https://youtube.com/watch?v=x5fJSv2KRhE
Pediatric Foot Massage
Children that are touched in a positive way show less signs of violence, aggression and stress. They also have a healthier body image. Parents that touch with a loving intention and massage their children benefit their child for a lifetime. Massage is a great way to bond and nurture parent-child relations. We learn how to listen, communicate, trust and feel safe in the world through how we are touched. Massage can also be used as a form of play, relaxation, and strengthening family relationships. Children that are massaged regularly get a better night’s sleep and so do their parents.
In the video above, Michelle Alva, Holistic Physical Therapist, Infant Massage Instructor and Energy Healer shares three simple massage techniques to share with your child at any age. Timing the massage at the same time in the day adds extra benefit. For example, a foot massage before bath time or after helps a child to get ready for sleep time.
Researched Benefits of massage according to research done at the Miami Touch Research Institute:
improve attention, IQ, sleep, digestion, growth, focus, immune system functioning, listening & communication skills.
Massage is a mutually beneficially activity to reduce anxiety, stress, and depression in our children and teens, which is on the rise according to recent reports in AHCA, (due to our hurried lifestyles and pressures imposed on our children to excel in academic performance without having free play opportunities to release, be creative, active, and express themselves).
Pediatric Foot Massage Recipe:
- Position your child comfortably. Ask your child for permission to make sure they are ready for foot massage.
- Warm up your hands by rubbing oil or lotion on the palms of your hands briskly.
- Create an loving intention to share with your child during the massage time. Center yourself by taking deep diaphragmatic breaths.
- Your breathing patter and relaxed and centered state of being relaxes your child.
- Place one hand under your child’s ankle for support.
- Take the opposite thumb and place it on the sole of your child’s foot.
- Clockwise Circles: Move your thumb in a clockwise direction over the sole of your child’s foot.
- Move over the inner arch of the foot to emphasize nurturing their intestines, digestion and elimination. Massage to the inner arch of the foot helps to relax the gut lining, to aid in elimination, relieve gas and colic and enhance nutrient absorption.
- Swedish Massage For The Leg: move one hand from the ankle to the hip, inner and outer. Repeat each stroke at least 10 -15 times or until you feel ready to move on to the next technique.
- Resting Hands. Create an intention of wishing well for your child’s life and development. Send your child loving energy and intentions from your heart to theirs. Feel the energy of love from your heart to your child’s whole body.
- Lightly lift off your palms from your child’s body.
- Notice how you feel after giving the massage and ask your child how they feel after massage. Share with each other what you liked, disliked and would like more of!
Try these techniques daily on both legs, one leg at a time.
Repeat at least 10-15 strokes on each leg.
Comment down below and let us know how you and your child benefit from pediatric foot massage.
Read about A Touch Of Love Infant Massage Classes with Michelle Alva HERE.