Donna Finando - Trigger Point Self-Care Manual: For Pain-Free Movement

TRIGGER POINT

Self-Care Manual

For Pain-Free Movement

Donna Finando, L.Ac., L.M.T.

Healing Arts Press

Rochester, Vermont

Contents

Introduction

M ovement is life. We all move. For some of us movement is a joy. For all of us movement should be pain free. As children we moved and played with abandon. Movement was natural, it was easy. In our teens and twenties we danced, we played ball. Maybe we injured ourselves a bit, but the injury healed by itself in a couple of days.

Now were adults, and we still move. Were athletes. Were dancers. Were commuters, mothers, gardeners, accountants, truck drivers, lawyers, skiers, massage therapists, carpenters. Sometimes we move too much; sometimes we dont move enough. And at one time or another we move in ways that lead to pain. We jump too much or too high, we slip on the ice, we carry bags that are too heavy across an airport that is vast. We sit too much, we stare at a computer screen too long, we spend way too much time on that beautiful first day of spring cleaning up a winter-neglected garden.

Have you ever awakened a day or two following such exertion knowing something was wrong? Theres a pain in the shoulder that really hurts. You arent comfortable reaching behind your back to fasten your clothing and it hurts when you reach up for your seat belt. X-rays of your shoulder dont show anything conclusive. Your orthopedist says its probably tendinitis or bursitis and prescribes anti-inflammatory medications.

A couple of weeks later the pain is no better. You arent sleeping because you cant lie on your shoulder without distress. Now the pain is in the front and the back of your arm, maybe your chest, and its going all the way down to your hand. At a follow-up visit with the doctor you get a prescription for physical therapy. The therapist shows you exercises to stretch and strengthen your shoulder. Maybe he applies some ultrasound to the area. It may help somewhat but the pain keeps coming back. In fact, you find that you are moving your arm less and less as time goes by. Your physical therapy prescription runs out but little has changed, and the doctor says the tests dont show anything significantyoull have to live with the pain. In an effort to get down to the bottom of this problem you try chiropractic, but that doesnt really help. Maybe you try deep massageits painful but it provides some relief, yet the relief doesnt last very long. You havent played tennis all summer because of the pain, and theres no way you can do any more gardening. You can feel despair building.

What is going on with your body?

The answer is this: Nobody has really checked your muscles. Only in the latter part of the last century has there been a growing awareness that the muscles themselves harbor knots that produce pain, weakness, restricted movement, and more. The tricky part about these knots, or trigger points, is that the pain is often felt far away from the muscle band that harbors the trigger point. Once trigger points develop in a muscle, a progressive snowball effect takes place if those trigger points are not reduced and eliminatedin compensating for one muscles weakness another muscle becomes strained and develops trigger points, and so on through the myofascial chain. Left unattended, these muscular trigger points can last for years and lead to disabling pain, dysfunction, and disability that defies conventional medical diagnosis and treatment. Emotional distress inevitably follows as quality of life deteriorates. There is nothing more disturbing than weakness and pain that seems to have no resolution and no end.

Once they are identified, trigger points can be reduced. Doctors inject analgesics directly into the trigger points; acupuncturists use dry needling; massage therapists use manual pressure. This last technique for reducing and eliminating trigger points can be employed by everyone as a self-care approach, an approach that gives us power over our pain.

We all have the capability of finding and eliminating our own trigger points or trigger points in the muscles of those around us who are in pain. This is the key. It is what leads to having real power over our pain. All that is required is the desire to feel our own muscles, to find our trigger points and work on them, and then to modify the behaviors that produced the trigger points in the first place.

Thats what this book is about. Using the information here you can take hold of your pain and do something that will help you to eliminate it. This approach teaches us that trigger points and the pain they cause are real. It demonstrates that our pain is truly muscular in nature and that there is something we can do to help ourselves. Using this manual, you can identify the muscles that are the sources of your pain. You can learn to feel the muscle, its taut bands and trigger points, and you can learn to use pressure and stretching techniques to reduce them. To maintain your health and strength, you will find several simple guidelines that you can easily incorporate into your daily life that will help you to reduce your chances of developing debilitating trigger points in the future.

Learning a new skill and body of knowledge takes some time and effort. However, in this case the personal rewards are great: freedom from pain, freedom from restriction, and a return to the activities that we love to do.

So how do you go about using what is offered in this manual to help you care for your own muscles?

1. Take a look at the pain pattern images at the beginning of each muscle section and identify those images that most closely resemble the location of your pain. Read through the information regarding the muscles that youve determined are the ones that might be causing your pain. Do the symptoms sound familiar? If they do, its a good bet that you can start there; if not, read about some of the other muscles.