In-person Classes with NCBTMB CE's
MotherTouch™ Pre & Perinatal Massage Classes
MotherTouch™ Prenatal Bodywork
Mothertouch™ trains massage therapists and birth professionals in practical, advanced bodywork skills, woven together with current research, traditional and mainstream pre and perinatal wisdom, and Leslie's decades of experience as birth professional.
We offer NCBTMB, MEAC, and CE Broker approved Prenatal and Maternity Massage Certifications, as well as specialized trainings in Bodywork for Women's Health, and products like DVDs, Streaming videos, Nurturing Massage for Pregnancy Textbook, and soon the MotherTouch™ booklets.
What Makes MotherTouch™ Prenatal Massage Trainings Unique?
- 32-hour Prenatal Certification and Advanced 65-hour Certification
Unlike most prenatal massage certifications, MotherTouch™ offers two Certifications:
- The 32-hour Prenatal Bodywork Certification focuses on support for women as they adapt to the common challenges of pregnancy.
- The 65-hour Maternity Massage Certification includes the Prenatal Certification, along with the Massage & Acupressure for Birth and Bodywork for the New Mother. To be certified, students take all required classes, submit written case studies, and complete a project focused on a sub-specialty related to pregnancy, birth, or postpartum with guidance and mentoring from Leslie. This advanced training program will help you become a Pre and Perinatal Massage Specialist!
- Taught by a Birth Professional /Massage Therapist
Leslie Stager’s programs are infused with her indepth personal experience and confidence based on:
- A decade of experience as labor and delivery nurse, doula, childbirth educator, and a midwifery clinic triage nurse.
- Attendance at over 500 births
- Supporting postpartum women for months after delivery.
- Practicing as pregnancy and postnatal massage therapist and educator since 1992
- Cross-Training: Skills Applicable to all Clients
MotherTouch™ trainings emphasize application of massage techniques useful for all clients, not just pregnant ones. This makes the course information useful and relevant for a broad-based practice.
- Incorporation of Traditional Birth Wisdom & Rites of Passage
MotherTouch™ classes introduce traditional wisdom based on Leslie’s international travels and her Anthropology degree from Smith College, where she focused on women’s health and menstrual rites. She has explored traditional birthing practices in Uganda, Cambodia, Mexico, Myanmar, Indonesia and Alaskan bush with Yup’ik women.
Since 1980 Leslie has guided wilderness rites of passage, cultivating earth-spirit connection through earth solitude and elder counsel circles. The journey of pregnancy, birth, and motherhood are powerful and natural rites of passage. Massage therapists may be integral participants along that journey, helping client’s explore ancestral stories and attune to baby’s consciousness.
- Unique Body Mechanics and Positioning Options
MotherTouch™ courses:
- Emphasize safety protocols and precautions for optimal positioning
- Debunk common fear-based myths
- Practice body mechanics awareness throughout each class
- Utilize the table and mother’s body in non-traditional ways to support both practitioner and client
- Explore options for prone, sidelying, and semi-reclining positionings
- Offer techniques adapatable to each individual student's practice
6. Small, Intimate Classes help us develop and foster “womb space”
Classes typically have 8-14 students. Personal experiences of pregnancy, birth, and motherhood may become learning opportunities that help us deepen our relationship to this work.
Get inspired. Gain confidence. Learn advanced techniques applicable to All clients.
Why choose MotherTouch™ Prenatal Massage Training?
MotherTouch is unique among most run-of-the-mill pregnancy massage certifications, offering skills your pregnant clients will appreciate.
Here's why:
Here's why Pregnant Clients Choose MotherTouch™ Massage Practitioners:
- Stretching and Opening: MotherTouch™ emphasizes principles of unity, length and space to help ease gravitational aches and strains of pregnancy. A Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioner may use stretching and muscle resistance techniques to help increase comfort and relieve stressed muscles.
- Relief from rib expansion and uterine pressure against the diaphragm. As the body grows, there is more compression toward the diaphragm, the ribs expand and women may have more difficulty with deep breathing. MotherTouch™ techniques can relax the small muscles between the ribs, expand the side body, and release the diaphragm for easier breathing.
- Attention to regions few address: A Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioner may offer external muscle techniques that help relieve pelvic floor discomfort or pressure, hip pain, or round ligament strain. Gentle belly touch may support an emotional connection for a client after multiple miscarriages or previous traumatic birth experience.
Positioning Options: Women’s bodies make dramatic adaptations during the months of pregnancy. A Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioner makes adaptations for each trimester, choosing positions and bodywork techniques that best support these changes. She or He understands benefits and potential detriments of sidelying and semi-reclining positioning, and the concerns about and options for prone positioning with special cushions.
