Spacing Out Bodywork: Why Timing Matters for Physical Treatments

When receiving physical treatment like acupuncture, chiropractic adjustments, osteopathic manipulation, deep tissue massage, Rolfing, craniosacral therapy, or dry needling from a physical or occupational therapist, you should allow at least one week between sessions.

Why is this?

Getting numerous bodywork treatments in the span of one week or a few days (or all in one day) gives the body a lot of information to process and integrate. Sometimes too much information.

This can inadvertently muddle the assessment, diagnostic, and treatment recommendation picture.

And it can make it difficult to assess what is and isn’t working on the road to better health.

For example: When evaluating a patient the day after their chiropractic adjustment, it’s challenging to differentiate between their body’s natural response to the recent treatment and genuinely new areas of tension that may require immediate attention.

It’s like the body’s wires get crossed and things can get unnecessarily scrambled.

Any of these treatments – spinal manipulation, acupuncture, dry needling, etc – even if they are subtle and gentle, they are putting a lot of input into a person’s system at one time.

If you receive multiple forms of physical treatment in the span of a week and find yourself feeling wiped out and tired after the treatments – that’s important information to pay attention to.

Ideally we want to listen to the body and work in skillful relationship with it – not overload it with too many inputs or prematurely force it along on our timetable.

Receiving treatment is an investment of time, money, and energy. I have heard it described by trusted mentors and teachers that we in the the United States have a certain “more is better” bias, especially when it comes to health and well-being. Sometimes more isn’t always better. Especially with physical treatments we want to be mindful of administering the right dose – not an overdose!