A niece has revealed unto me via Facebook that she's into Reflexology. Sheesh. My first impulse is to debunk with something like, "And where on the foot do you press to cure gullibility?" But it's her life, and there are far worse things she could believe in. Like the LDS church. Oh, wait, she does.

Stray Mutt Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "And where on
> the foot do you press to cure gullibility?" But
> it's her life, and there are far worse things she
> could believe in. Like the LDS church. Oh, wait,
> she does.

ROTF..LMFAO....

These places are in fairly nice shopping centers and business offices, but they're quite obviously little houses of ill repute.

The flyers out front are in Chinese and other languages and they also offer "aroma therapy," "color therapy," full body massage, and "spa sevice in half hour time slots" starting about 4:00 pm and running until the wee hours of the monrning. Perhaps it's a sign of bad economic times.

A gullible person might fall for the reflexology and not realize what main sevice is offered.

I say get a good foot massage and some cookies out of it.

I would go there. I am trained in bach essences and color therapy :) Go ahead and diss yo, it works for me but not for everyone, I know. Not a sign of bad economic times at all. And calling ppl that believe gullible isn't very nice. They just have different beliefs. Unless you are saying it's a massage parlor for sex and not for reflexology

I do believe in reflexology but if someone touches my feet, they get kicked in the face

And they expect blind faith with no claim of training or education.

All they have are grainy Chinese printouts from the internet.

maybe some of them. I learned what I know at an accredited state college though.

I have tried reflexology and it really worked well for me. Haven't been for years though. I tried it with my massage therapist but he admitted he was trained but not extensively. I like his massages but not reflexology. Wish I could find a good one here.

FYI, The guy that created color therapy, I think his name is Stanley something, was sent to prison for 20 years for killing someone. I think it was a case of not telling someone to go see an allopathic physician. Can't remember much about it as it was in the 70's.

PS I do like your posts.

What's wrong with reflexology? It's just a type of massage and massage has been proven to help reduce stress and help with general well-being. Reflexologists believe that parts of the foot correspond with parts of the body but any respectable reflexologist will tell you that they aren't allowed to diagnose OR claim to cure any condition. The idea is simply to relax the person so that the body can help heal itself and possibly complement any doctor's treatment they are getting, if necessary. And, it's a scientific fact that people who aren't under stress heal faster. Some people aren't comfortable getting undressed and having a full-body massage and so a foot massage is a good stress reducing alternative for them. It's not supposed to heal you or diagnose you. I've had a several reflexologists work on my feet and not one has claimed to be able to cure me of anything although a couple of them have gotten me so relaxed I fell asleep and woke up feeling relaxed and calmer. Sounds like you need to learn more about what it is before you dismiss it.

The niece posted a chart claiming to show how various pressure points are connected to certain organs. Thyroid, spleen, pancreas, adrenal gland, kidney, gallbladder, etc. So she's talking old school Chinese cure-your-diseases Reflexology, not relaxation.

THANK YOU CA GIRL! I appreciate your pointing out that there are benifits to reflexology. I was of the same opinion as the OP but my daughter persisted. She also became a Foot Zone Therapist. Though the jury is still out on all of these things for me, I have received many "Zone" therapy's from her. (At first it was simply to appease her. However, she would mention certain things about certain spots she would work.

Usually I would ask before she explained as there were varying points on my feet that she would be working on that would make me wince.

I would ask her, what is that point right there? She would tell me what part of my body that it was associated with. It would be a place on my body that I had already (unbeknow to her) seen a medical doctor about.

Over a period of a few months of this happening, I realized that there really was a correlation between the spots on my feet that were a bit painful to be rubbed and touched and some areas on my body that were manifesting problems as well.

I no longer scoff, though I lack complete understanding, I am willing to investigate and remain open to reflexology and Foot Zones. Nothing ventured nothing gained. No harm in studying and if it feels good, I say go for it.

before I'd take consecrated oil on my head by two men.

:-)

<sigh>
Like Stray Mutt said, "It's a day for self-restraint"
<sigh>

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19740047

"CONCLUSION: The best evidence available to date does not demonstrate convincingly that reflexology is an effective treatment for any medical condition."

...said the industry run by pharmaceutical companies

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/11/2013 12:59PM by peregrine.

I saw it. Peninsula Medical School....my comment remains the same

so you just dismiss disconfiriming evidence as "anti-"
That style of arguement seems all too familiar.

