Cupping Therapy Benefits
Natural Skin Tightening Technique
Cupping massage is a derivative of cupping therapy, an ancient Chinese form of alternative medicine in which a local suction is created on the skin. Practitioners believe this mobilizes blood flow in order to promote healing. Suction is usually created using heat or fire.
If you happen to hail from Eastern Europe or East Asia, you’ve likely heard of fire-cupping therapy, traditionally used in those regions for treating bronchitis and colds. To westerners, it feels inconvenient, messy, and having to light a wick feels, at first, strange, suspicious. What’s more, there is a faint “bruising” effect *, thanks to the partial vacuum
Suction Cup Therapy Set
Here’s where our fire-free suction cups really shine. No fire, no wick, nothing to burn!
We use a simple pump to create needed air pressure. Simply regulate the pressure by pumping the rubber ball attached to each cup. Instead of leaving the cup attached to your body, as in traditional fire-cupping, you’ll be using our cups to perform massage strokes, pleasantly rejuvenating your skin, making it smoother, more supple, and reducing any cellulite.
Suction Cup Therapy Set
Here’s where our fire-free suction cups really shine. No fire, no wick, nothing to burn!
We use a simple pump to create needed air pressure. Simply regulate the pressure by pumping the rubber ball attached to each cup. Instead of leaving the cup attached to your body, as in traditional fire-cupping, you’ll be using our cups to perform massage strokes, pleasantly rejuvenating your skin, making it smoother, more supple, and reducing any cellulite.
I perform the cupping massage on my upper chest, hands, and legs regularly, and have loved the results.
Venus Sculpting Cups are available now at our Natural Beauty Store.
Why Cupping Massage Works
Cupping massage is a skin decompression technique. To learn more about the numorous benefits of skin decopression read this article What is Skin Decopression?
Collagen is the key. To understand how important cupping massage can be, think about the collagen which all the beauticians are trying to put back into your face without much success, via creams, masks, even injections. Collagen, skin’s major component, of skin, is seated in the dermis and has a fibrous structure, rather like felt. Collagen fibers are arranged in parallel to each other, loosely packed. In the spaces between them are thin channels filled with tissue fluid. It is through these tiny channels that the capillaries transport nutrients to the surface of the skin.
Healthy collagen is the key to giving your skin proper nutrition. But, as we know, with age, collagen fibers lose their hydrophilic properties, and your collagen becomes “hard,” unable to perform its function of moisturizing the skin. It becomes dense, covering up the channels, and consequently the capillaries can no longer use them to send nutrients to the surface.
Cupping massage is an effective means to help pull out the nutrients by, as it were, “fluffing” the collagen fibers. As you perform your cupping therapy, there is a strong enhancement of capillary blood flow—even in places where it’s been stagnant. Indeed, when you see slight bruising* appearing on your skin’s surface after a cupping session, this just shows that you’ve been doing the right thing—feeding your skin after a long period of hunger!
How Cupping Massage Works
How To Get Rid of Cellulite
When you’re using the “cupping massage” method, your goal is to exert a repetitive, very mild stress to the area you’re massaging. During cupping, due to the difference in pressure blood and lymph rush to the surface from underlying tissues. Increased circulation rejuvenates the capillaries. Watch the video above, in which I demonstrate this technique on myself.
Regular practice will keep your skin nutrient-rich, oxygenated and free of trapped toxins. All of which will make your skin well-hydrated and blessedly free of cellulite!
Useful Tips:
- At first, just a little pressure will do—squeeze the ball only half-way. Practice will help.
- You’ll use a natural light oil in your cupping massage, making moving the cups easier and smoother. I suggest using Nourishing Night Cream, which is excellent for cupping massage; you can also use Olive Oil.
- Start gently! Test how your skin reacts. Be careful—go slowly, with minimal vacuum, and for short periods when starting out.
- One effective and simple tip to reduce bruising* quickly: Slice a raw potato and rub it on the bruise—it will start to fade before your eyes.
Please Note: Just as with all holistic practices, whether juice or water fasting, the raw food diet or yoga — by the way, all of them I highly recommend --— you might feel worse before you start to feel better. The same situation applies to body sculpting. If your capillaries are in a really sorry state, you will feel some discomfort in that area. Most likely some temporary bruises will appear. That’s why I suggest you start with the less visible areas of the body, such as the upper thigh, or your butt. And begin with the smallest cup.
* A Few Words on Bruising
Bruising… Just what is it? A bruise forms when small blood vessels (capillaries) near your skin’s surface break, thanks to some kind of pressure or injury that doesn’t penetrate the surface. Blood leaks out of the capillaries and appears as a red or purple mark, which may be bright or dark. Your body eventually reabsorbs the blood, and the mark disappears.
Some people bruise more easily than others. Hemophiliacs are notoriously prone to bruising, but let’s put that special case aside. Two other major causes bring some people to readier bruising: (1) thinning skin and (2) aging capillaries.
Aging skin gets thinner, losing much of the protective fatty layer that helps cushion blood vessels from injury. Capillaries age when tissues supporting these blood vessels weaken, making the capillary walls more fragile and prone to rupture. Weakened blood vessels can’t circulate blood as well as they used to, which can lead to a host of problems.
Here’s one of the bruising basics that many don’t understand: During cupping massage, if there’s no stagnant blood in a capillary, no bruise will form. One of the features of aging: stagnant blood, caused by poor circulation. Lifestyle choices loom large as contributing factors. Smoking, drinking alcohol, obesity, eating foods high in cholesterol and low in fiber all age your capillaries.
Helpful Tip: Before using the Venus Body Sculpting Cups, warm up the area of the skin you will be treating by vigorously massaging it with your hands for about a minute. This should help minimize bruising.
The benefits of cupping massage far outweigh the temporary bruising. In fact if you have much bruising at all, this indicates your capillary walls have long lost their elasticity, having become old and brittle. As capillaries break, the body creates new capillaries. So the next time that area is massaged, there will not be repeated bruising.
Warning:
If you’re taking any kind of blood-thinning drugs, including aspirin, Coumadin or Plavix, don’t try the cupping massage until you are well weaned off these medicines. Such drugs reduce your blood’s ability to clot. Even minor capillary stress can cause excess blood leakage, and more severe bruising. You should also avoid cupping massage if you take any corticosteroids (such as for allergies, asthma or eczema). Of course, you should avoid using sculptured cups if your skin is very thin, if you bruise easily, if you have any skin diseases or problems with blood clotting. Avoid cupping massage also if you’re pregnant or have any kind of open wound or fever. When in doubt, always consult a qualified medical professional!
Please Note: Our Venus Body Sculpting Cups are for use on your body only. Even the smallest cup is too strong for use on the face. If you’d like to experience the benefits of a cupping massage on your face, we have a cup specifically designed for the purpose…RejuvaCup. You’ll find our RejuvaCup’s smaller size ideal for your face.
Glass cups do get broken. But it never happened to me in many years of doing cupping massages. Glass remains the best material to use for massage cups. It’s perfect for an airtight seal. It’s durable, easy to sterilize, and completely inert—no toxic chemicals in plastic to contact your body.
So how can you reduce the chance of a cup slipping from your hands? Easy…After you apply my night cream or oil on your skin, wash your hands thoroughly with soap or cleanser. Dry with a towel. Take the cup into your clean, oil-free hand and start massaging.
Available now at the Online Beautiful On Raw Natural Beauty Store.