Three Last Minute Gift Ideas For Your Health-Conscious Friends and Family Members

While the holidays are traditionally the time we all think of gift-giving, the quest for the perfect gift comes up many times a year.  Birthdays, anniversaries, Valentine’s Day, office celebrations, and many other holidays celebrated by various cultures, many of which include the giving of gifts, come up throughout the year.  This handy list of five gift ideas may find usefulness at any time you are stumped for a gift idea for your friend or family.  Gift certificates are often the go-to choice for gift giving, but not every gift certificate is appropriate for everyone.  Here is a short list of gift certificates that will suit everyone on your list, and they are easy to get and easy to give, and are nearly always well-received. 

The first gift idea on this list is a massage gift certificate.  There are very few people who don’t love a session of massage therapy.  Massage means relaxation; it means calmness; it means the ability to take a break from one’s hectic and crazy schedule.  Add to these benefits the extra benefit brought about by a gift certificate for a massage in the home, and it becomes the ultimate soothing gift, most loved by those you care about the most. 

Massage gift certificates are easy to buy, and are just a click away.  Easily purchase a gift certificate online, and you can choose to have it printed and mailed, or emailed to you or the recipient for printing at home.  Then you loved one simply calls or goes online to book their session, and the massage therapist comes to their home to provide the massage. 

A second gift idea for the health conscious individual is a set of yoga classes.  If your loved one already takes yoga classes, you can either buy a group of classes at their studio, or give them a set from a new yoga studio, perhaps your favorite one.  If they love yoga, they may like your teacher better than their teacher, and will appreciate the opportunity to try a new class at a new studio.  Or, if they are particularly fond of their teacher, be sure to contact them to arrange the gift. 

A third gift, which is also specific to the health conscious individual, is a gym membership.  As before, if they have a preferred gym, be sure to get the certificate there so that they don’t have to change gyms to use your gift.  Perhaps there is a new aerobics class they have been wanting to try, in which case you can get them a gift certificate for aerobics classes at their favorite gym. 

Of course, my favorite gift from this list would be the Massage Gift Certificate.  An hour or more of relaxation, watching my stress melt away during the session, is the ultimate gift for me.  And it is probably the best gift for many of your loved ones.  So that may be your first choice for a gift idea for your sister, brother, best friend, mother, father, and anyone other special person in your life.  You can be sure it will be appreciated, and it may even lead them into a healthy habit of getting regularly scheduled massages at home, easily and conveniently booked.  Everyone can benefit from a massage, and your friends and family will love the chance to get one for themselves. 

I hope this short list is helpful the next time you are stumped for ideas for the loved ones in your life.  Health conscious or not, they are sure to appreciate these gifts. 

Massage For Children Suffering From Autism Shows Promise As An Adjunctive Treatment

Children suffering from autism and the autism spectrum disorders are often in a very lonely and vulnerable place. They are unable to communicate with their peers, parents, or other adults who are trying to help them. Autism is a disorder that is characterized by brain development issues, where social interaction, intellectual ability, motor coordination, and other aspects of the person’s development are affected.

Oftentimes, the child suffering from Autism Spectrum Disorder will excel in creative activities such as art and music. Naturally, parents of these children, who are often also extremely gifted and highly intelligent, are looking for ways to help their children to develop into healthy and well-adjusted adults. Autism has increased in frequency ten fold over the last forty years, with improved diagnostics and testing having been determined not to be responsible for this increase.

So, more children are suffering around the world with this disorder, for which parents are justifiably lead to seek out alternative treatment options to help their children. Most of the treatments offered for children on the autism spectrum center around behavior therapy and behavior interventions. There are many different types, but most of them have been proven to be effective.

There are, however, additional methods that can be used in the treatment of autism and related disorders. Massage therapy, for example, has been shown in various studies to be effective in reducing stereotypical autistic behaviors in children when compared with a control group. Stereotypical behaviors are those such as touch aversion, off task behavior, orienting to irrelevant sounds, and withdrawal. In three studies on the effects of massage therapy on these children, these behaviors were significantly reduced.

For those seeking to add more help for their children with autism, massage therapy holds definite promise. Another modality that has been shown to be effective in the treatment of autism is CranioSacral Therapy. Having been studied primarily in a case study environment, there are no studies that have been performed with a control group. However, an article on autism which can be linked to here, publishes the conclusions of John Upledger, who has worked with many children with autism spectrum disorders.

