"Massage" covers a very broad array of modalities and session goals. How do you quickly communicate to others exactly what you do?

I call myself a Massage Therapist, and I see an array of therapeutic massage clients: post-injury clients, maintenance massage, pregnancy massage, but always with a goal-oriented focus on restoring function to muscles and joints. Some of the modalities I use are trigger point, deep tissue, and sports massage tools like METs. I do an occasional relaxation massage but it's not my focus.

I've recently introduced myself to a few people as a Massage Therapist, and then in the course of conversation when they find out more about what I do, they've stated, "Oh! You mean you're actually a bodyworker!" I've been in practice for 5 years, and this response is a recent development that I've gotten 3 times over the past 2 months (a fairly new development tho.)

The people have gone on to explain to me that they think of a massage therapist as anyone who is just seeking to do a spa type relaxation massage. But a bodyworker has a goal in mind for a lasting outcome of the massage. (Obviously, I'm paraphrasing.)

It makes me a little crazy that there's no hard and fast definitions *in the minds of the public* for describing the work that massage therapists do. It makes it really difficult to communicate to potential clients or people who have never had a massage before. Part of my issue may be that I'm in California's Bay Area. We have a gazillion types of massage here, and massage was until very recently regulated on a town by town basis. Meaning, in the Bay Area with cities smooshed together, there were different titles given to massage therapists by licensing agencies. Four licensing cities are adjacent to my area, meaning you could have completely different titles depending upon where in a 10 mile stretch you practiced. So I suspect that John Q. Public is just confused and no longer knows what to call any of us, regardless of what we do.

California passed state level legislature governing massage licensing this past year (yay!), which defines some aspects of massage, and I'm hoping that their standardized language will trickle into common usage with the public. Also interesting to note: the word "Bodyworker" doesn't appear anywhere in that legislature that I'm aware of.)

So I'm interested to know, what type of massage do YOU do, how do you describe yourself to potential clients and others, and do you feel that after just a short description people understand what you do? Also helpful: what state do you practice in, and do you have state wide regulation and for how long. And, is "Bodyworker" now a common convention, and have I got the meaning right?

Thanks,
--Andrea