Positioning Options: Women’s bodies make dramatic adaptations during the months of pregnancy. A Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioner makes adaptations for each trimester, choosing positions and bodywork techniques that best support these changes. She or He understands benefits and potential detriments of sidelying and semi-reclining positioning, and the concerns about and options for prone positioning with special cushions.- Safety-based vs Fear-based: Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioners learn the rationale for massage cautions and contraindications and do not perpetuate myths and rumors about the dangers of pregnancy massage. They learn contraindications of certain acupressure points, and also learn that massage over those very same areas does not pose a risk or danger. Unless a client has a specific risk factor that precludes certain types of bodywork (typically in high risk pregnancies) you’ll receive massage to your whole body, at the pressure you prefer, without concern of causing problems.
- No more wimpy pregnancy massage! Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioners recognize that being pregnant is a natural and healthy condition of the body and that massage can enhance a woman’s comfort. Massage does not need to be superficial or ‘fluffy’ during a healthy pregnancy. A practitioner may offer deep tissue work as requested by the client, while still recognizing symptoms or risk factors that may preclude certain massage techniques.
- Relief from Pelvic, Hip, Low Back pain: Certified MotherTouch™ Practitioners learn integrative pelvic bodywork to support pelvic rebalancing, pelvic floor release, and pelvic mobility, relieving hip and pelvic pain, low back pain, and sciatica.
- Birth Support and Labor Preparation: During the Prenatal Bodywork Certification, students learn bodywork techniques to support a mother in birth preparation and can offer sessions for women after 38 weeks gestation to help prepare for birthing.
Upcoming Courses
Fundamentals of Prenatal Massage
LOCATION: Portland, OregonMay 10, 2019 @ 9:00 am - 6:00 pm PDT
Your new Client is pregnant:
- What if she can't lay comfortably on her side, nor safely on her back?
- Do you know if your bodywork modality is contraindicated during pregnancy?
- What if she has uterine contractions during a session?
Most practitioners see an occasional pregnant client, but few know the PRIMARY Concern, the Benefits, or the protocols that ensure optimum care for their client!
Practice safely and effectively with greater confidence! Dispel the myths!
Pregnancy Massage Fundamentals presents essential guidelines that improve your body mechanics, increase your confidence and offer your clients greater comfort.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN:
- Pregnancy physiology that affects your bodywork practice.
- Prenatal massage Precautions and Contraindications
- Signs and symptoms of pregnancy Pathologies
- Positioning and Draping options
- Clarification of myths vs realities about pregnancy massage
- Massage benefits for women and baby in-utero
- Practice adaptations through the perinatal cycle
- Ways to optimize circulation, decrease edema, and support uterine ligaments in sidelying position.
This class is the First day of the 4-day 32-hour Prenatal Bodywork Training & Certification.
ADVANCED CERTIFICATION: Combine this course with Prenatal Bodywork Training, and Massage & Acupressure for Birth, along with a written exam, a project, and case studies, to receive the 65-hour MotherTouch Maternity Massage Certification.
This course offers 8 NCBTMB approved CE's.
The new mother undergoes numerous physiological changes that require specific massage techniques and precautions that few massage therapists understand or address.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN:
- General postnatal toning techniques
- Postpartum renewal acupressure
- Special Positioning concerns during postpartum
- Breast massage to facilitate optimal lactation
- Post-birth pelvic realignment
- Postural rebalancing
- Abdominal renewal techniques
- Uterine massage
- Approaches to surgical interventions & recovery
- Cesarean scar tissue techniques
- Multicultural approaches to care of the new family
NOTE: This course may be taught by Leslies's assistant teacher: Katie Rhyne, LMT.
ADVANCED CERTIFICATION: Combine this course with Prenatal Bodywork Training, and Massage & Acupressure for Birth, along with a written exam, a project, and case studies, to receive the 65-hour MotherTouch Maternity Massage Certification.
TESTIMONIALS:
A student speaks about her experience in the Bodywork for the New Mother class: "Warmth. Safety. Belonging. Wholeness. These sensations and emotions flooded through me as I experienced the “closing of the bones” ceremony. Healing. Completeness. Power. Trust. The emotions enveloped me like the blanket that wrapped tightly around me; I was cocooned with the unity of sisterhood that we all share. The women lifted me gently in the blanket womb and began rocking me. I could feel their collective strength as they rocked reassuringly. Carrying me. Sharing their united womanhood and sealing it up inside me. When the blanket cocoon was opened I had metamorphasized. I came out a stronger woman." M.Y. (Maternity Massage student)
Leslie is an NCBTMB provider. This course offers NCBTMB approved CE's.
