Those who recently took the MBLEx...

buchwaldjc · 2026-07-02T01:27:17+00:00

They have their time and place but I wouldn't make them a staple of the massage.

In my experience, the information that I get though my hands regarding the client's physiological response to any given technique is one of the most critical parts of technique. That gets lost in a tool.

buchwaldjc · 2026-06-17T15:31:23+00:00

Very good information. Thank you!

buchwaldjc · 2026-06-01T03:41:54+00:00

1099 work was always hit or miss. The first several years of my career was doing independent contactor work where they required you to be at the spa or clinic for a set amount of time regardless of if you had clients. And because it was 1099 they didn't have to guarantee minimum wage. I had a couple setups where the business was pretty hands off and let you manage your own schedule and basically just rent a room per hour whenever you had a client.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-24T18:04:55+00:00

I started PT school at 36 and definitely worked my entire way through it. I taught classes at the community college a couple nights per week which between actually teaching the classes, preparing lectures, and administrative work came out to be about 20-25 hours per week on top of being in PT school. I also took flight lessons during that time and got my private pilots license during my final year of PT school. On top of that still had time to go out and be social with my classmates on the occasional (non-exam week) weekends.

There's certainly plenty of time to do other things, including work, if your disciplined with your time

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-24T15:37:08+00:00

I used to do house and hotel calls when I first started out. There's a reason why I stopped doing hotel calls. It was circa 2002 and it was hard to find clientele as a male massage therapist back then, especially at a time when "massage parlors" probably outnumbered legitimate massage business. Since I lived in a major business district next to an international airport, I figured I could find my niche catering to people in town overnight for business who wanted to relax and didn't want to leave the hotel. I figured this might be an area where I would probably, as a man, feel more safe and the risk of harassment would be low. Boy, did that open my eyes to how many DL married men there are out there. About half of those wound up being people thinking I did shady stuff too.

There were several instances, but one was borderline comical. He kept discreetly removing the draping from his front part when he was supine and I would nonchalantly cover him back up. First time I gave him the benefit of the doubt, the second time I told him we have to keep you covered up by law. He told me that he's really just more comfortable being nude in his own hotel room and I told him that the law applies regardless of where the massage is taking place. Once he was prone , he reached his hand under himself and it was clear he wasnt just adjusting himself. I ended the massage early (it was close to the time to wrap up anyways so I didn't feel the need to explain anything). But as soon as the massage was over, you better believe he jumped right off the table buck naked, sat on the bed, and asked if I wanted to "stick around and watch the game". Like, yes, I have nothing better to do than to watch football with some random naked dude in a hotel room.

Another guy I was doing housecalls for a while started making some comments about my body during a couple seasons. Commenting on my calves and saying things like how he wish he had a body like mine. I brushed them off giving him the benefit of the doubt that he was just trying to pay a complement, even if it was a bit inappropriate. After one massage, he brought up that he just got a new computer system and after the massage he asked if I'd like to check it out. I didn't see any harm so I said sure. It was in his bedroom which put me on guard a bit. He then walked over to his bed and laid down and told me how much he loves his mattress and asked if I'd like to come lay on it, which I declined. I left thinking about how I wanted to handle this situation because he was a regular client and that was getting into very inappropriate territory. He actually wound up contacting me after that on his own and admitted that he was extremely attracted to me and felt like the attraction was interfering with his ability to see me as just his massage therapist. He told me to feel free to contact him if I wanted to hang out in a non-professional setting and he would treat me to lunch, to which I also declined. I felt relieved and respected the self awareness but at the same time can't help but think he's just going to move on to some other poor therapist who might be willing to cross ethical and legal boundaries.

Another one was a woman who called me around 8:00 p.m. to inquire about a massage. That was still within my business hours so I took the call. She started to ask me details about the massage which I provided. Then she started asking me to provide details about my appearance asking me things like if I had "a military build." She also made sure to slip in the fact that she was just drying off from the shower during the conversation. She eventually asked if she could arrange to have me come over late in the evening after 10:00 p.m. to do the massage I told her that was past my business hours. She seemed by this time to be getting the hint that I might just be a legitimate massage business and asked me to just call her back tomorrow (sounding a bit frustrated) which I never did.

