The foundations of practice at PALOMA — sanitation, the shape of a treatment, draping, and the recommendation.
4 chapters · about 22 min to read · everything is open, including the answers
This is for coming back to — before a shift, or with your trainer. The chapter screens are where you work through it the first time.
01Sanitation Foundation
After thisYou never invent a procedure, and you know the difference between cleaning something and making it safe.
Two therapists, same tool, same five minutes between guests.
Both rooms look clean. One of them is a problem.
●She's out of the usual product, so she uses the other one from the cupboard. It's a disinfectant, it's what's there, and the tool comes out visibly spotless.
Why this one
Yes.
Nothing about that was careless. She thought about it, she chose a real disinfectant, and the result looks right.
She improvised a sanitation procedure. Different products need different contact times and are approved for different surfaces — and a tool that looks spotless tells you nothing about either.
The room can't show you the difference. That's the whole reason this is a rule and not a judgment call.
○She can't remember the contact time for that tool, so she pulls up the procedure on her phone, follows it, and is thirty seconds slower.
This is what right looks like — including the part where she didn't remember.
Look at A again. It's the one that feels more competent.
Two different jobs. Which one does wiping something down actually do?
○Cleaning and disinfecting are two names for the same step, done properly.
They're two different jobs, and one has to happen before the other can work.
Try again.
●Cleaning removes what you can see. Disinfecting deals with what you can't. They are separate steps and the order matters.
Why this one
Yes.
Cleaning takes the soil off. Disinfecting acts on what remains — and it can't do its job through a layer you left behind.
That's why a procedure sometimes has two steps that feel redundant. They aren't.
○Disinfecting is the thorough version of cleaning, so if you disinfect you can skip cleaning.
This is the most common version of the mistake, and it's the one that quietly undoes the second step.
One of these two answers describes what each step is for.
Mid-shift. You've used this tool a hundred times.
You know the product. You cannot remember whether it sits for one minute or several.
What do you do?
○Leave it longer than you think it needs. Erring long is safer than erring short.
Reasonable instinct, and still a guess.
Contact time is a manufacturer instruction, not a margin you can widen by feel. Some products stop working as intended when they dry, and longer isn't automatically safer.
You still don't know the number.
●Look it up. It takes thirty seconds and the procedure is on your phone.
Why this one
Yes.
You are not expected to hold these numbers in your head. You are expected to follow the approved product instruction for the tool in front of you — and looking it up is following it.
This is why the procedures live in Reference. Reference is not the beginner's version. It's the correct version.
○Ask the therapist in the next room what she does.
She may well be right. She is also not the approved instruction, and if she's wrong the error now has two people repeating it.
There's a source that settles it.
Turning the room over.
One of these undoes the work.
○Used linens go straight into their container before you set out anything fresh.
This is the shape you want — the used thing leaves before the clean thing arrives.
●Fresh linens go down on the surface where the used ones were folded a moment ago.
Why this one
Yes.
Clean and dirty are places, not just moments. A surface that held used items is not neutral because the used items have gone.
The cleanest hands and the right product don't survive putting the fresh thing down in the wrong spot.
Where those places are in your actual room is something your LMT Trainer will walk you through — it's spatial, and a screen can't teach it.
○You wash your hands after handling used items and before touching anything fresh.
Correct, and necessary. Something else in this list is still going wrong.
You notice a piece of equipment is cracked. It still works.
Your next guest is already in the building.
What is this?
○A judgment call. It's a small crack and the session is a light one.
It isn't yours to judge — and that's the point rather than a criticism.
A damaged surface can't be reliably cleaned, because you can't get into what you can't reach. Whether the crack matters is a question about the equipment, not about the session.
●Take it out of use, and tell someone. Adjust the session around its absence.
Why this one
Yes.
Remove it, then escalate it. In that order — the removal doesn't wait for anyone to get back to you.
This is the same move you already know from everywhere else at PALOMA: stop, confirm, escalate. You are not the last line here, and you're not supposed to be.
○Clean it especially thoroughly and keep an eye on it.
Effort in the right spirit, aimed at the wrong problem.
Thoroughness doesn't reach inside a crack. Something has to happen to the equipment, not to your technique.
Five moves. Which keep the work, and which undo it?
You are not expected to
remember the procedure.
You are expected to
never invent one.
Every tool here has an approved procedure, and every one of them is a look-up away.
Your trainer will walk the actual room with you — where clean lives, where used goes, and how this room resets.
Next: the room itself.