Learn 12 practical techniques that you can immediately apply to your birth practice! The class can be modified to suit the specific needs of the attending health professionals, massage therapists, doulas.
Feel free to bring a pregnant client along to practice with at no charge. MEAC credits may be available for doulas/midwives.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: (Based on student experience and needs, but may include the following:
- Birth physiology and psycho-emotional realities
- Techniques for relaxation, pain reduction, and labor progress
- Releasing the pelvic floor
- Techniques for speeding labor and moving baby
- Care, psyche, and body mechanics for the Touch Companion
- Practical realities of offering touch during birth
- Acupressure and massage in a variety of positions through all stages of labor
- Cultivating healing birth environments
- Techniques for back pain, posterior baby, slow labor, contraction pain, anxiety, relieving leg cramps, cervical dilation
- Use of the rebozo, chairs, ball, and positions in hands and knees, standing, semi-reclining, sidelying, and others
ADVANCED CERTIFICATION: Combine this course with Prenatal Bodywork Training, and Massage for the New Mother, along with a written exam, a project, and case studies, to receive the 65 hour MotherTouch Maternity Massage Certification.
Leslie is an NCBTMB provider. This course offers 8 NCBTMB approved CE's.
You've been seeing pregnant clients for some time, but you've come across conditions and situations you were uncertain about how to handle. Where can you get the answers?
RIGHT HERE! In this class you'll have the opportunity to discuss what's had you confounded or concerned. We will practice myofascial, acupressure, deep tissue, stretch resistance techniques to address in more detail common issues related to pelvis, breasts, high risk conditions, non-optimal baby positioning and ways to help make space in the belly/pelvis.
PREREQUISITES: At least 32 hours of pregnancy massage training, and experience with at least 10 pregnant clients, or Instructor Permission.
CLASS IS ORIENTED AROUND STUDENT INDIVIDUAL NEEDS AND MAY INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING:
- Diastasis Recti: More practice with assessment and treatment options
- Pelvic rebalancing and Pelvic Floor Releases: Sidelying, semi-reclining, and floor based treatments to support pelvic health and mobility
- Breast Massage Considerations: Massage for Pregnant breasts to increase comfort and integrate with the rest of the body
- Birth preparation: More focus on Releasing the diaphragm, pelvis, mind in preparation for labor.
- High Risk Clients: Developing a specialized niche practice for women on bedrest and confronting high risk pregnancy conditions
- Exploring Prone and Semi-Reclining positions
MotherTouch™ CERTIFICATIONS
Gain skills and effective techniques useful for ALL your clients, while becoming a MotherTouch Certified Prenatal Massage practitioner!
MotherTouch™ Prenatal Bodywork Training & Certification is a 32-hour comprehensive, holistic Certification consisting of the Pregnancy Fundamentals Class and 3 more days of practical hands-on training.
TAUGHT WITH REVERENCE, APPRECIATION, & RESPECT FOR THE BIRTH RITE OF PASSAGE.
Drawing wisdom from multi-cultural birthing practices, MotherTouch™ offers a truly holistic Prenatal Massage course.
Pregnancy is a unique 9-month experience accompanied by physical adaptations of posture, pelvic floor, low back and breasts and leading to a variety of musculo-skeletal complaints. In the MotherTouch™ Prenatal Bodywork Training, you'll gain respect for this potent rite of passage, while learning advanced manual therapy techniques to address common pregnancy concerns such as:
- Sacro-iliac joint pain
- Leg cramps
- Uterine ligament spasms
- Headaches
- Anxiety
- Birth preparation
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN:
- Benefits & Precautions of Prenatal Massage
- Physiological changes and High Risk symptoms that impact your bodywork
- Postural Assessment and Realignment Possibilities
- Debunking all the MYTHS!
- Optimal Sidelying, Prone, and Semi-Reclining Positions and Secure Draping
- Sidelying Techniques that create length /space/ breath/unity
- BodyMechanics for your comfort and optimal client experience
- Assessing your client's needs
- Adaptations for your style of working
- Marketing Approaches and Networking
- Belly Massage & Diaphragm Release
- Client Intake and the Medical Release
- Specific Trimester concerns
- Pelvic Alignment Techniques, Sacro-Iliac Joint and Pelvic Floor Release
- Energy Assessment & Acupressure Flow
- Breast Massage for Pregnancy
- Birth Preparation Bodywork
GAIN CONFIDENCE! OFFER EFFECTIVE DEEP TISSUE, SWEDISH, ACUPRESSURE, FASCIAL RELEASE, STRETCH-RESISTANCE, ENERGY BALANCING TECHNIQUES FOR CONCEPTION THROUGH BIRTH.
