SPEAKER_03 0:00

I think one of the most surprising and one of my favorite parts of starting a new business is getting to know lots of different people in the community and different businesses and learning from them. And so we have a special guest today, Melissa Traiger. And she was one of the first people that I met when I started this practice. And I believe I found you online. I think I just found your website.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

Really?

SPEAKER_03 0:24

And I thought she looks really kind of cool. And I feel like I need a connection with a physical therapist. And so I think I just, I believe I just cold emailed you. And that's how we got connected.

SPEAKER_02 0:35

Yeah. And I had just moved here to Ada from Ann Arbor. And I was looking for my people as well. So anyone new in the, you know, the holistic but m medical realm, I was trying to meet. So anyone who reached out, I was like, yes, I would like to meet you. And you and Jana were, you know, one of the first. And that is what kind of came of what happened with renting a room from you so that I can work alongside, but you know, also for the people of Ada, I suppose it's a nice central area. It's a great spot. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:10

And I know I think you were looking at multiple places, and I was like, you should come here. We're the best option.

SPEAKER_02 1:16

Yes. And ultimately I did just because it was. It was really the best option. I love the location and I love how you know it is central, but it is also nice and quiet. And you gave me a room with a view. I know. You do have a nice room. It is a very nice room. And it's, you know, it's all I need. It's not like your typical PT clinic that, you know, a lot of people will know and uh maybe not love or love, but you know, that's just the way that I made my own business, just like you made your own.

SPEAKER_03 1:45

Yeah. And I think that is uh that leads really nicely into kind of what you do and how you do it. Because I think you do physical therapy a bit different than some people. And so we would love to hear kind of what got like, because you didn't start out as a physical therapist, right? I did not. So I'd love to hear kind of how your progression into that. Sure.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

That'll be a whole, a whole thing. But uh, so I started off not really knowing what I wanted to do with my life in college, as many people probably say. And after that, I always knew I wanted to work with my hands. I went to massage school. So I moved to the big city of Chicago and I went to massage school and loved it. And I worked uh alongside a chiropractor for a couple a good couple of years until every massage therapist probably knows this. But there's a thing called burnout. I suppose every other medical practitioner also can feel it too. But um, I loved working with my hands, but I also missed the side of it where you put exercise into it. So I actually became a personal trainer for a hot second. Yeah, it's not, it's a relatively a blip on the radar. Uh, I think I was a personal trainer for about a year and a half, and I really like the corrective side of exercise versus the uh performance side or the doing it for aesthetics. So that's where I was, I kind of landed there and I just decided that was not for me. All the while I was still doing massage therapy. I was still a body worker. So after that, I said, all right, my next foray was into um physical therapy as a tech. So an exercise tech.

SPEAKER_04 3:23

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

So while I worked for kind of a mom and pop business, uh, this was now over 15 years, maybe 15 years ago, um, I was their go-to person after a physical therapist would do their manual therapy, I would take them and go into the exercise portion of what the PTs dictated. So after, you know, a gosh, maybe like two months of doing that, I was like, I can do what they're doing with their hands, but I'm just a lowly massage therapist. Although massage therapists are not lowly at all, I am a proponent of that. But I was just like, how do I make this happen? So I had to, like after being out of school for like traditional school for so long, I had to go through the whole like GRE process and you know, all the applications, because I wanted to go to PT school and be like these, you know, PTs that were doing manual therapy on their own terms, kind of in a small business. So after getting accepted, I had to move from Chicago to Dayton, Ohio. And yeah, University of Dayton and uh GoFlyers. That was where I spent, you know, my three years of the DPT process, you know, getting the degree. Because I ultimately already had a lot of experience in hands-on like bodywork. Uh customer service is a huge thing. And you wouldn't know it uh until you have been in it, that it's actually a really helpful tool. Yeah. For, you know, after getting out of PT school as someone who was already in the workforce, uh, I kind of jumped right in and I was like, all right, this is pretty cool and comfortable that I'm doing what I want to do. I went back and I worked at the place where I got inspired to go to PT school. So I moved back to Chicago. I went to work with the people who I was inspired by, which was like ideal. And then uh I got to do a lot of their training in manual therapy. So that's kind of the buzzword that a lot of people will be like, okay, well, what does that mean? Because massage is one thing, manual therapy is another thing, except it's a very big umbrella term that kind of massages a little, it's like under it. So it's within the realm. So I would say I already had a leg up on that, but the other manual therapy techniques that I was learning from these continuing education courses from um the PTs that I was inspired by uh in Chicago were it was deeper. It was just deeper and more systematic. So you kind of have to get a groundwork and a protocol at first, and then you can grow kind of your intuition about what a patient needs. And that's what I did within those two years I worked for them. I got a lot of mentorship, I got a lot of experience, and then we moved to Michigan. So I had to find a new place to work.

