So, I give a lot of massages. My girlfriend has back problems so I usually end up giving at least a massage a day, and so I was terribly excited for this little ceramic beauty to arrive. When it did... I gave it a try and while it's lovely for massaging oneself, it did little to replace my hard working hands in terms of a real replacement for my hands. It can be rolled up and down the back, and each rounded end of the barbell can be used to work out knots, but it just doesn't do as good a job as my knuckles.

My girlfriend likes alright when it's warmed up, when left room temperature she's essentially ambivalent to this little tool of massage. It is beautiful, and well made, smooth white ceramic with a shiny finish, I'm almost tempted to see how this would work as a dildo... but as a massage stone... nothin' doin'. The one thing that I really like that I can do with it that I can't do with my hands (or can't do better with my hands) is the rolling move where you roll this up and down the back like a little rolling pin. It's not super effective for relieving my girlfriend's tension, and thus it's not great for saving my hands from the constant punishment of massages. I'm very sad about this, I was really hoping this would live up to the JimmyJane standard and be incredible, but I don't think the product is really at fault here, it's a beautifully made massage stone, but that's just it, I really think that perhaps massage stones are an over hyped product to begin with, the human hand works better... it just... does.

That said, this ceramic beauty works best on fleshier parts of the body (ass, tummy, upper back. On bonier parts the hard ceramic tends to "grind" uncomfortably, so generally this should be used on the fleshy bits. As well, make sure you warm it before hand in a bowl of warm water, as at air temperature it will be notably chilly.

Now, I don't have a lot of experience with massage stones, and I could not be using it correctly, but I looked into techniques to use with this and as far as I can tell I'm using it properly, so I do believe it may just be the nature of the product to simply not be that effective on back pain.

After warming this up on a cold night, and a little more experience I've learned to appreciate this little darling, although it's still not as good as my hard working hands, it's a pretty decent little massage tool that provides a nice variety of sensation.