WHAT'S INCLUDED:
- Extensive hands-on training
- Lecture & Participatory Discussion
- 1.5 hour supervised pregnancy massage clinic
- Individualized attention and evaluation of your application of MotherTouch techniques
- Written exam
- MotherTouch™ Prenatal Bodywork Certification upon successful completion
“I liked Leslie. I liked the way she taught and how she was very real. She took the tension of out of the experience and increased my confidence about going forward.”
"Thank you so much for an amazing weekend! This was exactly what I'd been hoping for in a pregnancy massage class. I loved the integration of practical technique, anatomy/physiology, spiritual, energy work, honoring ancestry and lineage, and the embracing of womanhood/motherhood/humanhood. I feel so blessed to have been a part of this, and so much more deeply connected to the birthing experience, in so many respects. Can't wait to do this work, and continue learning and sharing. Everything included in the course content was really useful, and I am grateful for all of it. It was also wonderful hearing the wisdom shared by students from their expertise/experience."
C. Jenkins 2014: Student from Prenatal Bodywork Training
Mothertouch™ Maternity Massage Certification is typically offered twice a year at Oregon School of Massage and occasionally at other locations. The most comprehensive prenatal, birth, and postnatal bodywork program available, the 65-hour certification includes 44.5 hours of extensive hands-on training, 17 hours of reviewed case studies, a written exam, and a final project. Those certified have more advanced training than the majority of pregnancy massage therapists in the country, with better access to employment as a prenatal and perinatal bodywork specialist.
Gain respect in the professional medical & birth community! Become a trustworthy, skilled prenatal massage practitioner that clients seek out! EXPAND YOUR PRACTICE!
REQUIREMENTS FOR MATERNITY MASSAGE CERTIFICATION INCLUDE:
Prenatal Bodywork Training - 32 hours
Massage & Acupressure for Birth - 4.5 hours
Bodywork for the New Mother - 8 hours
Maternity Massage Certification Practicum - 21.5 hours
Leslie's years of birth experience as a labor and delivery nurse, doula, childbirth educator and perinatal massage specialist informs her teaching and trainings. She has been developing the Maternity Massage program since 1992. Read more at Oregon School of Massage.
“Leslie is friendly, informative, open to share life experiences and very well-read in her specialty. I’d love to take more of her classes.”
R.T. Maternity Massage student.
“So wonderful! Motivational! Helpful! Healing! Can’t wait to get my certification!”
Maternity Massage Certification Student
Leslie Stager RN, LMT is a NCBTMB approved provider # 451910-12, and the Prenatal Massage for Spa Therapists course fulfills NCBTMB CE requirements
This 12-hour course designed specifically for your the unique needs of your spa can include any of the following topics:
- Prenatal anatomy and physiology relevant to massage therapists
- Emotional and practical concerns of pregnant women
- Peri-natal cautions, contraindications, and pathologies relevant to spa clients
- Debunking myths about pregnancy and postpartum bodywork
- Bodywork adaptations based on gestational age (trimester)
- Positioning, draping and bodywork guidelines per trimester
- Proper use of sidelying and semi-reclining positions
- Appropriate body mechanics for work in sidelying position
- Myriad techniques for pregnancy massage, utilizing Swedish massage, myofascial release, acupressure, deep tissue, stretch-relax techniques
- Recognizing bodywork concerns indicating potential risks during pregnancy
- Essential information to include on intake forms
- Physiological changes, precautions, & positioning relevant up to 4+ months postpartum
Mom & Jo Spa in Jakarta
BODYWORK FOR WOMEN’S HEALTH TRAININGS
Pelvic pain, infertility, menstrual cramps, breast discomforts, and general reproductive health concerns are epidemic. Become familiar with the abdomen and boney structure of the female pelvis, along with its ligaments, muscles and organs. Utilizing cranial-sacral therapy, fascial release, stretch-resistance, along with respect, compassion, and subtle listening, you'll learn to address infertility, menstrual challenges, pelvic pain, menopause, and breast health.
On occasion all six modules are offered as one training which includes the following classes:
- The Female Pelvis
- The Belly
- Menstruation and Fertility Bodywork
- Menopause-Moonpause
- Massage for Healthy Breasts
Dec 29th: FREE Q&A about Bodywork for the Female Pelvic Floor and Integrative Pelvic Bodywork
December 29, 2024 @ 5:00 pm - January 26, 2025 @ 6:00 pm PSTMay 3, 2025: THE BELLY & WOMB: Portland Oregon
May 3, 2025May 4, 2025 Breast Massage for Healthy Breasts. Portland, OR
May 4, 2025 @ 9:30 am - 3:30 pm PDT
7.5 NCBTMB CE's
Prerequisites: Massage Therapist
It’s the temple of our creative energy and the root of our spine, yet we often feel disconnected or know it by pain or instability. Class techniques are useful for male clients as well, but we will be focused specifically on the concerns of female clients.