SPEAKER_03 6:13

And then jump and side note, I think it's great that you didn't know what you wanted to do and you just tried different things and like learned what you want to do. It's okay to not know, right?

SPEAKER_01 6:23

100%. I think so. I'm not using my degree in any way.

SPEAKER_02 6:28

Exactly. I mean, everything I have done has built up to being useful in what I'm doing now. But yeah, I uh I commend anyone who just sort of uses what they have or not and what they want to.

SPEAKER_01 6:41

It's always a fun one too, where uh dad's always quoted on this, which is like it's when it comes to career path in this whole world, and especially going to jump in the workforce, you learn just as much out of a job or experience that you didn't like as much as you found something you enjoy. Oh, yeah. Like it it navigates you to the same point. So don't feel bad where it's like, hey, I did this. It w it had pieces I liked about it, but I'm gonna pivot because that's not exactly what I want to do. Right.

SPEAKER_02 7:09

Yeah. And since then, again, I found my spot in Ann Arbor when I worked there. And then ultimately, who knows what was the driving force? But I was like, I can do this on my own, and I don't really want to go through insurance anymore. Uh-huh. So that is the jump that I made in 2021 to go off on my own and do my business the way I wanted to do it. So was this right when you moved to Ann Arbor, or did you work for somebody in Ann Arbor first? I did. I worked for someone in Ann Arbor for a solid, gosh, I was with them for a good five years. There was a little in between, like where they still wanted me to help out uh while I was building my business. So they were great in, you know, accepting my path, which was like not the story that a lot of people have in switching from a, you know, an insurance-based clinic to their own cash-based clinic. So I had support, and that was very helpful in my uh foray into cash-based PT. So that's when I started my business called Rhapsody of Motion, which is a very whimsical term, but I love music and I wanted something musical in my business night.

SPEAKER_03 8:20

So and I don't think I knew until maybe this past few months that Melissa does open mic nights. She's a singer and a pianist and a guitarist. I need to come see you sing.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

Yes. I love it. It's like it's a new I've played music for a long time. I've I started singing a few years ago. I took lessons out of just being kind of bored and wanting to do something to challenge myself. That's right. And then I got placed with a band um in Ann Arbor, and we've been out together ever since. And now I just do it on my own now that I live here. So I have an acoustic guitar, a keyboard, and a mic, and you know, that's all I really need. So I've started to go into a lot more music while I'll obviously focusing on my the bodywork of rhapsody of motion.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Love it. Fascinating.

SPEAKER_02 9:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

She is well rounded. So then you started the practice out there, cash pay, just from your lens on that, making that adjustment. What were the big pain points and what was the big shift on why you went from an insurance-based model, which pretty much everyone understands, to that cash pay?

SPEAKER_02 9:28

Oh yeah. So honestly, I just knew that the people who needed me were going to find me and they would be okay with paying up front and saying being honest that, yeah, I don't think insurance is going to probably reimburse you, but here is a receipt in case you want to try. So there was kind of like an easy um way to say it's not it's a little scary sometimes to be like, oh, I'm just paying all this up front and I have no chance of being reimbursed. And I say, you know, it's sometimes people do get reimbursed. It just depends on your plan. So the people who do really, really, really want to talk about the insurance part of it, I I give them as much advice as I can. I give them the information and the receipts that I can. But generally, once people feel what I do, they're like, okay, that's that's that's all I need to know. And I will climb back and as often as I need to, which again, I as a PT, you never want someone to rely on you forever. However, as a body worker, I want to be able to help people forever and be kind of like the, oh, I'm the, you know, the puppet master of how your body can continue the longevity of whatever goals or activities you want to continue. Because the body, you know, it for all of us, myself included, it it does sometimes break down a bit until something goes wrong and you're like, I didn't even realize that that's where it was coming from, or someone could help with that through manual therapy, which is what I do, or sometimes I say, I'm not afraid to say, I don't know, I think you might need to see someone else, um, like more of an exercise-based or performance-based PT. I have, you know, an ability to kind of see or f figure out that they might need someone else, not just me, or maybe not me at all.

