Continuing a 22-year career in massage therapy, Claire Timmers has brought her experience to Fountain Hills with the opening of Intrinsic Body Therapy.

A graduate of Fountain Hills High School, she’s been working from home since settling back into the community, but the business is ready to move into its new location at 11873 N. Saguaro Blvd., Ste. B1. Timmers works by appointment and can be reached at 787-587-8480.

“It’s not a cookie cutter massage,” Timmers said. “I’m able to utilize a lot of techniques.”

Licensed in Arizona back in 1997, Timmers’ first big gig was opening the spa at the Arizona Biltmore Resort that same year. She later opened the Golden Door Spa at The Boulders Resort before transferring within the company to a site in Puerto Rico in 2003. From 2012 to 2017 she operated out of the Dorado Beach Ritz-Carlton, a job that ended following hurricanes Irma and Maria.

Returning to Fountain Hills to raise her family, Timmers said she’s excited to have a place to call her own and offer her services to the people of Fountain Hills.

She’s trained in multiple modalities of massage including deep tissue massage, myofascial, manual lymphatic drainage, aromatherapy, Thai massage, maternity massage, reflexology and therapy utilizing heat, cold and water. Timmers is also a certified intrinsic coach and trained in energy work, such as Reiki.

When asked what makes her practice unique, Timmers held up a handmade pouch and referred to it as her “secret weapon.”

“I make herbal compresses with my own blend of dry herbs,” she explained. “I steam heat the compresses to ease muscle tension and chronic stiffness, increase circulation and flexibility while personalizing each client’s massage session, working toward healthy balance in the physical and energy body.

“It’s similar to a stone massage, but my compresses hold moisture heat, whereas the rocks are a dry heat. Water is much more compatible to the body so, once your body meets with the moisture and heat and relaxing herbs, all of the tissue just melts.

“I’m able to work at any level, but I can get very deep without it being intrusive to the body. You’re not going to be sore. It’s a pleasurable experience. You’re not going to feel like you got beat up by a sumo wrestler.”

Timmers books her appointments in 60- and 90-minute sessions and likes to focus on flexibility and educating clients about stretching exercises they can do on their own in order to help prevent pain.

She is also a Rodan & Fields Skin Care consultant, offering products and 30-minute product applications to try recommendations before purchase.

Looking back, Timmers said massage was something she always did, but she never realized growing up that it could also be a career. She was always the one giving girlfriends massages at slumber parties or teammates massages on the bus ride home from games.

“I grew up in Minnesota, so a massage was something only the rich man’s wife in Beverly Hills did,” Timmers explained. “I didn’t realize it could be a career, to help people in that way.”

Her family eventually moved to Fountain Hills and she was in the second graduating class of FHHS. After Timmers graduated, a former Falcon teammate came across a massage therapy school at a job fair, thought of Timmers and gave her brother a brochure to pass along.

“I would have probably never considered it if it wasn’t for my brother,” Timmers continued. “He gave me the brochure. Before that, I never really realized you could study massage.”

Now, all these years later, Timmers has a career doing something she loves: Bringing comfort and relief to her clients.

“I love to teach and work with my clients but, when somebody tells you, ‘This is the best massage I’ve ever had,’ and they get off the table with that relief, it’s the best feeling,” she said. “It’s such an honor, that I can be a part of that journey.”