WHAT'S INCLUDED: Enhance mobility, balance, comfort of SI-joint, sacrum, pelvis.
- Learn to palpate the pelvic bones, ligaments, and muscles
- Techniques to enhance mobility and comfort to the sacro-iliac joint, hips,
- Free the sacrum or “sacred bone”
- Work in supine, prone, and sidelying positions.
- SI Joint Release
- Rebalance Sacrum/SI Joint
- Release external attachments of deep pelvic floor muscles and Obturator Internus
- SacroTuberous Ligament Release
- Sacral Stimulation & CST
- Postural Awareness Technique
- Options for prone, supine, and sidelying positioning
- Module II follows this course with more in-depth focus on the belly, womb, and ovaries.
UPCOMING CLASSES:
6.5 NCBTMB CEs
Focused belly sessions can be even more relaxing and potent than a full body massage--but it requires attention, intention, and slow careful listening to allow the layers of protection to dissolve.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Abdominal work to encourage deep relaxation and healthy digestion
- Techniques to support peristalsis and reduce heartburn and constipation
- Techniques to nourish the kidneys, free the respiratory diaphragm,
- Abdominal scar tissue reduction
- How to help clients regain connection to their center of energy
- Palpation of Uterus, Ovaries, Bladder (more info in Fertility and Menstruation classes)
- Deep and subtle abdominal techniques to mobilize the womb, increase circulation, and reduce adhesions, menstrual cramps, pelvic pain, and mild organ prolapse.
This course is followed by Module III, focused on Bodywork for Menstruation & Fertility
UPCOMING EVENTS:
14 CE's Menstruation & Fertility
Millions of women suffer from pelvic pain, infertility, menstrual cramps, breast issues, and general reproductive health concerns. Specific bodywork approaches can support a woman's relationship to her pelvis and her vital core energy. In this class you will learn about fertility/infertility issues, and the bodywork that can address physical-structural-energetic concerns: pelvic congestion, scar tissue, poor pelvic health, malpositioned uterus, pelvic energetic disconnect, and other conditions.
Learn to palpate the womb, uterine ligaments, ovaries, and bladder while reducing restriction and increasing mobility and fluidity of the tissues. 
Learn to palpate uterus and ovaries, round ligament, and other pelvic structures and apply deep and subtle abdominal techniques to nourish and mobilize the womb, increase circulation and enhance fertility, reducing restrictions, rebalancing the SI join..
- Enhance womb health and fertility
- Reduce menstrual cramps
- Release abdominal scar tissue adhesions
- Address mild organ prolapse
- Alleviate pelvic floor pain and associated back pain
- Encourage unity and vitality in the body
This course builds on and incorporates information and techniques from Module I & II, while focusing on female hormonal cycles. It is followed by or includes Module IV: MotherTouch Moon-Pause--Menopause Massage.
UPCOMING EVENTS:
4 NCBTMB CE's
Nearly 80% of menopausal women experience physical-emotional symptoms that lead many to seek out medical care. Often this results in surgeries and pharmaceutical treatments. Massage therapy can enter the field as a first line of defense to help ease some of the most common symptoms, including anxiety, stress and insomnia.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Protocols for menopausal concerns that enhance and support the changing body
- Acupressure sequences
- Aromatherapy applications
- Hormonal reflexology
- Cranial Sacral & Elemental energetic techniques to reduce stress and encourage parasympathetic nervous system to enter front stage to help improve hormonal activity
- Techniques for:
- Insomnia
- Skin changes due to estrogen reduction
- Stress & Anxiety Reduction
- Hormonal balancing
- Kidney-Adrenal fatigue
UPCOMING EVENTS:
4 NCBTMB CE's
Most massage practitioners in the United States don't include breasts in their full body massage sessions, whereas in Europe it is standard of care during massage. Breasts are an amazing part of our body that can create and provide complete nourishment for a baby. When breasts are restrained in underwire bras, women develop fibrous tissue and restricted lymphatic flow from constant compression.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Learn A&P of breast tissue
- Contraindications/Pathology
- Normalize touching breasts from a therapeutic standpoint
- Explore ways of easily incorporating breast massage into your practice
- Informed consent release forms
- Sidelying and semi-reclining approaches
We will address common breast concerns:
- Lactation issues
- Clogged ducts
- Lymphatic flow
- Scar tissue from breast reduction or enhancement
- Self Breast Massage
NOTE: This class does NOT cover techniques for cancer, mastectomy or lymphectomy recovery.