SPEAKER_03 11:19

So that's the good thing to do. I mean, I think it's so great when people can say this is not my area of expertise. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

Well, it's it's the someone who's actually and especially when it comes to but there's there's a there's a point in my mind where people that fall into the insurance model and lean in on the insurance model, number one how compensation tends to work is it's a volume game. And so you have to do huge amounts of people, which if from the experience of Lara, from the experience of Jana, probably from the same experience of you, when you're doing volume, you lose empathy, you lose connection because it's like I gotta see seven of you today. I guess I'm okay if two of you don't see results because I need seven and I'm kind of accepting this.

SPEAKER_02 12:06

Yeah, numbers game.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

It's a numbers game. And so that kind of that that expectation of of getting the outcome kind of changes in an insurance model where it's like cash model, it's they're paying me directly to see results. I care about this person. I'm seeing less people for this reason, and I want to make sure that if I'm going to be offering my services, I'm getting the again the results. The dynamic changes.

SPEAKER_02 12:32

Oh yeah. And it's something that I it took a little bit of figuring out, um, and you know, trusting yourself and not having imposter syndrome too aggressively for you to say, like, okay, yeah, I I am pretty good at this. So just trust that and people will feel the difference. And, you know, I am one of those people, I will make it right if it's not the difference that they are looking for. So that's the customer service that comes into it. It's like, you know, I am I recognize that not everything goes perfectly, but if there's something positive that comes from a session, then that's a that's a positive, obviously.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

So healthcare's funny like that. So she physicians, like dad like dad's already talking like that, that whole dynamic too, where it's it's you're s someone spent a decade learning a skill, and correct me if I'm wrong, bedside manner is not a high on the list.

SPEAKER_03 13:30

It depends on where you go.

SPEAKER_01 13:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:32

And it depends on what field you're in. Yeah. So like I went to Michigan State and they were much more focused on the interactions with the patient, and they did a lot more than a lot of other schools will do. But that's great. I know. So they were more focused, and but then you go into a surgical specialty, they're as residents, they're not gonna focus on that. So typically not that I had experience in surgery, but that's just like now what they're focused on.

SPEAKER_01 14:00

I feel like that's the general expectation everyone kind of understands.

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Yeah, yeah. And it's sad. Like I hear these stories from patients who have gone to a lot of doctors and not gotten answers. And I don't promise answers, but at least I have the time to sit there and listen. And sometimes that is therapeutic enough.

SPEAKER_03 14:19

Oh, it so is. I agree with you. Now, um, you mentioned manual therapy and body work several times. Can you tell us more what you mean by that and what that what that means?

SPEAKER_02 14:28

Yeah, so manual therapy, again, albeit kind of redundant, the umbrella term of manual therapy is kind of the buzzword that you'll see all out there and be like, what does that even what does that even mean? And in the terms of what I do, there are a lot of technical terms that I try not to like spout out for my patients or for just anyone listening. But anything that involves your hands being on the person, the patient, whoever, uh can be soft tissue, which is like skin, fascia, muscle, all of anything under like the realm of connective tissue can be mobilized or moved around, agitated to the point of hopeful change, that they have a window of opportunity to feel different, feel better, feel more motion. So that's one aspect of manual therapy is soft tissue. Then there's a lot of um joint mobilization, so you can move joints around and help them move easier if they're stiff. Uh, but sometimes you need to use manual therapy to almost help them feel where they are in space so they know how to stabilize, because another kind of a buzzword that's out there a lot more, because it's getting more play, which is a good thing, is hypermobility, which is almost harder to treat because it's not all about manual therapy of digging in and mobilizing and moving things around. You actually want to have your hands on them to stabilize. So I still put that under the realm of manual therapy. So it can be joints, soft tissue, muscles. Sometimes you'll hear it called myofascial release, um, trigger point therapy, which again, body work. I mean, I had all of this massage experience before becoming a manual therapist that I still pull from the experience of being a massage therapist, uh, because it's an additive thing. I've been doing it for 18 years, almost 20 years, I like to say. But um but manual therapy, I'm trying to think of there's you know other trains of thought or things I haven't covered, but generally anything you can touch can be manual therapy can be applied to.

SPEAKER_03 16:41

So when a patient comes to you and walks in and starts working with you, how is it different than going to the whole steps in down the road?

