Massage therapist combines several modalities to create a unique approach

By Therese Wood/Montana Health Journal

Massage therapist Tammitha Ann was always told she had a gift for healing with touch.

She knew it was true, but as a teenager the requests from those in her circle of friends and family became overwhelming, and she turned away from it, thinking that she never wanted to be asked to do another massage.

After a long hiatus, Ann became serious about her gift again, and wanting a better life with her son she decided to go to massage school. Transitioning to becoming a professional massage therapist unlocked the deeper gifts that she had for body work, and making it a career brought back her original love for this healing art.
Today, she has a thriving massage business in downtown Kalispell, Pure Magic Massage. Some of her devoted clients have been with her for over 12 years. Ann invests time getting to know her clients so she can work with all the life situations that are unique to each of them. “I know my clients”, she says. “Each person’s body is like a story of the things they have been through, or are currently going through.” In each session she tunes into what the body is holding on to and what the body is asking for.

The work on her table is like a dialogue that she is having with the body, and she often gently talks to the muscles and limbs with encouragements that produce what seem like breakthroughs in stuck or congested areas.

Having trained in several massage therapies, including Trager, positional release, passive range of motion, Reiki, deep tissue and Thai, she blends a mix of techniques that create her own style. Her work became so well known in the community that she was asked to work at the Montana Center for Pain Management where she operated for a year and half until she returned back to her own practice downtown.
Balance of physical and energetic aspects is what Ann works toward in her sessions. Using her own intuition and ability to feel the most subtle changes as she works on the body, she has made an art of her bodywork.

She refers to our bodies as temples. “We need to tune into our own bodies and listen to what they need,” she said, “and massage is a great guide for us to do that.”