You are not expected to remember the procedure. You are expected never to invent one.
Cleaning something and making it safe are two different things, and only one of them is visible.
Every tool here has an approved procedure, and every one is a look-up away.
After thisYou can open, work, close and follow up the same way every time, whatever the service is.
The guest is on the table. You have sixty minutes.
Both therapists begin. Only one has started.
●Hands on the shoulders. A breath together. Then a moment where nothing happens at all — no stroke, no adjustment — before the first movement.
Why this one
Yes.
That pause is not lost time. It is where the guest actually arrives.
Every PALOMA treatment opens the same way: static touch, a few deep breaths, and a moment of silence before anything begins. The service changes. This does not.
○Warm hands, oil ready, straight into long opening strokes. Efficient, competent, and the guest is being worked on within ten seconds.
Skilled, and it starts with the body rather than the person.
She came in carrying a day. The first ten seconds decide whether she puts it down or holds it for the next hour.
Look at A again — notice what it does before the work.
Four beats. Every treatment, every time.
Only the middle one changes.
Learn these four and you already know the shape of every service on the menu.
ARRIVE
Static touch. Several deep breaths. Silence. Let her land before you begin.
WORK
The service itself — this is the part that differs. Re-drape as you move; warmth is part of the experience.
CLOSE
Deep breaths with gentle compressive movements to elongate the tissue. Re-drape fully. The chime.
FOLLOW UP
The Recommendation Form. Water. A minute of her attention while she is still open.
Put the four beats in the order she feels them.
Deeper work. She's tight through the shoulder and you can feel it.
Where does the pressure start?
○Meet the tissue where it is. She's tight — work at the depth the tightness is at.
It's the intuitive answer and it produces the opposite of what you want.
Go straight to depth and the body guards — it braces against you, and now you're working through a muscle that has decided you're a threat.
●Superficial first, then deeper, then superficial again — every area, before you move on.
Why this one
Yes.
Superficial → deep → superficial. Every area.
The first pass tells the tissue what's coming. The last one tells it you're finished. In between is the only part that was ever going to work.
This sequence is why a skilled deep session can hurt less than an unskilled light one.
○Ask her how much pressure she wants, then apply exactly that.
Asking is right and it isn't the answer to this question.
She can tell you how much. She can't tell you in what order.
You're running short on time and one area still needs work. What gives?
○Work faster through the remaining area. Same techniques, more speed.
This is the one that costs you the most.
Speed heightens the nervous system's sensitivity. Faster pressure reads as more painful and accomplishes less — you get the worst of both.
Slower is not the gentle option. It is the effective one.
●Cover less ground, at the pace the work actually requires.
Why this one
Yes.
An area worked properly beats three areas rushed, and she will feel the difference tomorrow rather than in the moment.
Never take it from the closing ritual. The close is not padding — it's what lets her leave the way she came in, only better.
○Shorten the closing ritual and use the time on the tissue.
Understandable, and it's the one thing that shouldn't move.
The close is where the work gets integrated. Cut it and she sits up too fast, from a body that hasn't been told the session is over.
Twenty minutes in. She hasn't said a word since the opening breath.
Her breathing has changed — shorter, higher in the chest — while you work a tight spot.
What does that mean, and what do you do?
○She's relaxing into it. Breathing changes as the nervous system settles — keep going.
Settling breath goes slower and lower. This went shorter and higher.
That's bracing, and she isn't going to interrupt you to say so.
●Ease the pressure and check in — out loud, briefly, without making it a conversation.
Why this one
Yes.
Consent in a treatment is ongoing, not something collected at intake. A guest who agreed to deep work twenty minutes ago is not agreeing to this particular moment of it.
And the check-in has to be spoken. Most guests will not volunteer discomfort — they assume it's meant to feel like this.
○Note it and adjust your pressure silently. Interrupting would break the state she's in.
The instinct to protect her state is right. The silence is what's wrong.
Adjusting without asking means you guessed — and if you guessed wrong she has no way to tell you.
The last three minutes. She's up, robed, a little unfocused.
What is the follow-up actually for?
○Completing the Recommendation Form and offering water — the required close-out steps.
Both happen, and neither is the point.
A form filled in silently is admin. Look for what the three minutes are for.
●The one moment she's most open to what would actually help her next — so you say something specific.
Why this one
Yes.
She has just felt something change in her body. That is the only three minutes in the whole guest journey where a recommendation lands as care rather than as selling.
Specific, not general. "Come back soon" is nothing. Naming the thing you noticed, and what would meet it, is the work.
