90% of the time I play CBC Radio 2 in my massage therapy room. I’m in Kitchener Ontario so if you want to have a listen to what Radio 2 is playing now check out the eastern regional broadcast. Radio 2 plays a whole range of music; classical, opera, jazz, folk, country, hip hop, blues… the list goes on. Every hour on the hour we also get 5 min of world news but I find this to be a small price to pay compared to radio commercials every 10-15 minutes and hey it forces me to stay up to date.

As a backup, for those time when the opera gets to be too much or he hip hop to loud for my client I always have my .mp3 player as backup. On my .mps player I keep music like Nina Simone, Nora Jones, Jack Jonson, Lenard Cohen and U2.

Jeremy Climbing Sweet Dreams at Bon Echo

I started rock climbing in 1997 when I was 21 years old. I started climbing in the gym before I ventured outside top-roping and sport climbing a year later. Now I’m a dad, a husband and a massage therapist but I still love to climb and plan to climb for the rest of my life. 

My step brother introduced me to gym climb when I was 21 and I fell in love right away. It was like I finally found the answer to the meaning of my life. As I started venturing outside top-roping then sport climbing everything else in my life started to fade away. I slowly phased out my mountain biking and quite karate and ju-jitsu. I brought yoga into my life a few years later, only because a friend and climbing partner suggested that it would help improve my climbing. I have had to take time off from my climbing; moving around, injuries, massage therapy school and babies have all taken me away from climbing for periods of time but I have always come back to it. 

Now that I’m a family man my climbing focus has changed. I spend a lot of time teaching my children to climb and helping and encouraging my wife to improve her skill and experience. I take the whole family up multi-pitch trad climbs and we do day trips up to Rattle Snake Point to top-rope. My youngest daughter was four when we did our first family trip up to Bon Echo National park, a 300 foot multi-pitch trad climb craig. I do get out climbing without my family, I train once or twice a week at Grand River Rock, I get out to Mount Nemo a few times a year and up to Bon Echo a handful of times. When I’m climbing with my family I`m patient, encouraging and methodical. When I’m out with `the boys` we like to climb hard and push our limits.                 

My training as a massage therapist has been a great help to my climbing. When I injure myself I know what to do to get myself back climbing as quick as possible. I know right away if I should use heat or ice, when to stretch or rest or just push through. It use to take me a week or more to get a solid answer as to handle an injury, now I start with the right course of treatment right away. But even better I know what to do to stay healthy and reduce the risk of injuring myself. Proper stretching, training supporting muscles, better posture, proper rest periods and hydrotherapy all keep me strong, flexible and limber to me keep climbing and training hard. 

I find that my massage therapy clients who rock climb gain specific benefits. Aside from the fact that most of the injuries a climber will come into me for I have had and can relate to, I have also done the research for my own climbing injuries so I’m up to date regarding climbing injuries. I also know the lingo. I know what a crimp is, I know what a jug is and I know the dynamics of a layback and roof climbing. Communicating the specifics of an injury is often difficult between a client and their therapist. Trying to descried a climbing injury to a hockey player is like speaking a different language, and vice versa. I have experience with many different clients with many different injuries related to many different sports and professions but it’s the climbers that I know understand the best. 

Climbing has been part of my life for a long time. It has permeated the rest of my life, family and work. I might not be the best climber but I have a lot of experience and have a lot of fun with it. I hope to continue growing my climbing experience and I hope to share my knowledge by helping as many people as I can with their climbing.

To increase your Aerobic endurance you need to improve your body’s ability to bring fresh blood into a target muscle group (for rock climbers your forearms) and remove old/used blood. We can do this by increasing the blood pressure in the forearms for an extended period of time (15-20min). This will put pressure on the veins, arteries and capillaries, forcing them to expand and grow new branches. It’s kind of like upgrading the plumbing system making it easier for the blood to flow in and out. You need to climb, nearly constantly without stopping for 15-20 minutes just below your “pumped” threshold (no lactic acid burn). That is, climb 2-4 grades below your maximum ability making sure you feel fatigue when you’re done, but no burning. If you start getting a burning or “pumped” feeling, stop and lower right away, then go to a different route, 1 grad easier and continue for the rest of the allotted time. The burn means you are producing lactic acid which means you have moved into Anaerobic Metabolism and are no longer getting the benefits you are looking for.

Anaerobic Metabolism creates lactic acid but is also limited when lactic acid is present, which is why the duration of this energy source is so limited. To increase your Anaerobic endurance you need to increases your muscles tolerance to lactic acid. To do this you need to force your muscles to continue working with lactic acid present.  Bouldering is a great way to train in this way, short bursts of high intensity climbing with frequent but short rest.

The 4×4 is a great routine to train your Anaerobic endurance. Pick 4 bouldering problems 1-3 grades below your max. Climb each one 4 times in a row with no rest before moving on to the next problem. . Do not rest in the middle of doing you 4 repetitions of a problem; do not top out or rest, keep moving. Between each problem take 30 second’s rest before moving on to the next set of 4. You will have done 16 problems in a short period of time when you’re done doing your 4×4, your forearms should be toasted. If not, choose harder problems next time. If you couldn’t finish choose easier ones next time. Don’t do a 4×4 before a session of climbing, it’s not a warm up, it will ruin your session. Do this at the end of a session or do a short session dedicated to just the 4×4. And make sure you have warmed up your body well before doing a 4×4.