In states where breast massage is not within the scope of practice, we can still discuss benefits and precautions and self-massage techniques that can be taught to clients, to support breast health.
UPCOMING EVENTS:
May 4, 2025 Breast Massage for Healthy Breasts. Portland, OR
May 4, 2025 @ 9:30 am - 3:30 pm PDT
Inner Space--Inner Worlds
A preponderance of women suffer silently from pelvic floor pain and dysfunction. Whether these issues develop from stretching or tearing of perineum during birth, due to hormonal changes of menopause, or from physical trauma, or other considerations, most women have some pelvic floor issue by the time they are 50 or 60 years old that may result in bladder or fecal incontinence, prolapse, or pain. Trauma to the perineum may lead to discomfort & pain with sexual intercourse.
Pelvic floor pain often refers to other muscles: legs, hips, low back, sciatica-like pain, tingling, pressure, vague sensations.
In Oregon, an LMT with advanced training may practice internal vaginal/rectal bodywork when indicated.
This course orients practitioners to a sensitive approach to this work, including palpation and manual techniques that address common musculo-skeletal dysfunctions in the “sacred” zone of the female pelvis.
We begin with discussion about the importance of this work, and the issues of including it into your bodywork practice.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- The Pelvic Psyche: Psycho-physical Emotions & Bodywork Ethics for Internal Work
- Internal Palpation & Assessment
- Treatment Protocols
- Marketing
- Case Study Reviews
The course requires the following Prerequisites: LMT license, at least one session receiving pelvic floor work and write up review of the experience with Letter of Intent, completion of Modules I & II of Bodywork for Women's Health (The Female Pelvis, The Belly) or equivalent and instructor permission.
and Instructor Approval. Contact Leslie for more info)
UPCOMING EVENTS:
Dec 29th: FREE Q&A about Bodywork for the Female Pelvic Floor and Integrative Pelvic Bodywork
December 29, 2024 @ 5:00 pm - January 26, 2025 @ 6:00 pm PST
21-hours NCBTMB CE's. Upon request MEAC credits may be available.
A Unique Class For Bodyworkers, Movement Therapists, Birth Professionals, & Anyone Interested In Body Awareness!
Join this 3-day workshop to cultivate awareness and understanding of the structural integrity of the female pelvis from the inside out, using hands-on bodywork, movement techniques, and expressive art.
Connecting with this primary pelvic vitality is fundamental to treating pelvic imbalances and trauma, and restoring pelvic health.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Explore the inner landscape of our pelvic bones, muscles, organs, connective tissue, breath, posture, and mobility
- Through embodiment we Increase capacity to gestate and give birth to consciousness, power, creative process, and sexual energy\
- Identify pelvic movement and tension/restriction patterns
- Facilitate pelvic floor breathing to improve circulation and lumbosacral stability
- Palpate pelvic organs and discover how they offer musculoskeletal support
- Identify postural habits and apply functional anatomy skills to improve alignment
- Treat pelvic floor imbalances to relieve pelvic pain and urinary incontinence
- Practice hands-on techniques to release compression and tension inside bone
- Improve pelvic and spinal mobility to optimize pelvic space during pregnancy
- Practice myo-fascial techniques to increase diaphragmatic range of motion and enhance vitality
Create a conscious circle of reverence as we explore the pelvis with hands-on bodywork, experiential anatomy, guided movement, body re-patterning and expressive art.
About Lee Morgan, RMT: Lee is a Canadian-trained Osteopath, Body-Mind Centering® Teacher and Feldenkrais® practitioner in San Francisco, California. She has been practicing therapeutic bodywork and somatic movement education for nearly 30 years. Extensively trained in functional anatomy, Lee is a passionate and experienced instructor who inspires students to awaken from within.
Leslie Stager RM, LMT is a rites of passage guide and bodyworker, training birth & massage professionals in perinatal bodywork for over 20 years.
UPCOMING EVENTS:
Who are you and what are your gifts?
When you realize you are born to die, what is truly meaningful to you?
What is your purpose, your commitment in this life?
It is a given that humans benefit from conscious times of separation from all that is familiar --from daily distractions, from other humans, from technology and activities that we are accustomed to. We gain perspective on our scurrying lives; we reconnect to our purpose for being here; we experience being breathed by something bigger than our ego and mind; we experience the sensory experience of aliveness while in stillness, feeling our hunger and thirst, and wading through the fear of being alone and still.
