The forgotten experience of being cared for.

A client said something to me recently that I haven't stopped thinking about.

"How often do we get to just switch our phones off, lie down and be cared for an hour or two?"

It sounds like such a simple question, but the more I thought about it, the more I realised how unusual that experience actually is for most of us.

As adults, we spend so much of our time being the ones who take care of things. We organise, plan, remember, anticipate, decide and respond. We look after children, partners, parents, homes, businesses, colleagues and friends. Even when we're doing something that is supposed to be "self-care", we're usually still the one responsible for making it happen.

There is something very different about being cared for by someone else.

How many situations are there in adult life where we get to be looked after by another person? Honestly, one of the few other examples I could think of was when the choice is taken out of our hands - when we're in hospital, unwell or injured, or elderly and unable to care for ourselves anymore.

There are, of course, people in our lives who care for us. We can have loving relationships, supportive friendships and communities around us. But there is still something quite different about deliberately stepping into a space where, for a while, someone else is responsible for looking after you.

And I think this is one of the most valuable things about receiving a massage, honestly it is one of the main reasons why I love what I do, I think it is a privilege to be able to offer another person the attentive care that, quite likely, they don't often receive.

For the time you're in the treatment room, you don't have to organise anything. You don't have to answer your phone, decide what happens next, think about your to-do list or look after anyone else. The room has been prepared for you, the temperature, lighting, music and little details have all been considered. I'm there to listen, I'm paying attention to you, to your comfort and to what your body is communicating, and the treatment can change according to what you need that day.

Your only job is to receive.

I think we sometimes underestimate how unfamiliar that can feel.

We're very used to the idea that if we want to feel better, we need to do something. We need to exercise, meditate, eat better, get outside, manage our stress, practice our breathing, improve our sleep or learn how to regulate our nervous system. All of these things have their place, but they can also leave us with another task on the list: something else I need to do to look after myself.

There is another kind of care that asks nothing from you.

For a little while, there is nowhere you need to be and nothing you need to achieve.

You can simply lie down and let someone else take care of the details for a while.

And then there is the touch itself.

Touch is one of the ways we experience connection and care, yet as adults, particularly in a culture where we are often expected to be independent and self-sufficient, nurturing touch can become surprisingly absent from our lives. We might hug the people we love, but there are relatively few opportunities to simply receive sustained, attentive touch where nothing is being asked of us in return.

There is also some fascinating science behind why being touched in a safe, consensual and pleasurable way can feel so different from simply resting.

Touch gives the brain information on several different levels. Some of our sensory receptors tell us about pressure, movement and where we are being touched, while other systems appear to be particularly involved in the emotional and social qualities of touch. C-tactile, or CT, afferents are one example; these nerve fibres respond particularly well to the kind of slow, gentle stroking that we tend to experience as pleasant, and their activity is linked more closely to how pleasant touch feels and our emotional response, rather than to simply identifying where the touch is happening.

But CT afferents are only one small part of the picture. Research into touch more broadly suggests that pleasurable touch can positively influence areas of the brain involved in emotion, reward, interoception and social connection, while also affecting our physiological state. Studies of touch interventions have found benefits including reductions in anxiety, depressive symptoms and pain, and research into massage has found short-term changes such as reductions in heart rate and anxiety following treatment. The picture is complex, though, and we are still learning exactly how these effects occur. There isn't one single "touch hormone" or nervous system switch that explains why massage feels good.

What does seem clear is that touch is much more than a physical sensation. When it is wanted, safe and experienced as pleasant, it can communicate something to us at a very basic level: connection, attention and care.

And maybe this is part of what makes receiving massage different from simply taking some time to yourself. You aren't just resting your body. You are receiving sustained, attentive touch from another person, in an environment where the focus is entirely on you. Your body is receiving sensory information, while at the same time you are experiencing something relational: someone is here, paying attention, and taking care of you.

We don't necessarily need to understand all of the biology for that experience to matter. But I find it reassuring to know that there is science behind something we have probably all experienced instinctively: being touched with care can make us feel better.

And perhaps that is part of why receiving care can feel so restorative. It isn't only about releasing tension from your shoulders or easing an aching back, although those things matter. There is something about being listened to and attended to, about having someone notice what you need and responding to it, that meets a much more fundamental human need.

We are not designed to carry everything alone.

Sometimes we need other people to share the load. Sometimes we need someone to listen, or someone to notice that we're tired before we have to explain it. Sometimes we need to be the person who doesn't have to think about everyone else for an hour or two.

And perhaps we don't need to wait until we're completely overwhelmed before we allow ourselves that experience.

We don't have to be ill enough to need a hospital bed. We don't have to reach breaking point. We don't have to earn it by being exhausted enough, busy enough or productive enough.

We can simply allow ourselves to be cared for because we are human beings who sometimes need to receive, as well as give.

🌿So, when was the last time you switched your phone off, lay down and let someone else take care of you?

Reference list-

Löken et al. (2009) — foundational CT afferent research. PubMed  

Ackerley et al. (2023) — current review of CT afferents and affective touch. PubMed  

Packheiser et al. (2024) — systematic review/meta-analysis of health effects of touch interventions. PubMed  

Moyer et al. (2004) — massage-specific meta-analysis. PubMed