How do I protect my own body after years of hands-on work?

You can take the pain out of almost any body that lies down in front of you, and your own body is quietly paying the bill for all those years. There is a hard irony in that, and you are allowed to feel it. The gift in your hands is real, but it was never meant to be spent without refilling. Caring for the healer is not a betrayal of the work; it is what lets the work continue. A worn-out body helps no one, including the one it belongs to. Put the same attention on your own recovery that you give your clients, even a fraction of it, starting this week. Stretch, rest, get worked on yourself. You spend your body easing others. Spend a little of it keeping yourself able to.