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A typical experience
I had a new client the other day for an 80 minute massage. I asked him if there is anything that he wanted me to know. He told me that he suffers from a herniated disc that he has had for a few years. He has constant low back and right hip pain that at times radiates down the back of his leg to his knee. He told me that he has had two injections in his low back and has to stay on anit- inflamtory medication. Anything to avoid surgery. The pain is always there. I asked him if he ever saw a chiropractor for his pain. He said yes. But the adjustments hurt his hip so bad that he could not continiue. So here is a guy that thinks he is on the verge of surgery. I knew that there was a very strong probubllity that was not the case. The vast majority of pain people experience is nocioceptive pain( soft tissue- muscle, tendon, ligament, facia). MDs and Chiropractors see pain as neuropathic pain( nerve pain). With that asumption they give the wrong treatments and therapies. Now there is no denying that at times injections and surgery is needed. Not denying that. But most of the time - NOT. 70% to 85% of all pain comes directly from trigger points. Anyway I showed my client a testimonial from a client that I was able to help out of a very painful condition that she had delt with for a couple of years. I showed him that testimonial because all pain has a psychological eliment too it. I wanted him to start thinking maybe he is not on the edge of surgery. I palpated his entire back upper torso, both hips, and right leg. I found a very painful spot on his right L5 erectors. Another very painful spot on his right greater trochantor. A painful spot in the middle part of his lower right hamstrings. And also a tender spot on the right spinous of L3. I knew that if Iwas able to eliminate all those painful palaptory spots that I would most likely eliminate his pain problem. Because a healthy body had no painful spots even with deep massage. Ive been hunting and eliminateing trigger points for thirty years now. He walked out of the massage room pain free. He was pain free for the first time in years. All those other professional people misdiagnosed him because they assume neuropathic pain over nocioceptive pain. I assume the other way around. I'm a Massage Therapist.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Therese Schwartz on
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Good to remember!!
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Permalink Reply by Gordon J. Wallis on
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If a client comes in with obvious pain, I usually convince them to let me do my trigger point thing. I really don't have to think too much about spinal, dural or muscle chain connections, because I basically palpate their entire body for pain points and eliminate them as I find them. And as Ive said before. The client helps me find them by verbally telling me or flinching. But sometimes I do have to think like a chiropractor in order to accommodate a client or expedite things. . And the interesting thing is that its usually not with the clients that are in real pain. So here is an example of chiropractic think, or whatever you want to call it? And of course we know that muscles move bones, so .... Anyways, a new client came in the other day with no real pain complaint. She was very excited for her gift certificate massage. A smiling happy person. I asked her if she had any areas she wants me to concentrate on. She indicated the very bottom of her low back and upper hips. She said you can dig in there as hard as you want, it always makes me feel better. She gets massages regularly. I said, Your low back hurts? She said its always a low grade nagging pain so I'd like you to dig in there, but I want my full body massage too. Then she laughed. Then she said, my neck and shoulders are always tense too. So here is how I'm thinking at this point... She has some minor pain. Thats probably trigger point work, but she wants a massage. And I can see the connection between the neck and low back, those spinal bone relationships. I also know that trigger points in the abdominal area can refer pain to the low back. I asked her if she ever has any abdominal pain or discomfort She said no, but I did have a hysterectomy a few years ago. So I'm thinking that could have caused trigger points in her abdominals. I also know that the nerves that come out of the low back and sacrum innervate the legs and feet. I asked her if she had any leg or feet problems.. She said yes, I have arthritis in my right ankle, but it only bothers me when I walk a long time. I asked her if she has a problem with headaches. She said occationally. Ok so I'm thinking maybe jaw involvement maybe( because of its connection to the neck )? Now it just took me a couple of minutes to get this information. I showed her a video clip of me doing my trigger point thing( another minute ). She said, yea go for it.. But I want my massage also.. I said ok. I palpated pain points in both SI joint areas, L4 and L5 pain points on the paraspinals both sides. Pain points on the spinous of L4. I palpated pain points on the lateral spinous of T1 and C7, and a pain point on the right occipital area. I eliminated all those pain points and then had her turn over. I palpated pain points ( to her surprise ) in the lower part of her left upper abdominal quadrent, another pain point in her lower left abdominal quadrent, and again another pain point just below her belly button above the pubic bone. and yet another in the upper part of her lower right quadrent at the belly button level. I palpated her jaws, and they were very tender. I was able to eliminate all those points. That whole deal took maybe 20 minutes. So I had her turn over and began her massage. There was time for a really good back massage which she enjoyed. When I got to her feet, I remembered her arthritic right ankle. I palpated her ankle and found a pain point just below her lateral malleolus. And made that go away then carried on with some good foot massage. So it was a 50 minute session, 20 minutes of assessment and trigger point work along with 30 minutes of massage. She left the spa really happy. So that was cool for me, and good for her.
