Prenatal & postnatal massage

How I position you, and why that is the whole treatment

The real difference between a prenatal massage and an ordinary one isn’t the strokes — it’s the setup. From the second trimester onwards you lie on your side, never on your stomach, and not flat on your back for any length of time. Everything else is built on top of that.

Side-lying done properly takes cushions in four places: one supporting the bump so its weight isn’t dragging on your lower back, one between the knees so the top hip doesn’t roll forward and pull on the glute, one under your head to keep your neck level with your spine, and often one to hold so the top shoulder doesn’t fold across your chest. Once you’re settled, I can reach what actually aches in pregnancy — the lower back and sacrum, the sides of the hips, the glutes, the upper back — with steady, even pressure and no strain on you at all. Then you turn over, and I work the other side the same way.

Pressure is adapted, not abandoned. Pregnancy aches are usually genuine muscular tension from a shifting centre of gravity, and feather-light stroking doesn’t touch them. What changes is where I go firm and where I don’t: I stay off the deep points at the inner ankle and the web of the hand that are traditionally avoided in pregnancy — not because I think a thumb there is proven to do harm, but because there is no reason whatsoever to take the chance. That’s the rule for the whole hour. Given a choice between a slightly better release and a definitely comfortable one, I take comfortable every time.

Who books this in Dubai

• Expecting mothers in villas — Palm Jumeirah fronds, Dubai Hills, JVC townhouses — with the space and privacy at home and no interest in driving anywhere at 34 weeks.
• Second and third trimester aches: the lower back, the hips, and shoulders that have quietly rounded forward.
• New mothers in the fourth trimester, sore from feeding and carrying, running on broken sleep.
• Mums a long way from their support network — expat life often means the family who would normally be helping is on another continent.
• Anyone who wants one consistent female therapist she has met before, rather than whoever an app sends that day.

What a session looks like at your place

I arrive with the table, fresh linens and considerably more bolsters and cushions than a normal visit needs, then set up in whichever room is quietest — usually a bedroom, sometimes a corner with the curtains drawn. You don’t prepare a thing.

Before we start, tell me everything: how many weeks you are, how you’ve been sleeping, what your doctor or midwife has said. If you have high blood pressure, a history of clots, or any complication at all, please clear it with them before you book — and if something doesn’t feel right on the day, we simply don’t proceed. That isn’t me being difficult; it’s the only sensible way to do this.

The hour itself is slow and quiet, with proper draping throughout. Sixty minutes is usually plenty; ninety if you’d like the legs and feet given real time. Afterwards you stay exactly where you are.

My honest take

Prenatal massage is comfort care, and I think it should be sold as exactly that. It doesn’t fix a complication, it doesn’t reposition anything, and nothing I do overrides your doctor. Be wary of anyone who hints otherwise.

What it does do is give a tired, aching body an hour of relief and an hour of being looked after — which, at 32 weeks in a Dubai summer, is worth a great deal on its own. The rest of the value is logistics, and I don’t think that’s a small thing: getting dressed, the drive, the parking, the waiting room and the drive home can quietly undo most of what a good massage just gave you. Staying put is half the treatment.

If you’re weighing it up, start with my honest guide to whether massage is safe during pregnancy in Dubai. Between sessions — and once your doctor is happy — the shoulder release for laptop and phone posture works just as well on feeding posture, and a wind-down routine for better sleep earns its keep in the fourth trimester. If you’re local, here’s what a visit looks like for prenatal massage on Palm Jumeirah or in Dubai Hills. Message me on WhatsApp with how far along you are and I’ll take it from there — AED 400 an hour at home, fixed and agreed before I set off, with no deposit.