what to expect from a thai massage

i have some pretty gnarly chronic issues with my shoulders & trapezius muscles due to my first ribs constantly popping out of alignment. i mean, nothing terrible - i go to a chiropractor regularly now, and the act of getting aligned once or twice a week has really helped my body figure out how to put the ribs back on its own when it happens now. but they do still come out a lot, which makes the muscles around them very unhappy, so i basically always have giant rock-hard knots in my traps. not that big of a deal, but as a result i tend to snap up any massage deals i see on livingsocial these days.

a few weeks ago, there was one for a thai massage. "neat!" i thought to myself, "a new kind of massage!"

chris has had thai massages while actually in bangkok, and had told me to expect a lot more stretching than in a swedish massage. i figured that would probably be good for me and my inflexible limbs. stretching is good for you!

so walking in, i thought i was pretty well prepared for what to expect. massage, stretching, relaxation. sweet. i got there, stripped down, and got under the sheet.

what i was NOT anticipating was for the masseuse to come in and immediately hop ONTO THE TABLE with me.

this was not a larger-than-average massage table, mind you. this was a regular sized massage table, which i took up nearly all of, but now there was also a small thai woman kneeling in between my ankles and starting to massage the backs of my legs.

until she climbed directly on top of me and started kneading my butt with her knees, that is.

(it should be noted that she was not, in fact, wearing green pajamas for the massage. but these were awfully hard to draw in mspaint even without also giving her stylish clothing.)

i had just about acclimated myself to having a woman kneeling on my butt, when she climbed off me, repositioned, and grabbed my ankles. and then this happened.
let's just say i'm pretty glad it was laundry day and i was wearing some of my uglier, more full-coverage underwear.

this was, as you can imagine, only the tip of the iceberg. many of the positions were far too complicated for my meager mspaint skills (for example: imagine me on my back, with my knees together but on the right side of my body to stretch my back. my left arm is being held out by her right arm, her right foot planted in my armpit to keep that side of me in place, and she's kneeling on my upper thighs with her other leg to keep me fully torqued. also i have on only underwear. AWESOME.)

it was.. well, "relaxing" was not exactly one of the words i'd use to describe it. acrobatic, yes. often painful, also yes. but oddly enjoyable. and most often, very undignified.