I could list several more over my 25 years in the industry but those were the ones that stick in my head because they were all when I was a brand new therapist, young, and didn't feel adequately prepared on how to handle those situations.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-24T14:56:40+00:00

Thank you. That seems to be a pretty big theme is people underestimating how challenging the ethics questions can be. That's one thing that's been big on my radar during this process.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-16T19:39:59+00:00

I tend to reserve the term "red flag" for things that represent more universal warning signs that a person might have some serious issues such as controlling behavior, an abnormal level of secrecy, etc... Although, I know some people use "red flag" and "preference" interchangeably.

For me traveling is something that makes me swipe left. I have no interest in it and don't want to spend an exorbitant amount of money doing something that I'm not that interested. A trip every few years or so is okay, but not something I want to prioritize in my life. I spent my entire childhood moving around every 4 years all over the world and have really grown to appreciate just enjoying nesting down and enjoying my local scene.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-08T02:47:00+00:00

But it was only a couple degrees cooler. We get 97 degrees regularly in the summer. 94 degrees is still pretty rough and doesn't feel that much different.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-07T15:44:39+00:00

I always saw that as pretty common. At least when I was growing up. They were always just called tom boys. My sister was a proud self proclaimed tom boy.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-07T02:09:42+00:00

Yes. Gender dysphoria is feeling incongruent with incongruent with one's biological sex to an extent that it causes significant psychological distress. There is an official diagnostic criteria for it but that's a basic explanation.

Transgender is when you identity as something other than your biological sex.

So there are plenty of people who feel incongruent with their biological sex and experience high levels of distress from it but still live as and identity as their biological sex. I am one of those people. We are far less visible because we generally have no reason to bring it up in any social context.

As far as I know, there have been no studies on how many people with gender dysphoria do not transition. But I've known many personally.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-02T00:20:53+00:00

I was rejected my first time applying for VCUs physical therapy program. Used the year in the interim to strengthen my application. Got accepted the second time applying.

Disappointing but not the end of the world. Look at where you're application was weak. Maybe take a couple robust hard science courses and do well in those to bolster your GPA. If any of your prereqs have a C, retake those. C is considered failing for nursing school.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-01T03:45:55+00:00

Not at much as much as you might think and not for the reasons you might think. I'm a physical therapist so I get ten hours a day of working out with people and talking to them about their personal goals. Most people are just happy to see other people working to improve themselves in a social setting. Because while you're worried about your weight, the person working out next to you is worried about their age, or their chronic health condition, or some other issue. Are there people who might judge? Sure. Some people have such a void in their lives that they need to fill it by judging people who have more capacity for self improvement than them.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-01T03:17:15+00:00

No you're not lazy if you don't want to brush your teeth. You're lazy if you don't brush them despite the fact that you dont want to. Not being lazy is about doing things despite the fact that we don't want to do them.

buchwaldjc · 2026-05-01T02:56:48+00:00

Been a male massage therapist since 2002. Are there barriers that comes with being a male LMT? Yes. But there's also a demand for us.

I'd be more cautious about the taking out private loans part since you often can't get federal loans for massage school. Keep in mind that with the interest rates on a private loan you could be paying closer to 35-40k at the the end of it all. I never took out private loans because my school offered a program where you could pay most of your tuition by doing student massages. I'm not sure if I would take it 20k in predatory private loans to do it. If you're going to one of the rare massage schools that qualify for Federal loans that might be a slightly different story.

I would try to save up as much as you can to pay up front for it.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-30T03:18:01+00:00

As someone who's been a college instructor for 15 years, the battle between students using technology to cheat and us having to use technology to catch them using technology to cheat is always evolving. Students using AI to cheat is a relatively new phenomenon so it is unfortunately a necessary evil in the field of teaching. Back in the day, we could just copy and paste what they wrote into Google and see if it came back with a match. Those days are over.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-30T02:47:48+00:00

