Can a massage beat the winter blues?

Aside from the commonly known benefits of soothing sore muscles, improving blood circulation and pain relief, massage has other, less widely known mental and emotional health benefits as well!

When you are always plagued with anxiety or depression (the winter blues), the stress hormone cortisol builds up in your body. Cortisol raises your blood pressure and lowers your immune system. 

Massage therapy works to combat these issues by increasing the flow of good hormones like serotonin and dopamine to your brain, causing instant relief from symptoms of depression and sadness.

Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) - otherwise known as seasonal depression or the winter blues, is often triggered by the shift from summer and fall, to winter. Decreased sunlight in the winter, combined with increased time spent indoors triggers SAD in many people and significantly reduces its sufferer’s quality of life.

Massage therapy tackles these issues head-on by:

• Reducing depression and anxiety 
• Decreasing heart rate 
• Reducing systolic blood pressure
• Reducing diastolic blood pressure
• Lowering stress hormones
• Improving mental health

While releasing the structural collapse associated with depression, you will also be releasing the breath process which will allow depressed clients to energize their system and have more energy. This additional energy will enable them to take part in their lives and move out of depression.