Welcome to Bodywork Professionals
It is the mission of Bodywork Professionals to provide a standard of massage therapy, bodywork, and soft tissue treatment that is effective and consistent. Massage therapy and bodywork can be an art or a science, and we explore the possibilities in each perspective.
We Believe that bodywork and massage therapy is good for humans well being, and should be affordable to everybody. We offer fair prices and flexible hours. Contact us via email: BodyworkProfessionals@gmail.com
1.14.2010 Metroland Article
Nick is featured in this weeks Metroland Health and Wellness article. We've always avoied the word wellness because it sounds corney but I suppose it's here to stay. The editorial features Nick with a simple explination of Structural Integration.
"People choose Structural Integration or Rolf Bodywork for a variety of reasons. The most common goals are to regain easy and natural movement and the desire to feel more at home in the body.
Structural Integration looks at the body as a system of tension and compression, a dynamic relation to gravity. Practitioners see pain as the result of dysfunction. The byproduct of improving function is often decreased pain.
I've been a licensed massage therapist for 14 years. I spent the early part of my career chasing pain without any real sense of what was causing it. The training in Structural Integration gave me the skills to evaluate a body and it's patterns and see what causes soft tissue pain.
Grace and ease are the trademarks of alignment. Movement is pleasure in a balanced body and Structural Integration can be a tool to re-establish your body's natural potential."
12.20.2009 Times Union Article
We were mentioned in an article from the Times Union called "Wisdom of the Crowd"
"Bodywork is one of the greatest places I've ever been. Nick is a sweetheart and my aunt sings the praises of the women who work there. The also offer Structural Integration which fixed a weird clicking sound in my shoulder, and a problem with my uncles knee. I cannot speak highley enough of the practice." Erin L.
We couldn't agree more. ;-)
*Voted "Best of" by Metroland Magazine
The Gift of Massage
The only thing better than getting a massage or bodywork sessions is getting one as a gift. At Bodyworks we see everyday how much massage and bodywork can effect a person. It's not just about feeling good during the session, but giving thanks to a hard working body. Addressing pain before it grows, and freeing your mind by relaxing your body. A bodywork or massage sessions says that you've paid attention to what you are feeling, and done something about it. You have taken action that move you toward health.
The best gifts are the ones that everyone wants but never indulge in. Thats why few gifts are as cherished as that of massage because it allows your friend or family member to enjoy a an hour or more of rejuvenation that they might not otherwise allow themselves .This holiday season, you have the opportunity to make a lasting, caring impression on those you love. Give the gift of massage and show that you want to give more than just a present, but the gift of relaxation and health.
~Walk-ins welcome~
We always recommend an appointment, but sometimes you need some work. The office is staffed with a license massage therapist from 10-7 Monday-Friday. Saturdays and Sun
Nick Pavoldi's bodywork blog
We are changing the format of our website a bit and our news and information will be posted on the site NickPavoldi.com.
Note About Swine Flu - General Safety & cleanliness
We practice universal precautions when performing our work. Open wounds are always covered by the therapist and an open or irritated part of the skin is not touched. We use a linen service to clean and sterilize all of our sheets, and are fastidious about changing them and keeping clean. As Far as we know the H1N1 virus is pretty bad but not the end of the world. Some people have died, but most healthy adults will recover after a period of illness. We are hearing bout it on the news and internet and that's a good thing. Technology and communications allow us to track and know more about whats going on but it can also be scary. We are bombarded with frightening images, and stories about doomsday, but this too shall pass.
That being said we are stepping up our efforts to keep the office as sterile as possible. As always, if you are feling sick or flulike symptoms consult your physician and know that it's ok to cancel, even if it's less than 24 hours with no problem.
Preventing the Flu - Proactive Prevention
By Karden Rabin
Mainstream health organizations supply sound advice on how to “avoid” the flu and “prevent” its spread. Aided by modern hygiene and universal precautions, these avoidance measures go a long way to obstructing the spread of disease. That being said, primary health providers supply us with little advice on how to maintain our natural defenses and preempt illness.