SPEAKER_02 16:49

Sure. I am not positive of how they work, but I imagine that it's that they get maybe 10, 20 minutes with a patient and then they do their exercises, which again is a great model for volume for when you do need to go through insurance, which is very viable. But when you're with me, you're on my massage table the entire time with my hands working on you, trying to figure out where these restrictions are coming from. So if restriction is not that fancy of a term, but it just means I feel something. And usually it gives the person like, wow, you feel it too. So they're almost like solidified in that I feel what they're feeling. So they get a bit more trust in that I can tell like there's something happening and I can help with it because I'm very targeted. If you have heard uh any stories about how my patients describe what I do, it might be a little torturous.

SPEAKER_00 17:44

I was I was gonna say, I'm like, there's there's probably a dance here.

SPEAKER_02 17:48

Yes. And that's the other positive of having the experience of starting with massage is that you do have to kind of invite yourself to be, you know, trusted by the person on your table, the patient on the table to be worked on. And it doesn't, it can't start off with an elbow as hard as you can.

SPEAKER_01 18:05

So I've done a couple of massages in my life, not many. One of the biggest reasons why I struggle with it is I literally tell almost every single massage therapist, if I don't tap out, I don't like, I don't feel like it was a good quality massage. Ah, and so I and You're one of those. Yeah, I'm like, I if if I don't feel like my soul is leaving my body. It wasn't good enough.

SPEAKER_02 18:29

Absolutely a hundred percent. I yes, those are cases where I will see and I'd be like, why? But and I will also say a lot of times it's because it needs to be more specific pressure and massage is very general in the reason uh the ways that it should be. Um but sometimes you have to delve into the the cavernous, like bony landmarks that you know I know I would not trust any or need anyone to know themselves. Like tell my patients, I'm not gonna test you on all this stuff I'm spouting out. Like I'm just gonna recite the anatomy because it helps me kind of like integrate what I'm feeling and it makes sense of it for me and maybe my patient on the table, but they just know they appreciate the information while it's happening so that you know the reason why I'm being either not so deep or I'm going very deep and it's not quite that comfortable. But you if you want to leave your if you want to have your soul leave your body, that sometimes it just needs to be a bit more specific of a or intentional of a uh technique or or something of that sort.

SPEAKER_01 19:40

Well, it's like um funny enough, when I last time a year ago when I threw my back out, because like for example, uh I have hypermobility problems. So like I think a lot of because I've gone to a couple different PTs in the past and they were always blown away by my mobility and that leading into potentially a lot of the problems I'd have had like harming myself on because the flexion extension I can go through in so many joints is above what most people can do, especially for my size and muscle mass and all that kind of stuff. And so, but when I was down in Florida, when I uh I th I like my general uh process, I throw my back out once a year. It's like the general what happens. Last year, when it happened, I was down in Florida and at the time I actually met a physical therapy I met a uh massage therapist down there, probably the best I've ever been with.

SPEAKER_04 20:30

Good.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

And she brought up burnout, and she had been a massage therapist for I think it was like 13, 14 years, which she told me the average is like six.

SPEAKER_02 20:39

Yeah, it's not very long.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

And uh, I think one of the reasons why she's huge into elbows and saving your hands uh was like what she kind of talked about. But she was really passionate about the whole process and she was talking me through it the whole the whole time. And I still can't I still never forget what she's doing. I I explained to her the low back is the problem, but obviously, you know, just because something's low back doesn't mean it's low back.

SPEAKER_02 21:03

Sure, sure.

SPEAKER_01 21:04

And she was just testing her out. Then she goes, How are your hamstrings? And I'm like, I think they're fine. Yeah, and then all of a sudden she presses mid-handstrings, oh I was like, Oh, maybe maybe there is something.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

I have no idea. It's so it I love, I love what I do, obviously, and people can see that. But when that happens, like bringing realization to some place in your body, you had no idea what was going on. And you're like, oh, maybe that has some sense of why this low back thing keeps happening because these haven't been addressed. And if things happen like once a year for throwing out your back, maybe something if some change is implemented to the hamstring specifically or whatever the need needs to be, uh, does that stop the cycle? So bringing realization to things that you would never have even known to look at, because that's not your job, that's a professional's job. Uh, and then trying to get a plan to address. It, which is the challenge for manual therapists, is that I am a lot like a lot of times I know that manual therapy is not the end-all be-all for anyone or everyone. It's a stepping stone to getting to the next level of what maybe corrective exercise or retraining or activity modulation needs to happen. You know, I love doing posture retraining, um helping people actually engage muscles in the way that they're like, wow, I didn't realize I wasn't using my core or my hip stabilizers or my rotator cuff. Like it's just people don't realize until things go, you know, the wrong direction.

