No, it is not. I have many clients who just come to me for one or the oth­er. At some point, I might advise you that both things togeth­er would be ben­e­fi­cial for you; how­ev­er, it is total­ly your choice.

I will always start each ses­sion by check­ing in with you about your areas of ten­sion, your gen­er­al stress lev­el, how you’ve been feel­ing, and your indi­vid­ual pref­er­ences. The ses­sion will be an inte­gra­tion of a vari­ety of modal­i­ties meant to specif­i­cal­ly address your needs.

Please bring your filled-in intake form with you to your ses­sion or arrive five min­utes ear­ly in order to fill out a hard­copy on site. After I look over your form, I will talk with you about your expec­ta­tions for the ses­sion and what your short and long-term goals are. I also will want to look at your pos­ture and how you move. All body­work is done with the client wear­ing clothes, so please wear com­fort­able, loose-fit­ting cloth­ing (e.g., t‑shirt and sweat pants, shorts, or leg­gings). Please no hood­ies (which make it dif­fi­cult to access the neck and shoul­ders) or pants with thick seams such as blue jeans. Also, please refrain from wear­ing any per­fumes or colognes.

Check with your insur­ance com­pa­ny to see if your pol­i­cy cov­ers mas­sage and/or man­u­al ther­a­py and under what con­di­tions. For instance, you may need a pre­scrip­tion from your doc­tor for mas­sage ther­a­py in order to get reim­bursed. If your pol­i­cy does cov­er mas­sage ther­a­py, I can pro­vide you with a receipt so you can file for reim­burse­ment. I do not do in-house insur­ance billing.

Check with the admin­is­tra­tor of your FSA or HSA to see if they will cov­er mas­sage and/or man­u­al ther­a­py. In many cas­es, mas­sage and man­u­al ther­a­py can be cov­ered by Flex­i­ble Spend­ing and Health Spend­ing Accounts, and I have a num­ber of clients who pay me direct­ly using their FSA or HSA charge cards. Oth­er­wise, I can pro­vide you with a receipt so you can file for reimbursement.