K so I haven't written in ages and I have a ton to write about and there's no way I can do that all in one blog and still keep ya'll interested, so i'm going to have to break it down into a couple in order to keep all of us sane.
As usual, alot has happened since the last time I wrote. I really need to get better at blogging, but I feel like there just aren't enough hours in the day!
Ok so the Second Quarter of CRSMT is over. I'm pretty confident that my grades will be similar to what they were last quarter, but I won't know until monday, so I'll have to keep you updated. I just finished finals at about 3:00 this afternoon, and I think they went pretty well. Today I had a final in Hydrotherapy and in Bodywork Experiential. The one for Hydrotherapy was just a basic written test - the class was only 2 days long, so it was pretty easy. Bodywork was a totally different story. Just like with my Swedish Massage class last term, I had to give a massage to my instructor as my final exam. This time, we had 20 minutes to complete abdominal massage, flip our client over, do an advanced Shiatsu hip stretch, and bilaterally perform a deep elbow stroke. It was terrifying. I didn't stop shaking until about halfway through my massage. I chose to do my deep work on Hillari's back, so luckily she didn't have to see me freaking out. After my 20 minutes was over, she gave me some feedback. It wasn't quite as good as Jill's feedback last time, but it was alright. She told me to speak a little louder and slow down my abdominal strokes a little. The worst part was that she said she felt a fingernail for a split second - that one thing can fail me. I don't think it did, but it was still horrifying to have her tell me that. She said that my connection and my quality of touch was awesome and that my depth has increased exponentially since the beginning of term, so that was good. Overall I think it went well, but again, we'll see on Monday.
In other news, a really cool thing happened in Clinic last week. That one guy didn't come back to me, which is totally cool. But I was assigned 3 women who were all fantastic. The first woman had NEVER had a massage before. This simple fact puts an INCREDIBLE amount of stress on the therapist because what the client thinks of their first massage is what they'll think about massage for the rest of their lives. No pressure. So this woman came in terrified and clutching her purse like it was a lifeline. I got her on the table and she was so tense that her head wasn't even on the table and she was holding her arms for me, etc. I put a ton of positive healing intentions into my hands while I worked, and by the time I got to the front of her legs, she was finally relaxing her body, but she was blinking nonstop, so I knew she wasn't quite there yet. As I kept working I watched her eyes slowly slow down, and by the time I was working on her back, she was snoring. It was so AMAZING to be able to be a part of this woman's transition from terrified and tense beyond belief to asleep on my table! I relaxed her THAT much! It was so cool. I talked to Hillari after the massage and she said that the woman totally loved the massage and would definitely be coming back to me. So that's awesome as well.
My 2nd lady is an accepted student at CRSMT for the January term, so she asked all kinds of questions, and it was really cool to have her on the table and be like "want to feel something cool" (crazy stretch or awesome elbow work) "you'll be able to do that in 4 months!" and we just talked about school and classes and "is it really as hard as they say" and stuff like that. It was fun.
My 3rd client didn't speak a single word of English, but luckily she's had tons of massage before, so she knew what to do, which made things easier. But it was tough to figure out if my depth was what she wanted or to ask if she wanted water before she flipped... all in all, an interesting night. But the first client was by far the best experience in Clinic I've had so far.
I have lots more to say, but I'm going to have to sign off and let it wait. I've had a lot of recent personal discoveries that will take some time to scribe, but unfortunately I'm going out with the gang for a celebratory "we're done with 2nd Quarter" dinner, and then tomorrow morning we leave for Nicaragua! So in my next entry I'll tell you the rest of things and I'll also update you guys on Nicaragua, which I'm sure will be amazing!
I love you guys!
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