SPEAKER_03 22:40

Because I think I feel like most people when you go to a physical therapist, you go there, they do an evaluation where they will put their hands on you to some degree. Yeah. And then yeah. And then they like put you on the table and give you some exercises to do. And so that is not your patient's experience at all.

SPEAKER_02 23:01

I would say I start off for like a new patient. I'll do like the usual PT measurements. I'll see what their range of motion is, I'll see what their strength is. I'll, you know, try to look head to toe, even though if their symptoms are located in one part, I'll focus on that first. Like, of course, you have to give the people what they want until you then say, well, maybe it's from somewhere totally different. But yes, first I will do kind of traditional things, but I won't start with exercise. Uh I'll start with the manual therapy and then test and retest. Say, did that help your range of motion if you're stiff? Did it help your strength if you're weak? Because manual therapy or releases, I guess, is what I'll say, even though it's not acting. Release is kind of like a term that doesn't really make sense sometimes. I like to work on muscles and actually activate them and then say, did that actually make you use your muscle better so you actually appear stronger? So a lot of people are not actually weak in what they test weak for, but they are inhibited. So they need to be activated. And sometimes it's manual therapy, sometimes it's neuromuscular retraining, which is another buzzword. Sorry. It's just I have no uh alternative. Yeah, I'm like trying to figure out how I just want people to learn how to turn on their muscles correctly, correct timing, so that it helps prevent the stress on whatever is the stress point or the pain generating tissue. If it's a local tissue, if it's from the nervous system, sometimes that's systemic or systematic, and that's a little harder to sure.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

I was I was thinking about it where it's like we've been in this body for 20, 30, 40 years, and you'd think that I've been walking this whole time. I'm doing it right. And then all of a sudden some PT goes, all right, technically, yes, you are walking, but you're gonna hurt X, Y, and Z doing that, but you are completely unaware of that because yes, while yes, you are moving your feet and you're moving in a direction, the way you're doing it is going to I think at the time my mom uh years ago went through foot drop. Um so she actually had what was called plexopathy. Uh-huh. Um, super rare. It was actually our best understanding was it was secondary to shingles. Oh and it was causing this, like, so like she was having she was losing feeling in her legs, burning sensations, power loss. She had a foot drop, so she had like the big old cast thing.

SPEAKER_02 25:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:25

And she went to a PT, and this PT was and she was doing what she could based upon her situation. The PT's like, you keep walking like that, you're gonna you're gonna take out your hip, and the hip's gonna take out your back, and you you can't do that. She said, Well, it gets me to move. And it's like, that's great, but it's gonna lead to all these problems down the road, right? And then my favorite one too is from a golfing reference. It's like Lara's right now, we're working on how to sequence correctly to put herself in the right position to be able to hit the ball. And then all of a sudden, like she'll see a video of herself, and she's like, I don't feel like I'm doing that. And she'll get frustrated going, you you're not you gotta release your hips before you move your hands. And it's it's that whole game of I'm in this body every day. How can I not feel this?

SPEAKER_02 26:12

Right. Yeah, no, and go, gosh, uh, golf swing is complex, but it is, and good on you for you know, starting off because you started I started last year.

SPEAKER_03 26:23

Last year, pretty much pretty good, yeah. Yeah, David's trying to make me better. You're gonna very frustrating.

SPEAKER_02 26:29

Yeah, oh it is, it's a very frustrating game. I love it, but it's frustrating. I am oh yeah. I can drive the ball, great, and everything else, not so good. Yeah, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:41

So you probably so from my point of view, it's a whole tangent, but there's usually there tends to be two types of golfers. Golfers that are really good at hitting down on the ball, which means they're probably good iron players, and then golfers that love to swing up on the ball, which means they can hit a good driver. You love to swing. I'm at the driveway. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:58

We power through. You know, it's so fun to see it sail. Right.

SPEAKER_03 27:03

Then that's all about all I can do.

SPEAKER_02 27:05

Yeah. So I love a good scramble.

SPEAKER_03 27:07

Yeah, that's definitely the way to go for me too. But um, yes, we obviously are gonna end up talking about golf if David's around. That's just that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

I'm I'm here for it.

SPEAKER_03 27:17

But I do think activating muscles on that point. Um, I have learned since starting lifting more. After a couple of years, I realized I wasn't activating my lats or my glutes very well. And so it is hard to learn then how to do that correctly. Right.