"The best evidence available to date " is not 100% disconfirming now is it? Not to me anyway. You are free to believe what you want and I'm not arguing, upset or mad. I am basing my opinion upon my own experience and training.

It's quite possible it DOES work for you, although I'd personally cite the placebo effect.

Either way, it's the reflexology proponent's burden to prove it, not ours to disprove it.

Xyandro Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Either way, it's the reflexology proponent's
> burden to prove it, not ours to disprove it.

yup

I’m not accusing anybody of being upset or mad. However you are stating your position on this issue and I am stating my mine. The evidences and the rhetoric with which one defends their position is “by definition” an argument.

Ar.gu.ment
2. a : a reason given in proof or rebuttal
b : discourse intended to persuade



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/11/2013 01:16PM by peregrine.

well good. Sounds like we're on the same page then. Except about reflexology :)

Your claim that you are "basing (your) opinion upon (your) own experience" is a classic appeal to anecdotal evidence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence

It's the same thing a TBM does when they bear their testimony that the church works for them and tells you a story about an answered prayer or a preisthood blessing working.

I'm sorry holistic therapy doesn't work for you. It does work for me and my many repeat clients. If that makes me like a TBM in your eyes then oh well. I'm sorry I don't have a link to a "scientific" paper to back up my experience. If I did I'm sure you'd quickly change your mind. It's good to be skeptical about things, but I am not closed-minded about everything just because of my experience with the morg.

I never accused "you" of being a TBM. I only compared the style of rhetoric used to support your claim.
I’ll ignore the “closed-minded” personal attack. However, I’m not sure there is such a thing as being too skeptical.

where did I say you were close-minded? I simply said that I wasn't. That is all. You are really making too much of this entire conversation. I have nothing against you personally. Anyway, have a great day!

Tupperwhere Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> where did I say you were close-minded? I simply
> said that I wasn't.

point taken and conceeded.

So I can't STAND to have my feet touched. They are just waaaaay too sensitive. Even walking barefoot on smooth floors is a challenge.
Possibly not surprising to those involved in reflexology, I have lots of pain issues.

What would you do with someone like me? If I go without shoes long enough, I can become tolerant of smooth floors, but still touching them by anyone but me is a no go.
Thick socks and comfy shoes are my friends.

there's a nuerological reason for that you might find funny.

http://www.skepdic.com/reflex.html

"One reason foot massage may be so pleasurable and is associated with significant improvement in mood is that the area of the brain that connects to the foot is adjacent to the area that connects to the genitals. There may be some neuronal overlapping. Neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran writes of a person whose leg was amputated and who experienced orgasms in his phantom foot (1998: 36-37). “The genitals are right next to the foot in the body’s brain maps,” he notes, and speculates that this fact may account for foot fetishes."

no argument from me that it's pleasurable and relaxing. I agree. It's the additional claims of reflexology that are unsupported by evidence.

yup

I have a foot reflexology massage once a month. I don't expect it to cure any illness. I can say that I feel as relaxed after an hour of just having my feet rubbed as after a full-body massage. There's a lot of happy endorphins flowing through me.

Deja Vue is correct, parts of the feet correspond to other areas of the body. Every time the masseuse gets to a spot near my toes, my sinuses drain.

It's foolish to think it will cure an illness but it is quite useful for stress reduction and overall well-being. I had similar reaction when I had acupuncture treatments.

janebond462 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a foot reflexology massage once a month. I
> don't expect it to cure any illness. I can say
> that I feel as relaxed after an hour of just
> having my feet rubbed as after a full-body
> massage. There's a lot of happy endorphins
> flowing through me.

If you don't beleive that a foot massage coorelates to the specific parts of the body, like that the chart Stray Mutt's niece posted, then you don't believe in reflexology. No one is suggesting that foot massages aren't relaxing and pleasurable.

I do love a good foot massage. Wish there was an app for that.

No one doubts--certainly not I--that the mind exercises a powerful influence over the body. From the beginning of time, the sorcerer, the interpreter of dreams, the fortune-teller, the charlatan, the quack, the wild medicine-man, the educated physician, the mesmerist, and the hypnotist have made use of the client's imagination to help them in their work. They have all recognized the potency and availability of that force. Physicians cure many patients with a bread pill; they know that where the disease is only a fancy, the patient's confidence in the doctor will make the bread pill effective.

Mark Twain