Importance of Massage after Surgery

Soon after my mom got her knee surgery I had another client that came in to have me work on their knee post-op. They had their surgery about a week and a half before my mom, so at this point they were 5 weeks out. Usually an optimist, this person had started to go down the pessimistic route and was unsure how their recovery was going to go, upset with the numbness in parts around their knee, and afraid that they were going to have to get MUA (Manipulation Under Anesthesia).

We spent our first session doing a 90 minute, I did a wide variety of techniques including Swedish massage, lymph work, scraping with light and deep pressure (I used both gua sha tools, and a towel for this), passive stretching, active stretching, and myofascial release techniques.

During the session she was telling me that she was mainly worried that her progress is going well enough and she thought that she would have to get another surgery to manually break up the scar tissue that had been built up, falling victim to similar worries as my mom. She was comparing herself, her progress, to people online and worried that her progression wasn’t fast enough or adequate. I reassured her that her scar looked very well healed, she was walking fairly well (a little limping is to be expected at this point), and to continue putting in the effort because it will pay off. It is easy to eternalize the pain and recovery process, to think that we can’t do things that we could before, things feel different and they will always be this way, and to fall into a depressive state. I recommended to her and to anyone else going through a similar problem, to break up your goals into small achievable steps, whether its an extra two and a half degrees, extending your leg further, reducing the amount of medication needed because the pain is less, or being able to use that body part for more activities. This way we feel small rewards and a sense of moving forward instead of looking at the end goal, becoming overwhelmed and feeling sad. Afterwards she was sore but, two days later she noticed she had slightly more range (five degrees extra) and a week later the swelling in her leg had decreased (noticeably).

When she went into her second and last post-op, she was telling the doctor that she was starting to feel really sad and hopeless and the packets that they give before surgery should talk more about options to help the emotional support side of post-surgical recovery. The doctor even admitted that a patient had recently told him that they had never felt more depressed in their life. I think that there is a big lack of support and resources given to people after they have a surgery. All that is usually given is several weeks of PT and the person is on their own unless they have problems and need to come back for another surgery, which who really wants to do? I think that massage, or psychological therapy should really be a part of treatment after surgeries to help calm the nerves of patients and give them some relief (physically and mentally). All of these different facets of support would completely change the recovery time of people that have had a surgery and keep them from falling into a depression and demise state.

Overall, after our first session she gained 5 extra degrees to go from 100 to 105 in her flexion of her knee. She feels slightly more hopeful and has decreased the amount of medication she needs because her pain has decreased. She has been doing her homework of massaging across her scar tissue and now to do some tapping along the surgical areas and we are working on bringing more sensitivity back to numb areas around her leg. Massage should 100% be a part of every post-op recovery for people for their relief and sanity. The majority of massage therapists are upbeat and are empaths who can work along with people to reconnect their body to the new piece of equipment that is a part of them now.