May 2026 · 10 min read · Wellness
My father never told me he loved me. Not in so many words. But he showed me every single day, in a language that did not need vocabulary. His language was touch. A hand on my shoulder when I was upset. A firm grip on my arm when crossing a busy street. And every night, without fail, for as long as I can remember — his thumbs pressing into my temples before bed.
This is the story of how I rediscovered my father's love fifteen years after he left this world, in a small therapy room at Meraki Spa on Bazar Road in Raipur. It is a story about generational healing, about the wisdom our parents pass down without knowing, and about a tradition as old as humanity itself: the healing power of how touch affects health.
The Ritual: What My Father Did
My father was not a demonstrative man. He was born in a small village in Chhattisgarh, grew up during times when survival mattered more than sentiment, and raised three children with the quiet discipline of someone who believed that love was something you did, not something you said. He worked twelve-hour days at a government office and came home smelling of ink and faint sweat. He rarely laughed out loud. He never hugged us. That was just not how men of his generation expressed affection.
But every night, after dinner, as I sat on the floor doing homework, he would sit behind me on the bed and place his hands on my head. His thumbs would find the exact spot behind my ears — the mastoid process, I now know it is called — and press gently. Then he would trace slow circles across my scalp. Down the back of my neck. Across my shoulders. He never said a word while doing it. I never asked him to. It was just our ritual.
As a child, I thought all fathers did this. I thought every kid fell asleep with the sensation of strong, calloused thumbs smoothing away the day's worries. It was only when I grew older and started noticing that my friends' fathers did not do this — that in fact, most of them barely touched their children at all — that I realized my father had been giving me something extraordinary.
The Loss and the Long Silence
He passed away when I was twenty-two. A sudden heart attack. One day he was there, sitting in his usual chair, reading the newspaper; the next, he was gone. I did not grieve properly. I was young and foolish and believed that grief was something you handled by staying busy. I buried myself in work. I built a career. I got married. I had children of my own. And I never once thought about those nightly head massages. Not consciously.
But my body remembered.
The Rediscovery at Meraki Spa
Fifteen years after his death, I found myself at Meraki Spa on a recommendation from a colleague. I had been having tension headaches — the kind that start at the back of your skull and creep forward like a slow fist. My wife suggested I see a doctor. My colleague suggested something else. "Just try their Indian Head Massage," she said. "It's only ₹500. What do you have to lose?"
What I had to lose, apparently, was my composure.
The therapist at Meraki Spa — a soft-spoken woman who had been trained in traditional Indian massage techniques — began the session the way all good head massages begin: with gentle pressure at the base of the skull. She used her thumbs to work the suboccipital muscles, the ones that hold all the tension of modern life. Then she moved upward, tracing circles across my scalp with her fingertips.
And that is when it happened. My eyes filled with tears. Not from pain. From recognition. Her hands knew the exact rhythm my father's hands had known. The same circular motion behind the ears. The same gentle press at the temples. The same slow, deliberate pace — as if she was saying with her hands what my father had said with his: I am here. You are safe. Rest now.
I did not tell the therapist why I was crying. I could not speak. I just lay there, tears streaming sideways into the towel, while a stranger's hands unlocked a grief I had been carrying for fifteen years without knowing it. She did not ask questions. She simply continued, her pressure steady, her breathing calm. She understood that something was happening that had nothing to do with muscles and everything to do with memory.
The Indian Head Massage at Meraki Spa is a relatively simple treatment on paper. It costs ₹500. It lasts about forty minutes. It focuses on the head, neck, and shoulders using traditional Ayurvedic techniques — warm oils, rhythmic pressure, and a sequence of movements designed to balance the body's energy centers. But what it actually does is something that cannot be captured in a service description. It reminds you that being touched with care is a fundamental human need, one that does not disappear with age or grief or the illusion of independence.
