Cover story; January/February 2004 issue of  Massage Magazine; page 94

Nobody knows the power of tender touch better than a mother and her newborn—and few know it as intimately as Dominique Webster of Manhattan Beach, California. Learning to communicate through touch with her baby boy provided a needed sense of connection while he was in the hospital—and lifelong memories in his absence.

Webster learned infant massage in 2001 from the nurses in the neonatal intensive care unit when her son, Charlie, was critically ill.

"I'm not the type of person who gets in touch with myself. I don't get massages, and I don't read Deepak Chopra," Webster says. "So I thought the idea of infant massage was a little crazy. But I was desperate to find a place for me in that intensive-care environment, where pretty much everything was beyond my control, and where things that would normally help me bond with my baby were taken away. Infant massage became the only thing I had to support my son."

What started off as very gentle touching—just warming her hands and concentrating on the tremendous love she had for her baby as she touched his body—developed, over five months, into such a rhythm that when Charlie became anxious or uncomfortable, he would immediately calm down with Webster's touch. "I'll never forget the day when Charlie was being moved and was just coming off the ventilator, and he was all wound up. It was amazing: After just one or two of my strokes, he looked, focused and I could almost see his breathing slow down."

Charlie didn't live beyond those five months, but Webster was transformed by the blessing of his life and by the intense bond they shared through infant massage, so much so that in 2002 she became a certified instructor of infant massage (CIIM).

"The experience taught me to live calmly, quietly and in the moment," she says now of her too-brief time performing gentle touch on her son. "Time, presence and listening—these are gifts. Infant massage is a gift."...

[full text available on request ]

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