Books, Media, Teaching & Awards
More Than a Decade of Education, Writing, Teaching & Wellness Work
Before Fire & Ice became what it is today, there were years of teaching, writing, experimenting, building businesses, creating educational programs, speaking, and finding new ways to share what I was learning.
I’m Ashley Biro, formerly Ashley Dwyer, founder of Fire & Ice Holistic Health.
Over the course of my career, I have worked as a licensed massage therapist, traditional naturopath, holistic health practitioner, continuing-education instructor, author, coach, consultant, podcast host, and small-business owner.
This page is a collection of some of the projects, publications, recognition, and educational work that helped shape the practitioner I am today.
Published Books
Massage for Couples: Heal, Soothe, and Connect with the One You Love
Published under my former name, Ashley Dwyer, Massage for Couples was created to make massage approachable for everyday couples.
The book combines professional massage principles with practical instruction on touch, pressure, positioning, communication, relaxation, and connection.
Rather than trying to turn a partner into a massage therapist, the goal was to teach people how to use intentional touch safely and confidently while creating another way to care for one another.
Raising Well Balanced Kids
Raising Well Balanced Kids grew from my broader interest in family wellness and the many factors that influence how children grow, develop, and experience the world around them.
The book reflects the same philosophy that eventually became central to Fire & Ice Holistic Health: wellness is rarely about one isolated thing.
Nutrition, environment, routine, connection, emotional wellness, lifestyle, and the foundations we build at home all matter.
She Rises for Tomorrow
I was also a featured author in She Rises for Tomorrow, a collaborative book highlighting female entrepreneurs and women bringing their ideas into the world.
Entrepreneurship has been an enormous part of my story.
Fire & Ice itself has evolved through multiple stages, but it has never been the only thing I built.
Teaching other professionals, developing continuing education, creating subscription products, writing, coaching, and experimenting with new ideas were all part of learning how to create a career that didn't have to fit into one traditional box.
Featured Massage Expert in Women’s Health
My massage expertise was featured in Women’s Health magazine in an article teaching readers how to give a better massage.
At the time, I was publishing professionally as Ashley Dwyer.
As one of the massage experts consulted for the article, I shared guidance on topics including massage pressure, technique, consent, relaxation, creating the right environment, stress relief, safe product use, and intentional touch.
The article also explored something I have always found fascinating: the way massage and touch can become part of communication and connection between people.
Media, Podcasts & Interviews
Education has taken me into quite a few different spaces over the years.
In addition to print and online publications, I have appeared on podcasts and other media discussing massage therapy, aromatherapy, continuing education, entrepreneurship, wellness, and professional development.
The Do Hard Things Show with Ashley Dwyer
Around 2019–2020, I hosted The Do Hard Things Show with Ashley Dwyer through Mind Body XM Radio and podcast platforms.
The show focused heavily on entrepreneurship, some episodes even allowed callers to call in with massage related questions and the reality of building something of your own—the wins, the mistakes, the changes in direction, and the very unglamorous parts of running a business that rarely make it into the highlight reel.
Spapreneur Podcast
I was also featured on the Spapreneur Podcast alongside Simply Earth to discuss the development of aromatherapy continuing-education courses for massage therapists.
We talked about continuing education, building professional courses, aromatherapy, entrepreneurship, and creating practical education that massage therapists could actually use inside their practices.
Continuing Education for Massage Therapists
Teaching other massage therapists became a major chapter of my career.
For years, I developed and taught professional continuing-education courses covering a wide range of massage, spa, and wellness topics.
My continuing-education teaching has included:
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Cupping therapy
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Prenatal massage
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Hot stone massage
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Massage ethics
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Aromatherapy
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Spa treatments
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Foam rolling
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Thunderstorm Therapy
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Additional massage, wellness, and professional-development education
One of my larger programs was a comprehensive 14-hour cupping continuing-education course, designed to give massage therapists both the knowledge and hands-on experience necessary to use cupping more confidently in practice.
I also taught prenatal massage, including pregnancy-specific positioning, draping, precautions, stretching, and bodywork considerations.
Teaching made me a better practitioner.
Having to explain why you do something, rather than simply knowing how to do it, forces you to understand your work at an entirely different level.
Aromatherapy Education with Simply Earth
One of my professional education collaborations was with Simply Earth, where we developed continuing education around the safe and practical use of essential oils in massage therapy.
The program combined aromatherapy education with hands-on applications designed specifically for massage professionals.
