it is not as intense as you would like.
4. Deep Tis­sue is for those who are in chron­ic pain, were involved in any stren­u­ous activ­i­ties, or who are con­tin­u­al­ly trou­bled by pre­vi­ous injuries. This tech­nique is very effec­tive and has longer-last­ing results. It can be dis­turbing­ly deep and may leave you sore for 3 to 4 days after.

I myself get a Deep Tis­sue every six months. I per­son­al­ly find it very renew­ing to get bro­ken down thoroughly.