Today we’d like to introduce you to Cara Thurman.
Hi Cara, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I see my career as more of a calling than a job. I know first-hand how scary it can be to have surgery, be hospitalized and have your health be out of your control. I was born with a congenital heart defect and have spent my entire life in and out of hospitals. I have had open-heart surgery four times, open chest surgery once and too many cardiac catheterizations to count. I have spent many nights; in the hospital, in pain and scared that my life would be cut short. My last open-heart surgery was February 23, 2009. This was the first big surgery I had as an adult and it changed the course of my career and my life.
Leading up to the surgery, I was running a small organic vegetable farm in Vermont. The stress and anxiety of preparing for an open-heart surgery caused me to seek help. I decided to integrate therapies not offered by my traditional medical team into my care. I found help in a massage therapist named Susan. Susan and I worked together for weeks leading up to the surgery. She helped calm my nerves and get me into a positive mindset.
She also worked on my husband Patrick. The change I saw in him after their sessions was as helpful to me as having a massage myself. Working with Susan during my recovery, it became clear that massage therapy was my calling; what I would do as my life’s work.
My sole purpose in massage therapy training was to study oncology massage and work with people experiencing cancer and other medical conditions. 12 years later, I am now the proud owner of Vinings Massage & Wellness, Atlanta’s #1 provider in oncology and medical massage.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
It has not been a smooth road for many reasons. I started my business as a sole practitioner with very limited funding. Our growth was largely organic through referrals and reputation. Heading into 2019 things really began to click. Our wellness center was ranking #1 on google thanks to our reviews and we had several hospital contracts across Atlanta. Then in March of 2019, I arrived in the morning to open the wellness center only to find the entire building was filled with water. A pipe had burst overnight and now water was pouring from the ceiling.
We closed our doors for three months to renovate. Fortunately, we had our hospital programs, which allowed us to keep our employees working at least some. We gained a lot of perspective and a beautiful new therapeutic space. We now look at that flood as a bit of a blessing in disguise. We had so much support from our community for that reopening and started moving along and gaining momentum. Boom, then the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March of 2020, and we shut our doors again. We pride ourselves in upholding the highest of COVID-19 standards and have followed CDC guidelines from the start. We stayed closed for much longer than most massage therapy practices and did not open our doors again until September 2020; this was unfortunately a short-lived reopening as we shut down again as soon as COVID-19 numbers began to spike in December. We are happy to say we finally reopened again in March of 2021 and have been open since. Both our team and our client volume have been steadily growing and I feel grateful for this every day.
Our hospital programs have been off and on over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, but we are thrilled to report that our work with the employees at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta continues to expand. Our patient-facing programs at Piedmont Fayetteville are back up and running and we are patiently awaiting the restart of our Piedmont Atlanta program. I see a lot of opportunity for our business in 2022. We are working on several additional healthcare partnerships and hope to provide more massage for healthcare workers as well as their patients.
As you know, we’re big fans of Vinings Massage & Wellness. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
Vinings Massage & Wellness (VMW) has been serving the Atlanta community since 2012. Cara Thurman established VMW with the two-fold mission of creating a sustainable place for exceptional massage therapists to work as well as to provide Atlanta with best-in-class massage therapy services. We are not your typical spa; we focus more on the therapy aspect of massage and strive to be industry leaders. With a focus on quality and healthcare, we have developed industry leading COVID-19 policies and are trusted by Atlanta’s top hospitals. Though we offer a variety of massage modalities at our wellness center, we also have a unique niche in medical massage. Not only are we contracted by several local hospitals to provide inpatient massage to cancer patients and post op patients, we also provide the employee massage for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta.
At VMW we take the time to get to know each client and their needs, then establish a treatment plan unique to their goals. I am extremely proud of our staff as well our loyal clientele. We have clients that have been coming to see us for nearly ten years and our staff turnover rate is a fraction of the industry norm. Once clients find us, they seem to keep coming back, just read our online reviews.
Are there any books, apps, podcasts or blogs that help you do your best?
I am an avid podcast listener. As a female business owner living with ADHD, I have had to do my fair share of personal development. I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD until a few years ago and I love learning about how my brain works and how to best harness it. I am a big fan of Ned Hallowell’s books, as well as Brendan Mahan’s “ADHD Essentials” podcast.
For anyone striving to be their best self, I would prescribe Chris Duffy’s podcast “How to be a better human” and “The Science of Happiness” podcast which comes out of Berkley’s Greater Good Science Center.
As a massage therapist, I also subscribe to podcasts by Healwell, a non-profit that specializes in working with medically complex clients. Their most recent series, “Massage Therapy without borders,” has helped me think through how to be a responsible massage therapist and business owner throughout COVID-19. Then there is Tracy Walton, who is the industry leader in Oncology Massage and has become a mentor over the years.
Contact Info:
- Email: cara@viningsmassage.com
- Website: www.viningsmassage.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vinings_massage/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/viningsmassage/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/vinings-massage-and-wellness-atlanta