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For whatever reason I can only post one attachment at a time. So there will be three or four seperat attachments that are a visual for the conections I discribed in the above entry. Here is the spinal bone relationships
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Another The abdominal relationship
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a 3rd one C2 for the jaw,,, and low back/sacral and foot connection
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And another conection I did not mention kind of links it all. Meridian conection.
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Or if you want to look at the meridian conection the muscle chain way.
I find that thinking on things to be very helpful. - Attachments:
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Infraspinatus Trigger Point gone( via LU10 ).
"Sufficiently advanced( in this case ancient ) technology is
indistinguishable from magic."
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Someone told me the above video clip is sideways and the audio is quite? Sorry about that? Anyway, here is an attachment that goes with the above attachments. The guy in the above clip has had upper back and shoulder pain for eight years. He has been to Chiropractors, Physical Therapists, and Neurologists to no avail. They gave him all kinds of reasons as to why he hurts except Trigger Points. After one session he was able to run for the first time without his back hurting( he is in the Army ). He had a bucket load of trigger points on his spine and upper back. Truth truely remains hidden, like a shadow in darkness.
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Gordon, I have a question for you. I'm asking it here rather than through email in case it helps another therapist too, although if you prefer to have an email conversation rather than a public one, that's good too.. Right before one of my chronic-horrible-low-back-pain clients got here at 5:30 today, I looked at your attachments. I paid attention to the one with the rectus abdominus Trp's. She had really painful TrP's on both the left and right sides, right on top of the pubic bones. I did the best I could with them but they were still painful at the end of treatment. Can you give me any suggestions to try? I won't see her again for 4 weeks, just FYI. Is there any self-care she can do?
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Yea there is a technique that should deactivate those TPs at refex speed( in a matter of seconds ). I will contact you via email in here.
Therese Schwartz said:Gordon, I have a question for you. I'm asking it here rather than through email in case it helps another therapist too, although if you prefer to have an email conversation rather than a public one, that's good too.. Right before one of my chronic-horrible-low-back-pain clients got here at 5:30 today, I looked at your attachments. I paid attention to the one with the rectus abdominus Trp's. She had really painful TrP's on both the left and right sides, right on top of the pubic bones. I did the best I could with them but they were still painful at the end of treatment. Can you give me any suggestions to try? I won't see her again for 4 weeks, just FYI. Is there any self-care she can do?
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Just curious. Does she have painful periods or menstral cramps? Often times Trigger Points in those areas indicate that.
Gordon J. Wallis said:
Yea there is a technique that should deactivate those TPs at refex speed( in a matter of seconds ). I will contact you via email in here.
Therese Schwartz said:Gordon, I have a question for you. I'm asking it here rather than through email in case it helps another therapist too, although if you prefer to have an email conversation rather than a public one, that's good too.. Right before one of my chronic-horrible-low-back-pain clients got here at 5:30 today, I looked at your attachments. I paid attention to the one with the rectus abdominus Trp's. She had really painful TrP's on both the left and right sides, right on top of the pubic bones. I did the best I could with them but they were still painful at the end of treatment. Can you give me any suggestions to try? I won't see her again for 4 weeks, just FYI. Is there any self-care she can do?
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