Today we’d like to introduce you to Dana Ball.
Hi Dana, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
My massage career began in 2006 when I enrolled in a small massage school here in North Charleston that was owned/operated by a massage therapist. Massage was introduced to me through my Mom’s work accident. She was misdiagnosed with a rotator cuff injury when she actually had a herniated disc in her neck. After her second surgery, I took her to most of her PT appointments and her Physical Therapist showed me how to help her at home. I learned some hands-on therapies and kinesiotaping methods to help her progress. My Mom always said what I did felt amazing, and I knew then I had to learn more. I completed my massage program and have been licensed to provide massage since 2008.
I began teaching entry-level massage in 2015 when one of my instructors was preparing to move back home. She encouraged me to apply for her position, and I remember telling her there was no way I could do what she did; her shoes felt impossibly big to fill. She saw more in me than I saw in myself, which is often the case in a teacher : student relationship. I went on to serve as Program Director at that institution for about a year and a half before being approached by another school to help grow their massage program. I taught there for the next five years, until I became increasingly disillusioned with the layers of corporate bureaucracy, leadership that felt progressively disconnected from the people doing the work, and it no longer aligned with how I believed education and care should be delivered. At that crossroads, I reached out to the massage education community to better understand what it would look like to open a school of my own.
I was incredibly blessed to have found a school owner/operator in Washington and with her and her team’s guidance, I submitted Carolina School of Bodywork’s application for licensure to the SC Commission on Higher Education in August of 2022 and achieved licensure by December. It is absolutely the biggest thing I’ve ever done.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It was most definitely not a smooth road. One large struggle was securing funding. Many small business owners talk about “bootstrapping” as a method to obtain startup funding, but in reality, bootstrapping does require individual wealth. I tried crowdfunding and had many friends and family members willing to support my endeavor, but starting a school requires significant funding. SC requires the physical space to be operational prior to granting a license and we are not permitted to advertise before obtaining that license.
I did secure funding through The Climb Fund which is a local small business development center that specializes in helping people who do not qualify for traditional small business loans through banks. The Climb Fund provides a business coach and she has pushed me more than I was comfortable. The truth is, change and progress don’t come from being comfortable. And Cindy if you’re reading this, Thank you for making me uncomfortable.
I ran into challenges with up-fit, many revisions of documents with SCCHE, and spent many hours in quickbooks questioning my life choices. On top of opening a school, I have my own massage practice and I am also a wife and a mother to two young boys. Maintaining my practice and being present in my family’s lives poses many challenges to my work/life balance. If I’m honest, it’s closer to a work/life juggle.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
In my private practice, I’ve created a space where I enjoy helping people figure out why they are in pain and showing them ways to move differently and adapt better habits to live with less pain. That passion helps me in the classroom by having real-life examples and scenarios to share with my students. I’m a firm believer that pain doesn’t have to be permanent, which is why my practice is named Sore No More.
I don’t view other bodyworkers as competition, because what we do is so subjective. There is someone for everyone. Massage/manual therapy is largely under-utilized in pain management and I’d love to see massage therapists codified as healthcare providers in SC. We understand so much more about the biomechanics of the body than most people realize and can play a much larger role in case management than we have been.
In the classroom, I encourage my students to ask questions and to question everything. The exam to become licensed in massage is an applied knowledge exam that requires critical thinking to pass. I find myself answering their questions with: What do you think? We should never stop learning, and we will never know everything.
What matters most to you? Why?
Increasing the quality and quantity of massage therapists locally matters most to me. Massage therapy can be truly transformative for so many people.
My favorite clients are the ones who have low to no expectations, mostly because it’s easy to exceed expectations when there are none. I have a regular client who all but made her spouse come to see me because of his frequent intense back pain. His primary care provider had ruled out structural issues like arthritis and disc bulges or herniations, and suggested physical therapy or massage. He tried physical therapy and didn’t get the results he was looking for and came to see me next. He told me something along the lines of, “I don’t think this is going to work at all.”
After his first session, he got off my table with bewilderment. He didn’t have the sharp pain with certain movements anymore, and we made a plan together for some changes in movement patterns he’d adopted that aren’t working for him anymore. I’m happy to say that he doesn’t see me anymore, and not because he didn’t enjoy my work, but because he can do the things he likes to do now without pain.
I happily told him that we never had to tell his wife that she was right, and that could be our secret. It is stories like his that make what I do so much more enjoyable. It truly is wonderful to have a career doing something that you love, and it brings peace to one person at a time.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.carolinabodyworkschool.com
- Instagram: carolinabodywork
- Facebook: carolinabodywork