○Giving her space to come back to herself without being asked anything.
Kind, and it leaves her to work it out alone.
She doesn't know what PALOMA has. You do. Saying nothing isn't restraint — it's withholding.
Only the middle changes.
Arrive. Work. Close. Follow up.
The service you are performing changes the middle. It never changes the other three.
Next: the room itself, with your trainer.
Four beats, every treatment, every time. Arrive, settle, the work, return.
Only the middle changes. The opening and the close are the same whatever she booked.
The beats are what a guest feels. She will not name them, and she will notice if one is missing.
After thisYou can re-drape so a guest stays warm, covered and at ease without having to ask.
Finishing the left leg. Moving to the right.
Both re-drape. One of them is doing something else as well.
○Covers the leg, then uncovers the next one. Efficient, correct, and her attention is already on the area she is about to work.
Nothing here is wrong. It is compliant, competent, and it will pass any observation.
It is also the moment the guest can feel the difference between being covered and being cared for.
Look at B.
●Covers the leg and smooths the sheet down over it before uncovering the next — one continuous movement, no gap where the guest is waiting to be covered.
Why this one
Yes.
The difference is about a second and a half, and she will notice it every time.
Re-draping is not the pause between two pieces of work. It is part of the work — and it is the part where warmth and dignity are actually delivered rather than assumed.
Who decides what draping has to do?
○PALOMA. It's our treatment room, and draping is part of how the experience feels.
Half right, and the half that's wrong matters.
PALOMA has a great deal to say about how draping feels. It does not get a view on what draping must cover.
●Your licensure sets what must be covered. PALOMA sets everything above that line.
Why this one
Yes — and holding those two apart is the whole point of this chapter.
The floor is not ours. What must be covered, and how, comes from your licensure and from professional practice. It is not a house style, it is not negotiable, and PALOMA cannot relax it.
Everything above the floor is ours — warmth, timing, continuity, the way a guest feels held rather than handled. That is what the rest of this chapter is about.
○The guest. If she's comfortable with less, that's her call.
A guest can decline a service, an area, or a technique at any time.
She cannot waive a professional requirement on your behalf — it isn't hers to waive, and it protects you both.
You've finished the back and you're about to work the shoulders.
The area you just finished — what happens to it?
○Leave it open. You may come back to it, and re-draping twice wastes time.
You probably will come back to it — and she gets cold in the meantime.
Warmth is not a comfort extra. A cold guest cannot settle, and a nervous system that cannot settle is working against everything you are doing with your hands.
●Re-drape it before you move on, every time.
Why this one
Yes.
Re-drape each area after working it. It preserves warmth, and warmth is doing real work — tissue responds differently when the body is not managing temperature.
It also means she is never lying there aware of an area you have finished with and left uncovered.
○Re-drape only the areas she seems cold in.
By the time she seems cold, she has been cold for a while — and most guests will not say so.
This is not something to read. It's something to do every time.
You're using something warm — a stone, a pack, anything heated.
It needs to rest somewhere for a moment.
○Directly on the skin, where the heat actually reaches the tissue.
No — and this is one of the few flat rules in this chapter.
Nothing heated rests directly on bare skin. Your hand has been holding it, so your hand has stopped noticing how hot it is. Hers has not.
●On the sheet, or on a folded towel — a barrier between it and her.
Why this one
Yes.
A resting object always has a barrier. The sheet or a folded hand towel.
Moving contact and resting contact are different: you can feel a stone while you are moving it. A stationary one sits there while your attention is somewhere else.
○Ask her if the temperature is comfortable, then rest it directly.
Asking is good. It doesn't replace the barrier.
She is answering about now — not about how it will feel in ninety seconds while you are working elsewhere.
Time to turn over.
She's face-down, half asleep, and about to move her whole body while wrapped in a sheet.
What makes this moment go well?
○Tell her clearly what to do, and lift the sheet so she can turn without tangling.
The instruction is right. Lifting the sheet is the part to look at again.
The turn is the moment of most exposure in the whole session — and the moment she is least able to manage it herself.
●Hold the sheet up as a screen, tell her to take her time, and let her turn underneath it.
Why this one
Yes.
You hold the drape; she moves inside it. She never has to think about coverage, which means she never has to think about being uncovered.
And say take your time. She has been still for half an hour — the turn is where a guest feels clumsy, and a slow one is smoother for both of you.
○Step out of the room and let her turn in privacy.
Thoughtful, and it leaves her to manage the sheet alone while half asleep.