He concludes that in many cases of autism, membrane tensions of the craniosacral system due to inflammation may be a significant causative factor in the development of autism. He additionally recommends that those receiving craniosacral therapy for autism continue to receive it throughout their growth period, as their growth spurts can create additional membrane tensions as they grow older.

If your children are suffering from autism or from autism spectrum disorder, and you are interested in learning more about how massage therapy can help, you can visit our website by clicking here. You can also visit our massage benefits area for autism by clicking here. Pediatric massage for kids is available from Mountainside On Site Massage Therapy.

Couples Massage: Sharing Time In a Way You Likely Overlooked

When we think of all the activities couples can do together, it's usually because we're trying to find something new and exciting to do with our significant other. And of course, that's a good thing, because we should never stop exploring life and finding new places to go and things to do. But one often overlooked activity for two is the Couples Massage.

Couples Massage At Home is one of the original flagship services that we offered to clients in New Jersey and New York City, and we still do. Over the course of the last ten years, we've seen many people experiencing Couples Massage for the first time. Evidently, it's a great way to spend time together, as clients often book again.

Activities are usually thought of as things to do, or visiting places where there's good food to eat. Sometimes we engage in activities as couples that are more passive, such as seeing a movie or going to the theatre. Even as an engaged and rapt audience member, compared with white water rafting, or even a drive around the town with your significant other, watching a performance or movie is just not quite an active activity. That doesn’t really matter; what does, is that it's fun, a great way to spend some time cuddled together.

Many might think that Couples Massage might be a boring way to spend time as a couple, but that is just not so. Couples Massage is yet another passive activity that, like viewing a movie together, is both a personal and private experience. However, Couples Massage is an experience that has been regarded by many past clients as one of the closest times they've experienced being with their significant other. Sharing time while being worked on, healing together, can be a transcendental experience of incredible closeness.

Do keep Couples Massage in mind the next time you're trying to figure out what to do as a couple. It's definitely one activity that is more fun than it even sounds, and is worth trying at least once. There is a place in the life of a couple for eating out; there's also a place for a home-cooked feast. When planning our activities, it's great to diversify our time among all different sorts, from active activities, like gardening together, to more passive activities, like Couples Massage at Home.

Check out our website for more information by clicking here.

CranioSacral Therapy: A Positive Therapeutic Approach to Pain Management

Craniosacral therapy is a relatively new therapy, in that it has been around much less than a hundred years, being developed in the seventies by Dr. Upledger. Utilizing small amounts of force and pressure, measured in grams, osteopathic manipulation is performed. Craniosacral therapy is built on the principles of osteopathic medicine, and specifically the work of Dr. Sutherland in the 1930s.

Using the craniosacral rhythm of the body, which is the circulation of the craniosacral fluid around the brain and spinal cord, assessments are made of the bones of the cranium and pelvis. Light pressure techniques, sometimes called releases, are performed to certain bones of the cranium and pelvic.

Very often, patients receiving craniosacral therapy are surprised by the relief of symptoms in one area which have been affected by therapy to a very different and sometimes distant area. For example, there have been patients suffering from TMJ or migraine headaches who experience an alleviation of pain symptoms after therapy at the sacrum and pelvis. Some of the principles of craniosacral work are that the body system is connected, and that often times, pain in one area can be what is known as referred pain, coming from an entirely different area.

While there are not very many studies on the effects of craniosacral therapy, the few randomized clinical trials that do exist have shown positive effects on pain in patients who received it. For example, one study published in Clinical Rehabilitation in 2011 concluded that craniosacral therapy “improved medium-term pain symptoms in patients with fibromyalgia.” Anyone who knows someone with fibromyalgia will understand that it is a very difficult disorder to treat. When someone has this disorder, they are in widespread generalized pain all of the time. Craniosacral therapy can be used as an excellent adjunct to standard medical care for these patients.

Another study published in Complimentary Therapies in Clinical Practice concluded that craniosacral therapy can help to reduce the severity and frequency of migraine headaches. Considering the debilitating nature of migraines, this is very promising to those suffering from migraines.

These are only two of the available studies on CranioSacral Therapy, both of which had positive findings for pain relief. Further research into the effects of craniosacral therapy are certainly warranted. If you are interested in learning more about CranioSacral Therapy, or in booking a session, please visit our website by clicking here.