How can reflexology and massage therapy help diabetic neuropathy?
Let’s first discuss what diabetic neuropathy is. This condition is a result of large amounts of blood glucose (sugar) remaining in the vascular system.
This high sugar state does serious damage to soft tissues of our body, in particular, the nervous system. Sugar to the nerves is like acid is the eyes. And the longer acid stays in your eyes the greater the chance of blindness.
It is the same with high sugar (hyperglycemia). The longer nerves are exposed to large amounts of glucose, the greater the chance of damage to the myelin sheath (outer protective layer of the axon or nerve).
Once the protective layer of the nerve is damaged, the nerve can either die, quit communicating or give false pain that feels like your feet are on fire.
My patients give subjective statements of pain or numbness on a scale of ‘slightly noticeable discomfort’ to ‘they can barely walk because of the pain’.
The pain can be that debilitating.
And my heart goes out to them because by the time they come to me, it is generally assumed they have gone the whole allopathic route and are now desperate for any kind of relief.
So how can reflexology or massage help diabetic neuropathy?
Doctors tell us that there are three possibilities why massage works:
#1 High pressure pulses with the fingers on subcutaneous tissues will move the blood glucose off the nerves it has settled on. It is like washing acid off the eyes.
Imagine fresh nutrients bathing and healing your cells after damage.
#2 Vigorous articulation of the bones and soft tissue of the feet stimulates nerve innervation, communication and health.
#3 The de-stressing of the mind-body connection.
In the video below, Doug Holland, LMT demonstrates how to perform reflexology on the feet to relieve symptoms of diabetic neuropathy: