Deep tissue massages are the “hurt so good” massages. That was how my masseur introduced it to be when I first blindly signed up for one last year. It was an accurate assessment but afterward, I felt better than I ever had after a massage.
I go get massages maybe three times a year, though the number seems to be escalating as I fit one in anytime a semi-special occasion rises. My birthday. Christmas. In Hawai’i. Home for Thanksgiving. I’ve always loved them since my first 30-minute Swedish massage at RZ & Company in Madison when I was in early high school. I remember the surprise when I realized massages weren’t just on your back, but your whole body. It had never occurred to me that legs could be massaged too.
And that rings a bell — before professional massages, my friend Jenna and I used to play massage parlor which sounds creepy for grade school kids but was really just us finding random objects to massage each other’s back while we pretended we were the owner of a business. I was pretty bad at it and Jenna was pretty good at it. I hoped back then that she would get professional training and I’d get free massages for life.
If we’re talking love languages, physical touch is one of my primary ones. Massages are heaven for me where some of my friends abhor them. A few years ago my therapist suggested I get massages when I confessed that it was hard going so long without touch (living in a city without family, without a partner, and with non-touchy friends, it was weeks sometimes in-between hugs . . . though cats help with that too).
So I am down for the whole event. Lying on a table and covered in oil or lotion and warm towels occasionally draped on the small of your back or wrapped around your feet and strong hands working over your skin until I remember I’m doing a deep tissue and the hurt kicks in. During my massage yesterday my masseur asked if it was too much and I told him to go for it: I wanted those knots in my muscles out. And apparently I am tenser than usual. “Above average” anyway. We only had to move on when I was too ticklish.
I have another deep tissue massage in just a few weeks, a nice long one when my Mom comes down to Austin in December at my favorite place: Milk + Honey. They have the best steam showers you can take after the massage.
With Love,
Natalie