After the session, I sat in the waiting area at Meraki Spa for a long time. I drank the ginger tea they offered. I stared at the wall. The receptionist, perhaps used to people emerging from therapy rooms looking different from when they entered, left me alone. When I finally left, I called my mother. I told her I missed Appa. She asked me what brought this on. I said, "Nothing. Just thinking about him." But it was not nothing. It was everything.
Beyond the Head Massage: Going Deeper
The therapist at Meraki Spa also suggested I try specific treatments that complement the Indian Head Massage. She explained that tension in the feet and shoulders is often connected to tension in the head, and that a holistic approach yields better results. On her recommendation, I have since tried the Rejuvenating Foot Massage + Scrub (₹1,499) — which involves soaking the feet in warm water with Epsom salts, a thorough scrub to exfoliate dead skin, and a full foot and lower leg massage. I was skeptical about how feet could connect to my father, but the connection became clear during the session. As the therapist pressed specific reflexology points on my soles, I felt corresponding sensations in my neck and scalp. The body is not a collection of separate parts — it is one interconnected system, and healing can enter from any doorway.
On another visit, I tried the Signature Body Scrub + Massage (₹1,800). The therapist began with a full-body exfoliation using a blend of ground oats, turmeric, and sandalwood — ingredients my own mother used in her kitchen growing up. The scrub was followed by a warm rinse and then a full-body massage. The entire process took nearly two hours and left me feeling like I had shed not just dead skin cells but old memories, old grief, old weights I had been carrying without realizing it. I thought about my father during the scrub. I thought about how he used to rub turmeric paste on my scraped knees when I was a child. The continuity of care — from his hands to the therapist's hands — felt like a thread running through my entire life.
Passing It Forward
I now do the same for my own children. Every night, after they have finished their homework and brushed their teeth, I sit behind them on the bed and place my thumbs on their temples. They giggle at first. They squirm. But within a minute, they go quiet. Their breathing slows. They lean back into my hands. I do not say "I love you." I do not have to. My thumbs say it for me.
What I Now Understand About My Father's Gift
- Touch is a language. My father did not have the words for affection, so he used his hands. That was his fluency.
- Grief lives in the body. I had processed my father's death intellectually but never physically. The massage unlocked what talk therapy could not reach.
- Healing is cyclical. By giving my children the same nightly massage, I am continuing a tradition that heals both me and them.
- Professional care is not replacement. The therapist at Meraki Spa did not replace my father. She reminded me of him, which is entirely different and entirely beautiful.
I eventually told the head therapist at Meraki Spa about my father. She was not surprised. "We get this often," she said. "People come in for a massage and end up processing something much older than their muscle tension. The body remembers what the mind has forgotten." She told me that Indian Head Massage, or Shiro Abhyanga, has been practiced in India for thousands of years as part of Ayurveda. It is believed to balance the Vata dosha, calm the nervous system, improve sleep, and promote mental clarity. My father had no knowledge of Ayurvedic terminology, but he understood intuitively what the ancient texts described: that the head is where the mind meets the body, and caring for it is caring for both.
I have since learned that what my father did — that nightly ritual — is actually a variation of Marmachikitsa, an ancient Indian healing practice that works on the body's energy points. He did not know the Sanskrit name for it. He probably learned it from his own father, who learned it from his. This is how traditions survive: not through textbooks, but through hands. Through touch. Through the quiet transmission of care from one generation to the next.
My father gave me a gift that I did not recognize until I was forty years old. He gave me the language of touch. And Meraki Spa — a place I initially went to fix a headache — ended up helping me remember that I already knew how to heal. I had just forgotten.
If you are in Raipur and carry the weight of an unfinished conversation with someone you lost, I encourage you to visit Bazar Road. Meraki Spa is at Changurabhata, open from 11 AM to 9 PM daily, and you can reach them at +91 9399075318. Book the Indian Head Massage (₹500). Close your eyes. Let someone's hands remind you of what you have forgotten. Cry if you need to. That is what the towels are for.
"You think it's just a massage until your father's ghost shows up in the therapist's hands. Then you realize some traditions are embedded in our very bones, waiting to be remembered."
