One of the earliest lessons I learnt in my massage career was that certain clients will say unfavourable things about your work, even if you have given them a very successful treatment. Or, to be more precise, because you have given them a very successful treatment. And it’s not that they want to do it, it’s that they need to do it.

These tend to be clients who have a long history of conditions and complaints and have been seeking medical help for years. They come to you on the recommendation of a friend who knows how good you are or who has heard how good you are.

Yet when you treat this client, you discover that they are not in such a bad a condition as they say they are, or to be more precise, in the bad condition they want their friends to think they are in.

Some people feign pain and discomfort in order to get attention from other people. It can become such a deeply embedded pattern of behaviour that the person in question is no longer aware they are doing it. Maybe this client really thinks they are ill or maybe they are knowingly trying to pull the wool over your eyes, but what you uncover with your treatment is that they are not as ill as they say they are.

This, however, is not what the client wants to hear. Nor is it something they want their friends finding out. They need everyone to think they are ill. So when they return home after  your treatment and their friend asks: ‘Well, how did it go?’ your client will reply: ‘Aah, it didn’t really work. He tried some things on me, but they weren’t right. I still have the same pain. I actually got the feeling he didn’t know what he was doing. It’s a shame really. I was so looking forward to it. But at least I gave it a try. Oh well, what’s to become of me now?’.

This is manipulative stuff and, of course, you have no idea such things are being said about you behind your back. Things which can adversely affect your business and reputation. And you may only find out months afterwards in a chance conversation with a friend of a friend of the client and the friend says: ‘Ah yes, I remember hearing about that. They weren’t very happy with your treatment. Did you know that?’.

Frustratingly there is nothing you can do to stop such a client speaking of you like this. For some clients, the need to stay ill in order to get attention is more important to them than your reputation. It is a lesson you have to learn, accept and move-on from. Just continue doing good work and your resulting reputation will reveal such an unwarranted blemish for what it is.