Lactic acid is toxic to your muscles and long term exposure to lactic acid can be detrimental to muscle development. Don’t do high intensity training where you are exposing your muscles to lactic acid for long periods of time more than once a week, you don’t need it more than that.

When training for climbing you need to make sure you are getting sufficient rest. Muscle and tendon strength is increased by overloading the muscle and tendons followed by periods of rest and recovery. Overloading without proper rest will cause degeneration and injuries. Don’t climb every day; 3-4 days a week is more than enough to progress through the grades.

I have a health history form that you will need to fill out before we get started (I recommend showing up 10min early to fill this out). You can also print the Health History Form hear and bring it in completed. This gives me a general overview of your state of health so that we can be sure there is no risk to the treatment plan I create for you. Once I have gone over your treatment plane we will have a short discussion about what it is you want me to treat. I try not to take up more than a few minutes with this stage but it is important for me to have a clear picture of what we will be working on before we get started. I commonly ask questions like, where does it heart, what does the pain feel like, what sort of things aggravate the injury and was there and accident to create the injury. Sometimes I will want to have a closer look at your posture (they way you stand) or maybe I will want to do some range of motion testing. These tests will allow me to zone in on the source of your problem. Often, I don’t want to do any of these test, I find I can get the same information while you are on the table by making the testing and treating procedure one and the same

After I get a general idea of what it is I’m going to work on its time to get started. While I go wash my hand it’s your chance to get ready for your treatment. You will always have the final say regarding how you get ready and what clothes you are comfortable taking off. Most of my clients are comfortable removing all their clothing but their underpants knowing that I will always make sure there are always covered discreetly with a sheet. I only expose one part of your body at a time and only that body part I will be working on.
During your massage treatment I will be using an assortment of different massage techniques. Some of these can be relaxing and others can be kind-of tender. Under most cases I feel a little pain is necessary to get the results you are looking for from a massage therapy treatment. This being said it’s very important for you to be clear about you comfort level. On a scale of 1-10, discomfort up to a maximum of 7 is appropriate but any more than that won’t bring you ant more benefit. Just let me know how you’re doing. Some areas more sensitive than others it’s, ok to ask me to adjust my pressure and technique more than once.
During your massage treatment I will try to spark up a conversation. Not only does this allow us to become better acquainted, I also find that a light conversation helps distract you from when I find a sore spot like a Trigger Point or Scar Tissue. This distraction technique allows you to stay relaxed, helps keep your muscles from pushing back against me working and overall reduces the pain. I often try to direct conversation to subjects that might give me clues or hints about what is creating your pain or discomfort. Topics like your work, the kind of car you drive or sports or athletics you are involved often give me lots of information about you posture, repetitive movements you often do or strength or flexibility issues.

When your treatment is through, I will let you know, then go wash my hands again (I do this a lot). This gives you time to get up, get dressed and come out to see me. If during your treatment we discussed any exercises, stretches or heat/cold treatments for you do at home this is when I will go over that in more detail.

After the massage treatment it is also time to handle the payment and rebooking. I don’t have credit or debit machines so cash payment is necessary. Its $80 for an hour massage treatment and $50 for a half an hour massage treatment. If you have extended health care benefits, on my receipt you will find my registration number as a registered massage therapist.  When you send your receipt to your health care company for reimbursement this registration is what they are looking for before approval.

Aside from putting on a sweater our body’s main mechanism to create or retain heat is to increase our metabolism (the amount of food energy we burn). Our body does this by contracting our muscles. You can relate to this by the way your shoulders rise up to your ears when you walk outside on a cold day without you jacket. Your legs, back, neck, shoulder and all the muscles in your body will do this. This increase in muscle tension will increase stress on your joints, pull your body out of alignment and create muscle imbalances. With this added stress to your body we can experience many symptoms like neck pain, back pain, headaches and muscle achiness.

Seeing your massage therapist will help decrees this muscle tension and correct your muscles imbalances.

At Kitchener Massage Therapy I use a few different Deep Tissue Massage techniques like muscle stripping, direct pressure held for up to a minute and stretching. It is uncomfortable to have a Trigger Point worked out but the relief you get from the headache, sore back or whatever it is you are experiencing can be great. My clients often describe the pain from Trigger Point work as a `good pain`. I think this stems from the fact that someone has finally been able to pin point and address the source of their discomfort after what could have been many years.

You can see in the cart below how a Trigger Point in the middle of your back (Lower Trapezius) can acutely create a headache at the base of you skull. It is very common to have pain referred from one spot in your body to another. I use the Trigger Point Charts in my office to locate, connect and treat the source of a client’s pain all the time.

Trigger Point Chart, Kitchener Massage Therapy

Exactly what a Trigger Point is has not yet been described by science. There are many theory’s out there, some more relevant than others. After studying and treating Trigger Points for many years I have put together some of the varying thought on Trigger Points to be able to describe it to my clients. I have put together this video where I describe what a Trigger Point is in my view.

If you are getting pain in your upper back please see your local massage therapist or other healthcare professional. It’s always a good idea to see a healthcare professional before starting a new exercise program.

Be sure to refer to my General Guidelines for stretching before doing any of the stretches I demonstrate.

The Psoas muscle is a strong muscle at the front of your hip. It often affects your low back causing pain. If you sit for long periods of time be sure to stretch the Psoas muscle often.

Be sure to refer to my General Guidelines for stretching before doing any of the stretches I recommend.