It covered not only essential oil use, but also safety, self-care, product creation, and ways massage therapists could appropriately integrate aromatherapy into professional practice.
That project brought together several things I love: massage, education, creativity, aromatherapy, and helping other therapists expand what they could confidently offer their clients.
Massage Innovation Network for Therapists
I previously owned the Massage Innovation Network for Therapists, an education and business-development platform created to support massage professionals.
Through the Network, I helped solo massage therapists and small massage-business owners navigate both the clinical and business sides of their careers.
That included continuing education as well as coaching around growing and operating a massage practice.
My professional education during that period also included certification in life and business coaching and certification in small business consulting through SEMP.
Massage school can teach someone how to perform massage.
It does not always teach them how to build the business that allows them to keep doing it.
The Massage Innovation Network was my attempt to help fill some of that gap.
The CE Box
Because apparently simply teaching continuing education wasn't enough for me, I also created The CE Box. 😂
The concept was simple:
Bring professional education directly to massage therapists.
Subscribers received continuing-education materials along with massage tools, supplies, resources, and other useful or fun items delivered to their homes each month.
It blended continuing education with the excitement of a subscription box and gave massage therapists another way to keep learning without every educational experience feeling like sitting through a seminar.
It was one more experiment in a career that has always involved asking:
Could we do this differently?
Thunderstorm Therapy
One of the modalities I developed during my teaching years was Thunderstorm Therapy.
The approach blended trauma-aware touch, relaxation, Reiki-inspired techniques, intentional presence, and nervous-system-focused bodywork into an experience designed around helping the client feel safe enough to slow down.
The exact language and understanding I use around the nervous system has evolved as my education has grown, but the underlying idea was already there:
Sometimes the body needs more than pressure on a tight muscle.
Sometimes the first job is helping someone feel safe enough to let go.
That early work eventually became part of the path that led me deeper into nervous system regulation and breathwork.
Awards & Local Recognition
Best of Mint Hill & Matthews Weekly — 2019–2022
Fire & Ice Therapeutic Massage was recognized as Best of Mint Hill & Matthews Weekly for four consecutive years: 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.
Those awards came during an important chapter of Fire & Ice's history in the Mint Hill and Matthews community.
The practice has changed.
The name has changed.
My work has expanded.
But those years remain part of the story of how Fire & Ice became what it is today.
Charlotte Weekly Small-Business Recognition
My work with Fire & Ice was also featured by The Charlotte Weekly, including recognition connected to local small business and the Mint Hill/Matthews business community.
Those features are especially meaningful because Fire & Ice was built locally.
Long before it became Fire & Ice Holistic Health, people in this community were trusting Fire & Ice Therapeutic Massage, referring friends and family, voting for the business, and helping it grow.
Professional Certifications Beyond the Treatment Room
My education has never been limited to massage techniques alone.
Along the way, I also completed professional training and certifications in areas including life and business coaching and small business consulting through SEMP.
Those aren't services I currently center Fire & Ice around.
They are part of the professional background that shaped the way I communicate, educate, problem-solve, build programs, and help people take a complicated situation and break it into manageable next steps.
Community Work
Professional accomplishments matter.
So does what we choose to do when there is nothing to sell.
One project particularly close to my heart involved creating pillowcases for children with cancer who were experiencing hair loss during treatment.
It was a very different kind of project from writing books, building courses, or growing a business.
But I think it belongs in the story.
Care can take a lot of forms.
Sometimes it is therapeutic touch.
Sometimes it is education.
Sometimes it is simply making something soft and colorful for a child going through something extraordinarily difficult.
Education Beyond Fire & Ice
Today, my educational work also extends into social media, where I have built an audience of more than 40,000 followers on TikTok.
Online education has allowed me to talk about wellness, massage, the body, holistic health, and the strange rabbit holes that sometimes come with being endlessly curious about how people work.
But follower counts aren't really the point.
Whether I am talking to 40,000 people online or one person sitting across from me in the office, I want people to leave understanding something they didn't understand before.
That has been one of the most consistent threads throughout my career.
The Common Thread
Massage therapist.
Teacher.
Author.
Business owner.
Coach.
Consultant.
Podcast host.
Traditional naturopath.
Holistic health practitioner.
At first glance, those things can look like several unrelated careers.
To me, they aren't.
The common thread has always been education, curiosity, connection, and helping people understand what they can do next.
Fire & Ice Holistic Health is simply the newest evolution of that work.
And I have a feeling I'm probably not finished evolving yet.
Want to Learn More About My Work?