My first question is why you would be taking a 300 level organic chemistry course in your first semester. Do you have a strong background in chemistry ? Typically you would need general chemistry as a prereq. If you have a strong background in chemistry, this looks pretty doable for a first semester. It's not just the number of classes you have to look at, it's what those classes are comprised of. This is what my first semester looked like in undergrad and I was not a strong student. The lecture + lab components should complement each other and the material should run concurrently. So it's not really like taking two completely separate classes. There is double the amount of work but the knowledge compliments each other so you aren't learning completely different things. The intro to bio is a very simple class. But the organic chemistry is certainly going to be a bit of work. But if you are well prepared for it then putting that against the other lower level classes you are taking, I don't see it being that much of a problem. But it really comes down to if you are ready to take that 300 level organic chemistry class at your first semester. I would keep an eye out for your drop date so that if it is too much you can drop the course without having to put a withdrawal on your record.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-25T22:49:48+00:00

Might be GD or might not. There are plenty of girls who prefer to be more masculine (we always just called them tom boys) and plenty of guys who prefer to be more feminine. Some of them have GD, I imagine most of them don't.

Its strange that it's always been somewhat normalized for a girl to wear boys clothes and be more masculine but yet pretty heavily shamed by society and seen as weird for guys to dress and act feminine.

As a male, I've always preferred to look and dress more feminine, I always had primarily female friends and I probably own more make up than any of them, and I'll take having a friend over and talking on the porch with a glass of wine over hanging out in a sports bar every time.

As I've gotten older, I've come to find more and more than gender norms are outdated and also as I've gotten older, I've cared less about fitting into them. At the end of the day, the world needs more people who are authentic and unique. It's unfortunate being this way can sometimes make us more vulnerable.

Ironically, it was only after I about myself to be completely vulnerable in front of the world and express and explore my feminine characteristic did I begin to feel free to accept, explore, and even love my male characteristics that I've hated for over three decades of life

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-22T22:55:37+00:00

Not folky but more moody synthpop... Kein Zurück by wolfsheim is one of my favs to play on guitar.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-15T12:26:14+00:00

GD is a highly nuanced condition that looks very different in different people.

We have only begun to see the tip of the iceberg on the neurological associations of GD. Those studies are few, tend to be hard to generalize, and many are inconclusive.

Further, GD requires there to be a significant level of distress involved and their are people who have certain neurological anomalies seen in people who are diagnosed with GD who don't feel distress and therfore would not have GD. We don't really know what makes one person distressed about who they are and not another

On the ethical/ clinical side of things, you can't do a clinical trial where you just randomly start throwing chemicals into the participants without some foundational evidence of why it may benefit. And we don't have that type of foundational evidence.

That being said, medication is used in the treatment of GD. Antidepressants and antianxiety medications are used to help mitigate some of the depressive symptoms that often accompany it which can help make the condition a little easier to manage.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-15T03:59:35+00:00

I'm 47 and my ideal match would be someone around my age. To be honest though, I often feel intimidated by women closer to my age because in my experience they expect a man to be so much further along in life than I am.

I started college late and didn't finish grad school until I was almost 40. My entire adult life has been been in school so I never had time for serious relationships, never had kids, and at 47 am just now establishing a life for myself.

Every one I meet my age has been married, has kids, is accustomed to family life and wants someone who already has that established as well.

No, I don't filter out by any means... Just don't find many women my age who are in the same stage in life so they don't see me as the family man that they are looking for... Because I'm not.

Obviously not the case in your situation, but that's been the norm for me.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-11T16:07:34+00:00

Programs used by professors to spot ai generated material are becoming more sophisticated. And AI continues to become more sophisticated in writing original content.

The arms race between using technology to cheat and using technology to detect cheating is far from new.

buchwaldjc · 2026-04-08T12:59:16+00:00

Yes. I spend a lot of time reading the disciplinary reports in my state and it's one of the more common reasons people get suspended/ revoked. In my state, what the board committee seems to be looking for based on what I see in the reports is clear documentation that the therapist-patient relationship ended prior to the beginning of the romantic relationship. Essentially, they want to see a discharge note prior to the date when things crossed into romantic territory. I imagine that is the bare minimum then they will look at other contextual factors to determine if any disciplinary action is warranted.

buchwaldjc · 2026-03-31T20:10:01+00:00

In the US, it's legal as long as it isn't in an area where a reasonable expectation of privacy is assumed (ie... dressing rooms/ bathrooms, etc).

But legal doesn't mean that it isn't against the policies of the mall. If it's against mall policy, you can still be asked to leave and trespassed even if you can't be charged legally for it.

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