SPEAKER_02 27:32

Because you can't just say, oh, you just have to activate your glutes. Just do it. Just do it. And or like do these exercises that are technically like lap pull down or like glute, whatever, squats, whatever you want to work your glutes with. If they're inhibited and you keep doing the exercises, that's still not gonna really do the trick. So a lot of times you will have to do something right right before to activate it and say, like, oh, do I need to roll it out on a foam roller or something really quick? Or do I need to, you know, techni I wouldn't say stretch, but dynamic warm-ups and things of that sort, like going back to like personal training lingo, um, are the ways to kind of get the pathways to talk to your muscles from the nerves a bit more freely so that you have it accessible for when you're doing like big lifts, like heavy things.

SPEAKER_03 28:18

They should be warming up more.

SPEAKER_02 28:20

I know. It's so it's hard to practice what I preach too. So I know it is, it's one of those things. But you know, yes.

SPEAKER_03 28:28

Okay, noted. I'll try to.

SPEAKER_02 28:29

And it doesn't have to be like a whole thing. It's like two minutes. Maybe. Like if you just want to do it.

SPEAKER_01 28:35

Just I just do my old I for my low back, I do my my hip mobility. Um low I call my old man stretches. And just that little 90-second, two-minute helps enough that I don't have those issues as much. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

That's true. Yeah, so it is. It's like it's like the story that people don't really want to hear, or the the answer sometimes that people don't want to hear.

SPEAKER_01 28:57

I just want to lift heavyweight and put it back down.

SPEAKER_02 28:58

Like, oh, why do I have to warm up? I know it is. I I understand completely.

SPEAKER_03 29:03

No, um, we what are like the main or like uh what are the best kind of conditions or problems for what you do?

SPEAKER_02 29:12

Honestly, anyone who has gone through the traditional and still tr traditional PT um model and still is having some struggles with pain, symptoms, weakness, um or just inability to do what they want to do generally with like an activity, like pickleball, tennis, running, like sports, yeah, is like a huge thing that people want to play forever. And anything that can contribute to their longevity of doing that, I will do. But um I'm trying to think what was the question again.

SPEAKER_03 29:46

Is that what were like the best condition or like the most the conditions or the problems that your type of therapy addresses the best?

SPEAKER_02 29:53

Okay. Generally I would I would probably get to go back to anyone who has chronic issues like headaches. A lot of neck. Oh gosh, I will go into every little nook and cranny of the neck and seek out all those muscles and whatever tissues might be contributing. Because there are a lot of, you know, I'll say trigger points or referral patterns or radiating pain that comes from places in the neck that create headaches and or just even just you know, a lot of other things, jaw pain that it can make upper back, like you think that your shoulder blades are the problem and it's actually your neck and all these little things that I guess I would say it's hard to explain because I'd have to go into a whole reason of why I have I'm working on your neck to help this because the nerves that come off of your spinal cord, blah, blah, blah, feed into those. Uh someone has to come work with you to find out. Right. But no, I mean it literally anyone head to toe who has any kind of symptom that they are not getting relief from, and they've just been dealing it with it for long enough. And they're like, all right, I you can ignore it, or you can have someone at least shed light. Sure. And that's what I love to do because I will see a lot of people who don't have technically diagnoses that can be fixed. They have like autoimmune, they have rheumatology type of uh symptoms or diagnoses. And I I never promise anyone, I'm gonna fix you with my manual therapy. I'm going to help you. I'm going to help you manage and maintain whatever we can with the, you know, the manual therapy that I'll do, the manual retraining that I'll do. Um, but it's such a general term of you know, or a general way of saying that's what that's who needs to find me is like anyone from head to toe. Well, that's everyone.

SPEAKER_03 31:46

Well, is then is everything you don't do? Like, are you like, hey, I won't do this?

SPEAKER_02 31:50

I the vestibular system. So anyone with vertigo or uh It's not you. It's not me. It's boy, oh boy, was that a hard module in PT school? Because it is over my head. And I will no tell people that right away. I'm like, I'm gonna find you a vestibular therapist. That is like, I think that's the only one that you don't I don't do. I don't see. Because I do pelvic floor, I do orthopedics, and that is that spans literally a lot. A lot. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 32:20

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 32:21

So I I I like a challenge, so I do like the complexity, you know, the complex, you know, patients who find me.

