Can massage help with menopause symptoms?
It won't fix your hormones. What it does help with is the sleep, the aching shoulders and the feeling that you haven't stopped for anybody in months.
The short version
Massage doesn't treat the menopause and anybody telling you otherwise is selling something. What it does reliably help with is the things that come alongside it: broken sleep, aching shoulders and hips, a jaw you've been clenching without noticing, and stress that has nowhere to go. An hour of aromatherapy or hot stone is £75, at home. If your symptoms are new or getting worse, see your GP first. This is something you do as well as that, not instead of it.
Massage won't do anything to your hormones. I want to get that out of the way, because there's a lot of nonsense written about this and I'm not adding to it.
What it does help with is everything sitting on top.
What people actually describe to me
Nobody books me and says "I'd like help with my menopause". What they say is that they haven't slept properly since about March. That their shoulders have been up round their ears for a year. That they've been waking at four and lying there. That they used to feel like themselves.
For what it's worth, that list isn't me guessing. The NHS names trouble sleeping, muscle aches and joint pains, low mood and headaches that are worse than usual among the symptoms of menopause and perimenopause. So if you've been wondering whether the aching is related or whether you're imagining it, you aren't imagining it.
And almost always, somewhere in the first ten minutes, that they haven't done anything just for themselves in a very long time.
That last one isn't a symptom of anything medical. It's still the reason a lot of women end up on my bed.
The bits massage genuinely helps
Sleep is the one people mention to me afterwards. I can't promise it and I'm not going to try. What I can say is that an hour in the evening with nobody needing anything from you is a different thing from an early night, and people tell me they sleep after it.
Aching shoulders, hips and lower back respond the way aching muscles always respond. Hot stone is better than hands alone for this because the heat gets in deeper, and a lot of women in their late forties and fifties are carrying tension in their upper back that has been building for years.
If it has gone into your jaw and the sides of your head, half an hour of Indian head massage is £65 and works the head, neck and shoulders together, which is usually where that has come from.
Where I'd send you instead
If your symptoms are new, or getting worse, or you aren't sure what they're, go to your GP before you come to me. I'm a beauty and massage therapist. I'm not medically trained and I'm not going to pretend that an hour with me is a substitute for a conversation about HRT.
I'll also say, because it comes up: if you're having a rough time mentally rather than physically, an hour of massage is a lovely thing but it isn't treatment. Please talk to somebody.
Booking it, practically
An hour is £75 and I come to you, which for a lot of women is the whole point. There's no getting dressed to go out, no parking, and no driving home afterwards with your shoulders undone and your hair full of oil.
All I need is somewhere to put the bed, a plug socket and a sink.
If you want to do it properly, book the same slot every three or four weeks rather than waiting until you're desperate. The women who get the most out of this are the ones who treat it as maintenance rather than as a rescue.
Questions I get asked
- Which massage is best if I'm going through the menopause?
- Aromatherapy or hot stone, usually. Hot stone if the aching is the worst part, because the heat gets into tight muscle faster than hands do. Aromatherapy if it's more about the sleep and the head. Both are £75 for the hour. If you genuinely can't decide, tell me what has been worst this week and I'll pick.
- What if I'm too warm for hot stones on the day?
- Say so and we change it. Aromatherapy instead, or stones only where you want them. I'd much rather adjust the treatment than have you lie there uncomfortable and too polite to mention it.
- Can I've a massage if I'm on HRT?
- Yes. I'll still ask what you're taking before we start, along with everything else, because that's what I ask everybody. If you've any doubt at all, check with whoever prescribed it, but it isn't something that has ever stopped me treating anyone.
Where this comes from
Anything here about the body, a symptom or a safe way to work is checked against a named source. The rest is what I've found doing the job.
I'm a beauty therapist of over ten years and a certified Dermalogica Skin Specialist, and I work as a mobile therapist across Sutton. Client stories here are shared with permission and identifying details are changed. More about me.