Privacy is not the same as absence. The drape is how privacy is provided while you are still there.
Five moves. Which ones keep her warm, held and covered?
The floor is not ours.
Everything above it is.
What must be covered comes from your licensure. It is not a house style and it does not bend.
How she feels while it happens — warm, held, never waiting to be covered — is PALOMA.
Next: the room between guests.
The floor is not ours. Everything above it is.
What must be covered comes from your licensure. It is not a house style and it does not bend.
How she feels while it happens — warm, held, never waiting to be covered — is PALOMA.
After thisYou can write a recommendation a guest will actually act on in the days after she leaves.
Two forms, same guest, same service.
Both are filled in correctly. Only one of them is worth handing over.
○Recommended service filled. Frequency ticked. Enhancements ticked. Healer's Notes: “Great session — see you soon.”
Complete, tidy, and it could have been written before she arrived.
Everything on it is generic, so the whole thing reads as generic — including the parts that weren't.
Look at B.
●The same boxes, and in Healer's Notes: “Your right shoulder was doing most of the work today — that's why I've suggested what I have. Try the doorway stretch before bed.”
Why this one
Yes.
Same form. Same five minutes.
One sentence that could only have been written about her turns a checklist into something she keeps. That is the whole difference, and it is available on every single form you fill in.
The form asks four things. Only one of them is about today.
Three of the four are about the time she is not with you.
That is the point of the form. It is not a receipt.
WHAT HAPPENED
Guest, healer, date, today's service. The record.
WHAT NEXT
Recommended service and session length — your actual opinion, written down.
HOW OFTEN
Condition type and frequency. The part that turns one session into care.
WHAT SHE DOES AT HOME
Enhancements, products, and the at-home ritual on the back. The days between visits.
Three of these were in the list you just read. One was not.
She told you at intake that she sits at a desk and her neck is always tight.
Three recommendations. One of them she'll act on.
○The service she just had, again — she enjoyed it and consistency helps.
Safe, and it tells her nothing she didn't already know.
She can rebook the same thing without you. A recommendation that requires no knowledge of her is not a recommendation.
●Something that addresses the neck specifically — and one line saying you're suggesting it because of what she told you about her desk.
Why this one
Yes.
The suggestion and the reason travel together. Without the reason she has a service name; with it she has evidence you were paying attention.
She told you about the desk hours ago. Naming it back on the form is the proof.
○Two or three options, so she can pick what suits her.
That's a menu on a form that already has a menu on the back.
You did the work. Give her the answer. She can decline it — she cannot decline a decision you didn't make.
The form asks how often she should come back. What is that question really asking you for?
○Your professional judgment about her body, based on what you felt today.
Part of it is — and the part that isn't is where care becomes clinical.
Frequency guidance sits close to a treatment plan. How close, and what PALOMA authorises you to write there, is being confirmed.
●A considered suggestion, written in the knowledge that it will be read as advice.
Why this one
Yes — and hold that second half.
Whatever you write there, she will read it as advice, because it is on a form with her name on it. That is not a reason to leave it blank. It is a reason to write it deliberately rather than by habit.
The specific guidance the form offers is being confirmed. Until then, suggest what you'd say out loud — and say it out loud too.
○A booking prompt — the frequency that keeps her coming back.
If that is what it is for, she will feel it, and the form stops working.
The form only has value because it isn't selling. Spend that once and it doesn't come back.
The back of the form. Healer's Notes, and a space for her intention for the week.
Most therapists leave these two blank. What are they for?
○They're optional extras — nice when there's time, skippable when there isn't.
They're the only two parts of the form that couldn't have been printed in advance.
Everything else is boxes. These two are the reason she keeps it.
●They're where the form stops being a form — the part only you could have written.
Why this one
Yes.
A tick in a box is information. One specific sentence in your handwriting is being known, and it costs about twenty seconds.
The intention line does something else again: it sends her out with something to carry rather than something to buy.
○They're for clinical observations, so the next therapist knows what you found.
Reasonable guess, and it's the wrong document — this form goes home with the guest.
What you write there, she reads. Write it to her.
It is not a receipt.
It is the days between.
Three of its four questions are about the time she is not with you.
One sentence that could only have been written about her is what makes her keep it.
Next: the room between guests, with your trainer.
The form asks four things. Only one of them is about the next appointment.
It is not a receipt. It is the days between. What she does when she leaves here is most of the result.
Both can be filled in correctly and only one is worth handing over. Specific beats complete.
