Jonathan Estrada L.Ac Licensed Acupuncture and Bodywork

Offering personalized therapy sessions to help you meet your pain-relief goals! Schedule a free consultation to learn more!

If you are in pain, stiff, injured, or stressed — you need soft tissue work!

Soft tissue work is the essence of physical and emotional therapy, and that is what I provide. Professional-quality treatments, utilizing a combined skillset of three services in one: A powerful Acupuncture session, skillful Bodywork and Massage, and a cutting-edge Trigger Point Release technique to reset tight muscles and speed recovery, from a practitioner with nearly two decades of experience helping bodies heal. A unique experience at a great value!

Consider scheduling a visit

As an occasional treat to yourself (or a loved one)
As part of regular health maintenance
To accelerate the progress of physical therapy that you are already doing
As part of a short course of treatments (typically around three or four) to focus on a particular area of pain or injury.

Listen to what satisfied clients have had to say (reviews sourced from Google Maps):

“…a rare find and a deeply healing experience…” “I leave each session feeling rejuvenated and refreshed.” “…a pro with a deep level of knowledge, sensitivity and skill.” “…kind and generous…safe and nurturing…” “…professional and intelligent…” “Excellent place, best around…” “…one of the great hidden gems of the five boroughs…” “…a genuine healer.”

Call (or preferably) text today! I look forward to hearing from you!

347-352-9426

Cancellation Policy and Other Reminders:

PLEASE BRING LOOSE CLOTHING, preferably shorts that can be pulled up all the way to the hip, and a tank top, sports bra, or short sleeve shirt that will allow full access to the shoulder.
Please do not make any appointments you do not intend to keep. If you must cancel, please let me know as soon as possible.
Please arrive no more than 10 minutes before or after your appointment time. Preferably before, of course.
Please do not schedule if you are in any way sick, or presenting with any manner of contagious skin issue. Thank you!

Here is my lovely space. A cool, tranquil basement home office.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is acupuncture, and how does it help?

Acupuncture uses gentle touch to stimulate, condition and heal the body’s connective tissues. Connective tissue not only holds the body together, but is involved in the functions of every cell, tissue, organ and system. Acupuncture is the product of thousands of years of human effort to understand the topography and function of the connective tissue matrix, associating the planes and points within it to various organs, bodily functions and emotional states, thus forming the basis of a powerful health intervention. People typically find noticeable improvements to their energy levels, sleep, digestion and mood, improved circulation and reduced levels of musculoskeletal pain and stiffness, as well as amelioration of all sorts of chronic conditions.

It is important to acknowledge that no acupuncture practice does, or should, make the claim that acupuncture “treats” any biomedically defined condition or disease (and you will literally be asked to sign off on this before treatment). This is not only for legal reasons, but also for reasons of accuracy and common sense — Eastern and Western concepts of disease are not the same, and should not be treated as such. So while acupuncture certainly promotes health and wellness, any talk of “treating” or “curing” a given disease or health condition is to be left entirely out of the process. Your acupuncturist is not your doctor.

Do you take insurance?

No, not yet. Maybe someday soon, but for now my focus is on providing the best possible value on a cash-only basis.

What do you mean by “bodywork”?

Bodywork is any technique which involves touching, relaxing, stretching or otherwise benefitting the soft tissues of the body. In short, the goal is to return softness to the soft tissue, keeping it flexible and circulating with blood and energy to maximize health. This would involve touching with the hands, or with any number of implements, such as a suction cup, gua sha tool, percussion gun, or acupuncture needle. Therefore, I consider acupuncture to be a subset of bodywork, as it is a form of physical touch, albeit a very specialized one requiring specific tools, licensing, and lots of careful training. I label my practice as “Acupuncture and Bodywork” as a way of describing how acupuncture, massage, cupping, and stretching are all means to the same end.

What do you mean by “Trigger Point Therapy”

A trigger point is a tight painful spot in the soft tissue, which typically radiates pain to the surrounding areas. There are various ways to “deactivate” or “release” a trigger point which could involve manual pressure, massage, stretching, or electrical stimulation. The specialized method that I prefer, and which I use frequently in my clinic, is to make a quick touch to the trigger point with an acupuncture needle, and then touch the handle of the acupuncture needle with a handheld device that produces a gentle electrical current. This typically results in a series of gentle muscle contractions which “reset” the muscle and get it firing properly again. This process works very quickly, with only about a minute needed for each trigger point, and it works immediately to reduce pain and restore flexibility.

If you want to heal an injury,you need a practitioner who knows how to work with trigger points — that is the only way to get good results.

How many sessions will I need?

When it comes to simple aches and pains, perhaps even one or two sessions might be enough to make a person feel much better. If the goal is to generally tune up the body and address areas of lingering tension, four bodywork sessions over two or three weeks should be enough to do just that.

But often times pain is not simple, and our muscles aches could be better understood as reflection of high stress, poor health, and long term bad posture, all of which takes time to counteract. In these cases, a longer course of therapy, perhaps focusing more on traditional acupuncture, would be the better strategy: Twice a week for two or three weeks, followed by a another few sessions once a week (that is, somewhere around 8-10 sessions) is a good estimate for the length of treatment plan required to give your body the time it needs to make significant change.

Of course, the important thing is to make sure you are getting value for your time and money, by receiving the best quality sessions you can find. I offer flexible pricing and treatment plans to keep costs as low as possible.

Does acupuncture hurt?

The thing to keep in mind is that people do acupuncture because it feels great — both in the moment and afterwards! If it were painful and difficult, nobody would do it (myself included). Working with sore muscles does in fact leave a little bit of lingering soreness, but even that is minimal, and goes away in a day or so, leaving you feeling better for it.

Perhaps the best way to conceptualize acupuncture and bodywork is to think of them in terms of exercise: Does exercise hurt? It could, depending on how you choose to do it, but it certainly doesn’t have to. Exercise could be done in a very easy way, to uplift and support the health of virtually anyone, and this is more like how I practice. I have soft hands, and understand that people need to be comforted before they can be healed.

Who are you?

Just a real person out here trying to build a practice one satisfied client at a time, in the hopes of contributing to a better, saner society. After graduating from Tri-State College of Acupuncture in 2009, I gained years of experience working both in private practice and in personal injury/rehab clinics all around the city. My interests include not only acupuncture and fascia, but also astrology, philosophy, sociology, personality typing — anything that describes the human condition, really — and I relish the chance to learn from, and converse with, deep and interesting people whenever possible. I see holistic healing as a profound vehicle for positive social transformation, and will be actively seeking ways to provide more of it to the community in affordable and accessible ways. Do you have space, or a community, or ideas for a program? I would love to hear about them.

Thank you for reading, considering, and possibly even reaching out, I respect and admire the courage it takes to make that first step, and will do all I can to honor that trust and leave my clients feeling better.