Massage therapist Pam Schrader, of Red Bank, says an exercise ball at the massage table is quieter and more fun than a stool.
Photo by Hannah CampbellMassage therapist Pam Schrader, of Red Bank, says her hands are a divining agent in her craft.
“They’re sensitive and they know how to feel,” she said. “I can feel temperature differences and things that are not quite normal,” she said, like “boggy” muscles.
Schrader opened her office 18 months ago inside The Wellness Pharmacy on Jarnigan Road, owned by chemical compounder Randy Davis, of East Brainerd, who makes bioidentical hormone replacements by prescription.
Schrader’s most unique offering is Primal Reflex Release Technique, developed by a physical therapist to remind the body what its natural reflexes were before an injury. She was certified in July, and she said she checks her status as Chattanooga’s only PRRT-certified practitioner by looking at her California instructor’s list of graduates online.
“We’re born with reflexes wired into us. That makes it primal,” she said, explaing that an injured muscle and surrounding nervous system are in a constant state of “upregulation,” causing them to forget their natural state and to feel pain after the injury has healed. “It continues to send a signal that something is wrong.”