Questions arise when we sit in the company of Quiet, when we listen to the songs of wind over sand, when we watch spiders casting out their lines to catch a tiny branch and build their web. We remember the mystery of Life under the dance of stars circling Polaris through the long nights. When we allow stillness, the dust of our busy-ness settles and we can almost hear the sound of distant mountains rising up from the center of the earth.
This journey is a Rite of Passage---a rite of honoring and gratitude for the life that has been given you, and a passage through discomfort and bliss. It is a time for clearing lingering stories and for inviting that which wants to be conceived or birthed.
HOW LONG?
Sensory Renewal journeys may be from sunrise to sunset on one day in a local earthy landspace, or may be 4 days and nights alone in the desert. Each journey includes some period of counsel, some period of solitude, and some period of reincorporation.
Why is this part of the Bodywork for Women's Health classes? Because it will make you a stronger practitioner, a clearer touch companion, a potent healer.
Earth is our primary teacher. When we reunite with earth connection and kindle wisdom from our elemental nature, renewing ourselves in relation to the Wild, we become stronger in our identity--not our ego identity, but our human identity.
We feel more grounded. We feel more clear proceeding forward in our life. We have more gifts to offer clients, students, family.
This earth work will feed your bodywork practice or any other work you do. You may feel more grounded in body mechanics. You may have more clarity about the purpose of your practice. You may even realize that it is time to shift your work, or the overall focus of your life. You may recognize and shed parts that have been unworkable for some time.
Through counsel circle sharings, sensory awareness activities, energy practices, we will attend to our deep hunger for reconnection and replenishment with Earth and Self.
YOUR GUIDE: Leslie's principles are formed from years of living alone in the wilds of Maine, traversing the California deserts on spirit fasts, and a lifetime of dream teachings. Her practices come from her mentors, Chris Olson, Steven Foster & Meridith Foster-Little, Elaine Marie, Rosita Arvigo, the humpback whales of Hawaii, and from those she has met on her travels who gave of their spirit without ego-- the elder Quechuan and Peruvian farmers, the Yu'pik birthing women, the Ugandan women dying in childbirth, the Cambodian midwives.
UPCOMING EVENTS:
CLASSES FOR DOULAS/MIDWIVES/CHILDBIRTH EDUCATORS
(0.6 MEAC CE’s available for class.)
Midwives are in a perfect position to assess for common pelvic imbalances during the perinatal cycle that may impact women's comfort during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, and for the rest of their lives. This class introduces midwives to ways of assessing pelvic tone and dysfunction before and after birth, and recognizing common symptoms that indicate pelvic floor imbalance and need for treatment and referral. Learn simple external and internal myofascial techniques to help address issues that may be related to scar tissue, birth trauma, postural issues, or general energetic disconnect. Perinatal pelvic care should be a part of every midwifery visit, helping prevent the epidemic of urinary incontinence, organ prolapse, menstrual pain, sexual issues, and general pelvic disconnect that women experience from birth trauma, abuse, accidents, or surgery. Learn techniques to influence pelvic mobility, reposition pelvic organs, and ease the birth process.
Learn about:
- Epidemic of women’s pelvic floor concerns related to birth, and interface with social, historical, political, sexual, physical issues.
- Detailed internal & external palpation of pelvic muscles, nerves, ligaments, bones—more than you learned in midwifery school!
- Introductory abdominal myofascial techniques that help decrease scar tissue, re-align pelvic organs, improve fertility, increase energy—incorporate into postpartum visits.
- Assess Pelvic Floor tone, know when Kegels are detrimental
- Learn basic assessment and treatment for 6 week postpartum visits.
- Benefits of a variety of pelvic bodywork approaches and when and to whom to refer.
Prerequisites:
This class is designed for female midwives & other medical professionals licensed or becoming with scope of practice allowing intra-vaginal work. Please be prepared to practice and receive internal work with one another or bring a model to work with.
As a Postpartum Doula you are in a perfect position to offer nurturing touch to new Mothers and babies during your visits. Even 10 minutes of touch can beneficially impact how a mother integrates her birth experience, how grounding she feels, and how much energy she has to offer her baby. Learn simple effective techniques that support the love, well-being, healing, and relaxation that new mothers need during this potent rite of passage. No massage experience needed, and all techniques within the scope of doula practice. Depending on the student needs, the class may include any of the following:
1. Rites of Renewal: Closing the Bones, Binding the Belly, Pelvic Rooting, Mother Roasting, Yoni Steaming.
2. Positioning & touch precautions
3. Quality of touch and energy transmission
4. Touch techniques to relieve tense shoulders, head, "nursing neck"
5. Breast massage tips for mothers, to enhance lactation and relieve clogged ducts
6. Teaching mothers Basic Baby Belly Massage
7. Leg, Back or sacral releases
8. Foot reflexology to support mothering
No massage experience necessary! The class is structured to meet your specific needs, and may include any of the following topics (or others as requested.)