SPEAKER_01 32:28

What's the what's the dynamic of especially when it comes to since you're with more manual therapy, and correct me if I'm wrong, one thing that's nice about it is like you said, it's you can get a direct uh reaction, like when you're working through someone's body, everything's fine, everything's fine. Oh, that's not fine. And so if you get something like that from a male to female perspective, do you find uh what's what's some of the dynamic changes between the two that you've experienced when it comes to dealing with patients? You find that men and women treat the process differently. Um is there something you have to look at from uh like for example, uh a toxic trait that a lot of men will always say, I'm fine, I'm fine. Where it's like they're not, but they'll act like everything's fine. And then as soon as you hit that point, they'll fight to not act like it hurts. But how do or at least that's from my ignorance, how what's how's that process like?

SPEAKER_02 33:23

You can kind of tell on the table, like you're I'm trained to to see the reaction without actually like maybe they're face down and I can't see their face. You can tell. You can tell. And my hands can tell. Like I don't even have to think anymore. I put my hands and I'm working and I'm like, oh, this is gonna hurt. So I'm gonna dig in and see what happens. And uh maybe that's a little sinister, but but it's for a good cause. Like I tell people over and over I use my powers for good, even though it might not feel very good, but it's supposed to be productive. And that's always, you know, the story or the intention that I like to tell people. But um, between like males and females, there are some females that I like women that I will work on so deeply and they don't even flinch. And I'm like, oh, I don't think I could take that. Although I'm kind of a a wimp with that type of stuff. Um, and then there are some males and guys who will see like I will be also like putting all my body weight into it. So it really there's depends it the classic PT thing. Oh, it depends. So it it's not a it's not definitely a gender thing for sure. It's like it's just it's like a nervous system thing. The people who I've seen for now I've been on my own for five years. I go to Ann Arbor and I see these long-term patients who have felt what I do, they're so used to it. You build up a tolerance. So the people who I I will start with, they're like, I don't know if I can do this. I'm with them five years later, and we've prevented joint replacements for however long. We've helped them, you know, be able to not be in pain every single day, or help them walk for exercise instead of just like go getting from point A to point B. So I like um starting off and seeing, like, oh, if a patient's really trying to not feel the pain and trying to hide it from me, they won't, they will not. And but then once I get working with them and I do the same exact thing, they're like, oh, remember when that felt so awful? And now I'm doing more. And it feels like, oh, I can just relax through it. So it is, it's your nervous system learning to withstand these hands. And the power. And uh the power is for good. And I would say it's um it's really fun to see the difference of how people tolerate it over time and how they do really it does change it, even though I don't claim that manual therapy is the end-all be-all. It's it's my favorite thing to see the change because it's undeniable when it's happening in front of me.

SPEAKER_01 36:02

Aaron Powell What's the general cadence like obviously just like so many things, depends on the situation. But when you when you're looking at when you when you're working with a new patient and that whole progression, what because obviously you're talking about you go to Ann Arbor occasionally to see your older the your more prolonged patients. Yeah, what's that timeline between those kind of sequences?

SPEAKER_02 36:23

Aaron Powell It can be I can still see them from once a week to once a month, to once every six months, to you know, sometimes there was someone who found me from when I worked at the PT clinic in insurance base who found me years later. And I saw them and just once, and sometimes it's just a one-time thing. And that is kind of the the way I like to play it is like it's a choose your own adventure. You're not looped in or like wrapped into a two times a week, three times a week, because that'd get way too expensive. Um and I recognize that. So I try to say, okay, we're gonna use this as a one-by-one. Like I don't schedule like a whole plan. I will say, okay, let's do one at a time, because I keep my schedule flexible enough that I can, I'm not going to like not be able to see you if you need to see me next week, or no, let's wait two weeks. Let's wake it a month and we check in because it's like a more of a relationship where you are not, it's more, well, it's just me with my business. So you call, text, email me, and it's kind of a you know, it's very friendly that I just like I'd rather be people always think that they're bothering you. And I'm like, You're not bothering me. I can troubleshoot on the fly, and you don't always have to have a session. It's sometimes like as easy as that. So having it be more like, again, it's concierge, right? I was I was waiting for it.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

I was just like, it's concierge PT.

SPEAKER_03 37:45

Yeah, what I said is like what it is. What you said is a lot, I feel like we've talked about this where a lot of people will first of all promise that they can fix whatever, which they probably can't, right? Um, and then they always have a program or something that and I've always said, and I've talked to you about this, David, that like people aren't programs, right? And they aren't gonna all fit in this nice little box. So having a program or, you know, a system that everyone goes through just isn't realistic.

