Therapeutic Relationship Flashcards
The use of physical tension to support psychological defenses. When massage reduces tension, tissues soften, and armoring comes undone. As a result, people may come into full contact with their repressed or deflected feelings and experience an emotional release.
Armoring
A psychological defense that involves ignoring or turning away from stimuli that trigger emotions in order to prevent recognition, or full awareness of, the material associated with the emotion. For example, a client might talk continually during a massage session to avoid paying too much attention to his or her feelings brought about by massage, etc.
Deflection
A psychological defense that involves the outright refusal to acknowledge something that has occurred or is occurring. For example, a client might deny that a technique is painful or that feelings are arising during bodywork. A client might deny that a lifestyle choice is impeding healing from a soft-tissue injury, etc.
Denial
The ability to observe one’s own feelings and emotions and those of others, to differentiate among them, and utilize them to direct thoughts and behavior.
Emotional intelligence
Skilled, purposeful, respectful touch that holds healing intent.
Ethical professional touch
The practitioner’s duty during a session is to uphold ethical standards of behavior, not work outside the massage therapy scope of practice, and provide a nonjudgmental environment where clients feel safe. Practitioners should refer clients to other health-care professionals when client’s needs exceed the limits of the massage therapy scope of practice.
Practitioner responsibilities
Positively representing the massage profession by maintaining standards of practice and demonstrating ethical behavior.
Professional conduc
A psychological defense that involves the unconscious transfer of feelings, impulses, or thoughts to someone else. For example, a client might project an unrealistic expectation that one session of massage will solve years of cumulative stress, or a client might confer his/her power to heal from a condition onto a massage therapist, etc.
Projection
Mental processes that enable the mind to deal with conflicts it can’t resolve. Every person learns some type of psychological defense from normal experiences of life. Common psychological defenses that occur during massage sessions include suppression, denial, projection, deflection, resistance, and armoring.
Psychological defenses
A psychological defense that involves an unconscious opposition to the therapeutic process related to a client’s feeling that change, even change perceived as desirable, is threatening. This psychological defense may show up as missed appointments, cancelled appointments, a seeming unwillingness to participate in self-care, and other behaviors.
Resistance
A psychological defense that involves the conscious pushing down of anxiety-producing ideas, urges, desires, feelings, or memories. For example, the client may recognize a tender feeling during a massage session, but tenses muscles and actively dismisses the feeling in order to avoid expressing or showing sadness during the massage.
Suppression
The intent to promote healing and overall benefit for the client.
Therapeutic intent
A professional partnership between therapist and client where safe, structured touch helps the client achieve reasonable, well-defined goals.
Therapeutic relationship
A client who claims to be committed to weekly massage, but then constantly cancels at the last minute is exhibiting what type of defense?
Resistance
Sometimes clients perceive change, even desirable change, as threatening. This might result in the psychological defense of:
Resistance
