How To Dry Brush Your Whole Body
If you’ve never heard of dry brushing before, welcome to your crash course! If you have heard of it, I hope that this blog post/guide can help you start taking advantage of it! Before we get started, I want to give you a quick rundown of what exactly dry brushing is…
What is Dry Brushing?
Dry brushing is a practice many people use before bathing by brushing across their body with a special dry, soft-bristled brush to help with fluid/lymphatic drainage, increase blood flow, and exfoliate the skin. However, my favorite thing about dry brushing is how much it helps support the lymphatic system! Since this system is one-way and has no pump like the heart to push fluid through, it needs our help through movement to help move things along. A great way to accomplish this is by adding dry brushing to our routine. However, if you theres a few things that are important to understand, so that you do it correctly and reap the reward.
This is why I wanted to put together a quick guide to break down exactly how to dry brush if you have a healthy lymphatic system. If you have lymphatic issues of any kind, you should definitely speak with your doctor before you start dry brushing, so that you can be aware of a different technique you may need to use if you should dry brush at all. Some conditions would also make a lymphatic massage more effective than dry brushing. However, if you are cleared and ready to try it, here’s how to dry brush your whole body…
Dry Brushing The Body and Limbs
When it comes to dry brushing, it’s helpful to picture your whole body in four “pieces” to show you where to start and end your strokes. So, start by visualizing two lines: one vertical line down the middle of your body, and the second one crossing directly over your belly button. This gives you a cluster of lymph nodes to push towards for every section of your body. These clusters are in both of your armpits, and both sides of your groin where the creases of your thighs are in the front…
Before you start actually dry brushing, it’s important to activate the deeper lymph nodes in your belly. To do this, place your hands flat against your belly button/slightly above your belly button and take a deep breath in. As you feel your stomach expanding, gently put pressure on it with your hands and keep it there as you exhale. You can also rub your hands in a circle around your belly button after each breath. Do this 3-5 times.
Now you can start dry brushing your legs. You might think that starting with your feet and working up would be the best way; however, this can create too much fluid buildup at a time. Instead, start by working down from your upper thighs. Make short, firm strokes (3-5 per spot) all the way around and down your thighs, being mindful to finish each stroke up towards your groin area where the cluster of lymph nodes is. This gives the fluid a place to be processed before it ultimately gets pushed to the heart. As you finish your thighs, do one more round of long strokes all the way up from your knees to your groin just to ensure you’ve moved all that fluid and make room for what you have in your lower legs and feet.
Now that your thighs are finished, do the same for your lower legs. Working down from the knee and still up into the groin, keep up with those short, firm strokes until you have covered all of your lower legs between your knees and ankles. Once you have finished, do another set of long strokes all the way around from your ankles to your groin.
Once your legs are all done, it’s time to get to your feet. If you haven’t already, it can be helpful to use a stool or something to put each foot up on so you can reach everything easier. However, the concept is still the same. Work your way down and around your feet, and be pushing fluid up into your groin as well. When you’ve finished, do one more pass from your toes to your groin, just to push through any remaining fluid.
Before we move to the upper body, we want to finish the lower body between our belly button line and the groin. This includes the glutes and the lower back and abdomen. Starting with the lower abdomen below the belly button, keep doing short, firm strokes (3-5x each) aimed down towards the lymph nodes in your groin.
After you’ve finished your lower abdomen, it’s time to move towards your lower back and glutes. Start with your lower back, and wrap your strokes around and down towards the front of your groin areas, keeping each side’s fluid on the side of the groin it’s already on. Do the same with your glutes, just pushing your strokes up and around to the groin nodes.
Now that your lower body is completely finished, it’s time to work on the upper sections—the left and right sides of your torso where you will be directing the fluid towards each armpit. (It can be very helpful to have a dry brush with a longer handle for this portion.) Start with your upper back, and push your short, firm strokes (still 3-5x each) across each half of your upper back and into your armpits. Remember to keep everything on the corresponding sides, so that you don’t have extra buildup on one side.
Once you’ve finished your back, do the same with your front sides. (If you have breasts, you may also want to try including a quick breast massage here.)
After you’ve completed your front and back torso, you can get your arms done. This is going to be exactly the same technique as you used for your legs, but instead of pushing everything towards the groin, you’ll be pushing it towards the underarms. Start with your upper arms, then forearms, and finally hands.
After you’ve finished dry brushing your body, go back to the first step and finish off with some deep breaths and more lymphatic activation for the deeper nodes you have in your belly area.
There you have it! You now know how to dry brush your body and limbs! Now, let’s move on to the face…
Dry Brushing The Face and Neck
Just like you did for your body, you want to remember to picture that invisible line vertically down the middle of your face. This will help you direct all the fluid to the correct side of your body. However, instead of guiding it to the groin or armpits, you’ll be pushing it to the lymph nodes around your collarbone area. These will be right around either side of your sternum, the center bone in your chest. As you finish each step, remember to do one final push towards your collarbone area.
Start by making small, circular strokes around and down your chest above your collarbone and below your neck. Make sure you are mindful of how you aim each stroke, since you want to actually be guiding the fluid instead of just moving it around.
Next, start at the bottom of your neck and work your way upwards as you push your small, circular strokes down towards your collarbone. Do this around your whole neck until you reach your jaw.
Now, once you’ve gotten up to your jaw, start at either side of your imaginary line that splits your chin. Then, work your small, circular strokes along the underside of your jaw, towards the underside of your ear, and then down to the collarbone on each corresponding side.
For the face, you want to be very gentle with your small, circular strokes, and push each stroke towards the undersides of your ears, and then down into the collarbone area again. Just make sure again that each side is separate—so the left side goes towards the left ear, and same for the right side.
After you’ve finished, take a bath or shower to get rid of any dead skin cells that have loosened with all the exfoliating you just did. It’s also a good idea to rinse off your brushes in some diluted isopropyl alcohol, then water, then let them air dry.
I hope this dry brushing crash course inspires you to add to your self-care routine, and remember to take care of your lymphatic system!
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