SPEAKER_02 38:16

Right. And that's the cookie cutter thing that I just yes, it's helpful when you're learning things and you're thinking, oh, this helped this person, so it's gonna help all these people. Uh not so much. You have to see the person in front of you and feel what's going on. And then you choose what's your next, what's your next move? And sometimes it's the same as the protocol. And it's not always. It's not always. And you after being in the the biz for how how long, um you just get a sense, an intuition, which is, I know, a little bit more like woo-hoo. But there's truth to that. It's truth if you feel it.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

You sit there and go, well, it there's also the uh the level of the the term has still stayed true and people that kind of say it, but you practice medicine or you practice a uh manual therapy. It's something that has you can't take away like the this art form experiential side to it. And there we've come to this day and age where everything is SOP systems driven, and it's like there's so many holes in that because there is a intuitive art experiential lens that you can't put ones and zeros to.

SPEAKER_03 39:29

100%. Absolutely. Yeah, I think it's very true. I love it. Yes. Good job, David. Good job. Love that.

SPEAKER_01 39:36

I uh that's all I got. That's all I got. That was great.

SPEAKER_03 39:39

Any other questions for Melissa you had?

SPEAKER_01 39:41

No, that was fantastic. It was good to know like the experiential side of how um obviously uh massage therapy into so like so f I guess from a personal perspective, yeah. If I like the idea of I want to feel my soul leave my body doing massage like a massage, what does your gut intuition say about the my current skeletal muscular system?

SPEAKER_02 40:05

Um I think there's probably something at in the depths that need to be that needs to be uncovered with it would just require more specificity versus a general like elbow. I love using an elbow when it's you know a bigger area, but there are such and all PTs are kind of like this. We all kind of seek and destroy the small, not destroy, seek to help the the small stabilizer muscles that sometimes you just don't even know exist because again, that's not your job. It's for us. It's our when someone would like come to me and say, like, uh you can give me all your pressure, I'm like, okay, let's see. Let's see how it goes. And um, and sometimes, yes, I can. It's just it helps the person on the table kind of realize, oh, I didn't realize it was just a a general feeling of wanting the soul to leave your body when you feel these these hard techniques. It's wow, there's something really that is restricted there that I you probably had the intuition that there is something a little bit like deeper in there, and you just need someone to get to it in a way that you think that pressure, just all out pressure is the only way to get it, and it might not be, and it may be, who knows?

SPEAKER_01 41:19

But that's just it is it's I could I could believe it, where it's like so many people, it's well, w worst comes to worst, just it's about more. And sometimes less is more if it's specific.

SPEAKER_03 41:29

Correct.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_03 41:30

Yes, yes. Well, David, you know where to find her.

SPEAKER_01 41:34

I know. Thank you for thank you for being on here because after because after a year of plus here of just saying, Hey, how's it going? I know.

SPEAKER_02 41:41

Now you know her a little better. Yep, yep. I am here and I will, you know, give you a little trial in case you get anything I can.

SPEAKER_00 41:48

I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 41:49

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:49

I did it for I got it for trial. Yep, yep, yeah. Um you should should do it so you can start starting telling everybody about her. Right?

SPEAKER_02 41:59

We'll we'll see.

SPEAKER_01 42:00

And also it's the most simple thing.

SPEAKER_03 42:02

You're like, ah, you know. Well, uh David knows where to find you, but w how can anybody else find you?

SPEAKER_02 42:07

I am freely uh communicated with with throughout my website. So my website is probably the easiest way to fill out the contact form. My website or I'm sorry, my email is on there, my number that you can call, text, leave voicemail, and I generally try to get back to people within a day, unless I was uh you know on vacation recently. But um with that, it's yeah, email number my number or fill out the website contact form. And yeah, Rhapsody of Motion.com.

SPEAKER_03 42:38

You do have an Instagram too, don't you?

SPEAKER_02 42:39

I do, yes. It's linked to the website. So it's it's all Rhapsody of Motion. I love the name. Yeah, it's fun.

SPEAKER_01 42:45

That's super cool. Yeah, I love it. Well, it was a pleasure for you to be on the show.

SPEAKER_03 42:49

Thank you for having me. Thank you. And uh we'll send David your way for a trial here soon.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

Oh, I'm scared.

SPEAKER_03 42:55

Boy, should be.

SPEAKER_01 42:57

All right, beautiful people. Have a phenomenal day, and we'll talk to you all later.