Leslie is an NCBTMB provider. This course offers 4.5 or 6 NCBTMB approved CE's. Upon request, MEAC credits may be available.
This fun and inspiring class is rich with hands-on practical techniques that you can immediately apply to your birth practice. The class is generally modified to suit the specific needs of the attending health professionals, massage therapists, doulas, or couples. Feel free to bring a pregnant client along to practice with at no charge.
Curriculum Outline based on student knowledge and needs, but may include the following:
- Birth physiology and psycho-emotional realities
- Techniques for relaxation, pain reduction, and labor progress
- Releasing the pelvic floor
- Techniques for speeding labor and moving baby
- Care, psyche, and body mechanics for the Touch Companion
- Practical realities of offering touch during birth
- Acupressure and massage in a variety of positions through all stages of labor
- Cultivating healing birth environments
- Techniques for back pain, posterior baby, slow labor, contraction pain, anxiety, relieving leg cramps, cervical dilation
- Use of the rebozo, chairs, ball, and positions in hands and knees, standing, semi-reclining, sidelying, and others
Combine with the other courses: Prenatal Bodywork Training & Certification, and Massage for the New Mother, to receive the 65-hour MotherTouch Maternity Massage Certification.
Leslie is an NCBTMB approved Provider of CE's. This class offers 21-hours NCBTMB CE's. Upon request MEAC credits may be available.
With Lee Morgan, RMT & Leslie Stager RN, LMT
A Unique Class For Bodyworkers, Movement Therapists,
Birth Professionals, & Anyone Interested In Body Awareness!
Join this 3-day workshop to cultivate awareness and understanding of the structural integrity of the pelvis from the inside out. Using hands-on bodywork, movement techniques, and expressive art we will explore the inner landscape of our pelvic bones, muscles, organs, connective tissue, breath, posture, and mobility. Through embodiment we Increase our capacity to gestate and give birth to consciousness, power, creative process, and sexual energy!
Connecting with this primary pelvic vitality is fundamental to treating pelvic imbalances and trauma, and restoring pelvic health.
Through the process of embodiment we will:
- Identify pelvic movement and tension/restriction patterns
- Facilitate pelvic floor breathing to improve circulation and lumbosacral stability
- Identify postural habits and apply functional anatomy skills to improve alignment
- Treat pelvic floor imbalances to relieve pelvic pain and urinary incontinence
- Practice hands-on techniques to release compression and tension inside bone
- Improve pelvic and spinal mobility to optimize pelvic space during pregnancy
- Palpate pelvic organs and discover how they offer musculoskeletal support
- Practice myo-fascial techniques to increase diaphragmatic range of motion and enhance vitality
Join us to create a conscious circle of reverence as we explore the pelvis with hands-on bodywork, experiential anatomy, guided movement, body re-patterning and expressive art.
About Lee Morgan, RMT: Lee is a Canadian-trained Osteopath, Body-Mind Centering® Teacher and Feldenkrais® practitioner in San Francisco, California. She has been practicing therapeutic bodywork and somatic movement education for nearly 30 years. Extensively trained in functional anatomy, Lee is a passionate and experienced instructor who inspires students to awaken from within.
Leslie Stager RM, LMT is a rites of passage guide and bodyworker, training birth & massage professionals in perinatal bodywork for over 20 years.
Videos About the Courses
Video Testimonials
Continuing Education Courses Offering NCBTMB & MEAC credits
Earn massage CE’s! Renew your NCBTMB Certification, state massage license, or AMTA / ABMP membership with any MotherTouch™ classes.All courses can be taken individually, or, become a Mothertouch™Maternity Massage Specialist through the 65-hour Certification program.
Doulas, Childbirth Educators, and Midwives will benefit from the Acupressure & Massage for Birth Classes, Integrative Pelvic Care, and Postpartum Doula Massage Trainings.
Educational Approach
Pregnancy massage training with Leslie Stager
Leslie’s classes are informal and fun, while still based in solid anatomy, pathology, and kinesiology information. She employs didactic, visual, and kinesthetic teaching approaches to help students learn easily. Detailed demonstrations, individual support, practical skills, and wholistic considerations give students a well-rounded and solid knowledge base. Student handbooks ground the information discussed, and a detailed textbook and DVD’s are available to support your learning and assure that you will have plenty of options for review of the material.