Human beings are bathed in disease 24/7 yet we are not perpetually sick. This is because we have an amazing array of defenses, beginning with our skin all the way down to the intracellular level that fight disease. In fact, we don’t “catch” the cold we become “vulnerable” to it. This is self-evident in any situation, i.e a classroom, where some of the students get sick and others do not. In all likelihood, each student has been exposed to the virus, it just that some students were vulnerable and others were not.
Proactive prevention is less about bathing in hand sanitizer every half hour, but about pursuing complimentary care techniques that optimize our already awesome mechanisms for resisting disease. There are many avenues for achieving this including massage therapy.
Massage can greatly increase our resistance to disease because of its affect on human stress. All people experience stress but few know that the mostly cognitive experience is also intensely biochemical. Internally, long-term stress causes the adrenal glands to produce a hormone known as cortisol. Cortisol’s primary job is to suppress the function of our immune and digestive systems in order to reroute power to our muscular and cognitive systems. This suppression results in an increased vulnerability to disease and more frequent illness.
Therefore, it is essential for all people to learn to manage their stress. Massage and bodywork are outstanding methods for achieving this. When one receives bodywork, the nervous system naturally responds to the therapeutic touch of the practitioner by switching to the parasympathetic nervous system. Also known as the rest and relaxation response, it is the opposite of the stress response people experience everyday. In one session, days or weeks of accumulated stress can be purged. Therefore, regular bodywork not only relieves aches and pains, but nourishes the immune system and makes one less vulnerable to diseases like the flu.
Bodywork and Massage are like Listening with Hands
By Nick Pavoldi
One of the important parts about being a bodyworker is knowing how to listen to your clients and their body. People often ask if our work hurts. I've found that good communication, especially listening on the part of the therapist, makes the session not painful at all. There is a difference between pain and experience. Direct work on tissue that is inflamed or irritated can give the body a lot of feedback. This feedback is important information and can be the product of a under functioning body indicating what parts are being most misused. Expressions involving stance and gesture can be more telling than the words behind them and can convey context and attitude. A bodyworkers job is to listen to the form that makes this happen. Bodywork looks at what path that led the body to this point, and where it would like to go. Our job is to support healthy structure and function. We have a bag of tools at our disposal, and rely on feedback from our clients to do our work properly. Feedback may be verbal, or a signal the body sends out on it's own communication network. A good therapist knows how to interpret these signals to direct the flow of work. Our Staff at Bodywork Professionals are skilled practitioners, and know that the person they are working on has their undivided attention during their session. By Jenna Bensen, LMT 've been practicing massage for two years at Bodywork Professionals. Since my time here I have learned a great deal about bodywork. Not only can massage and bodywork be relaxing, it can help with chronic pain and help speed up the recovery process from an injury. I have always enjoyed helping make people feel better. For some time I did this through cooking. When that became too demanding I started to search for a different avenue. I believe we live in a very chaotic and stressful world where people don't pay enough attention to the self care of their bodies. It makes me happy when someone comes in who is stressed and just needs to vegge out for an hour. This is a sign that they are in tune with their bodies and know what they need. They care enough about themselves to find healthy ways to destress. Jenna's insight
Frequently people will come see me who have been living with chronic pain or an injury. When this occurs, the work that I do on them is different than that of someone who wants to relax. I may focus on a particular spot that has been causing them pain or do some deep tissue work. My goal in this case is to aid them in the process of becoming pain free so they can go about their lives and function in a healthy state.
For fun, we thought we would make a short dog massage video. We used my Aunt Lucy's dog Celia.
This short video is Jenna and I working with her. It's come to my attention that New York does not allow massage therapist to work on dogs without a special veterinarians license. We had no intention of changing our practice to working with animals. So in case anyone was wondering; we cannot work with animals beyond recreational touch.
