I'm glad to hear your doing light massage yourself. All PT's and Massage Therapist are not created equal. As with most everything in life only about 20 percent are good and 80percent need to move on to another line of work.
Pete

Thank you so very much for your comments. This is the first I have heard of "Hot RSD and Cold RSD" Everything I read says to stay away from both Hot and Cold. This sounds like there are 2 different diseases that are quite close in nature. With so many different known Auto Imune Diseases the doctors have a terrible time coming up with a corect diagnosis. This may explain the variety of RSD. I will mention the HOT and Cold to my patients.
Pete

I would be carefull about taking pain killers or muscle relaxers before getting a massage. The pain you experience is body's warning. If you take pain killesr or muscle relaxers your body can't give you the messages that it needs to and you may allow the therapist to work harder on you than you should.
Pete

Light seems to be the key
 

I am glad to hear your doing some work yourself. From others thoughts light touch seems to be the key. Light is a relative terms though. Just stay under the pain thresh hold. Some minor pain in small doses is ok but if it causes your muscles to tighten then its to hard.

MrPete

Keeping joints moving Helps!
 

So far my patients have had the same type of experience you have. They say the slow light range of motion movements with very lite stretches at the end feels seems to be working for my patients.