Category: back pain relief

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Back Pain – Spasm Between Shoulder Blade and Spine

You probably know the back pain I mean. It’s that nagging, cannot-be-ignored pain between your shoulder blade and spine. It often feels like a knot or spasm.

It’s usually on the side of your dominant hand. If you’re right-handed, it will probably be on the right side of your back.

There are two likely causes and one that often gets the blame, but usually isn’t the cause.

The rhomboid muscle (there is one on each side of your back) often gets blamed as being the cause of that pain. The reason for this is probably because the muscle happens to be in the same area as your back pain. This is the muscle most massage therapists will probably try to rub out for you, but it may or may not (probably not) be the cause of your pain.

If this massage doesn’t help, or the muscle “won’t release,” then the rhomboid muscle is not the cause of your pain.

A more likely cause is that the muscles where your knot is located are being overstretched or strained. They are complaining about this by causing pain. Overstretched muscles will go into spasm to keep from being stretched further and torn.

Your back muscles can get overstretched when the muscles in front of your body (your chest and neck) are short and tight. Over-stretching can also occur when you work or play a lot with your arm stretched out in front.

You can correct this by strengthening the muscles between your spine and shoulder blades. The stronger muscles won’t be so easily overstretched and so won’t go into spasm like they do now.  Also, strengthen the muscles behind your neck gently so you won’t go into “forward-head” posture, which also strains your upper back muscles.

Loosen, relax and open the muscles in front of your body, too, with stretching or massage.

Another likely cause of this back pain could be the scalene muscles, which are located on each side of your neck. These muscles can harbor trigger points. Trigger points in the scalenes refer, or cause, pain into the rhomboid area.

Often a massage therapist will try to work out a pain by working where it hurts.  That only works sometimes, in some situations.

You can see in the two likely causes above, that the problem can be elsewhere. The pain between your spine and shoulder blade may be caused by muscles in front of your body being short or trigger points in your neck.

The first thing I would suggest today would be to begin a strengthening program for your upper back. This will help you get rid of that nagging pain between your spine and shoulder blade.

It doesn’t matter whether you call them “knots” or muscle spasms or contractions, they hurt!  And you CAN get rid of them naturally. 🙂   This is good…

Because You Deserve To Feel Better!

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Does Stress Cause Pain?

Could it be that stress causes pain?

Yes it does. Here is how it works. We each have a central nervous system (CNS.) Our CNS governs everything in our body.

Think of it this way: Your nervous system is a highway. The impulses, or messages, that travel on your CNS are the cars.

Everything is going fine, your cars are all travelling smoothly along the highway.

Ow! Banged my big toe into the table leg. That’s okay, all the cars are still moving right along.

Dang! Another notice from the bill collector! All the cars are still moving right along.

What do you mean, you want a divorce?  Tire might be getting flat.

I have such a cold! Cars are still moving pretty good.

Fender-bender. That’s going to cost me plenty. Traffic is getting heavy.

What a headache! Uh-oh. One of the cars just slid into the median.

The dog died. A bunch of other cars are slamming on their brakes to try to avoid a pile up.

Just slammed my hand in the door. I think I broke my finger. Big pile up on your highway. Cars are screeching to a halt, some are smashing into others. Traffic is stopped.

The highway is overloaded, and nothing is moving smoothly now.

We function great when we have no problems. We do pretty well when we have only a few problems. But when a lot of things are going wrong and we feel stressed…

Our CNS – our nervous system highway – begins to show symptoms of overload. We begin to have pain.

If we cannot relieve a lot of the stress, it is possible for our pain to become chronic – we have it all the time.

However, if we can remove any of the stressors in our lives, our pain can diminish and become less. Each stress that we get rid of will lower our pain level.

The more stresses we can get rid of, the more smoothly the cars on our CNS highway will start to travel again.

So, the car gets fixed, we get a new dog, our cold goes away, our toe heals. Our stress level goes down.

To help our CNS highway work better we have to do some things to straighten out the cars and get them all moving again.

You get a nice massage, take a soak in the tub, get lost in your favorite music to relax by, talk to your favorite friend, work something out, finish a project that’s been bugging you, take a brisk or slow walk, sniff some lavender oil or a relaxing blend of aromatherapy oil.

You do some stretching or deep breathing while relaxing. You take a walk in the softly drizzling rain. Clean a closet or a drawer.  Hum or sing or read or laugh. Watch a kid or a puppy or a cat. Garden or dance.

Talk with a therapist or counselor, take a nap, or volunteer.

Distract from the stressors or correct them.

Anything we can do to eliminate or negate any stresses we have will help us to feel better.

The less stress we have, the less pain.

And, there are basically two types of stress.

1. The jet fighter pilot. You have stress but it is good stress. You are in control.

2. The prisoner of war who has no control.

Good stress can feel energizing and powerful.

Repeat after me: I am the jet fighter pilot!

Yes, you are.

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Got Achy, Breaky Shoulders?

If you have achy, breaky shoulders you are not alone!

Our lives cause us to overstretch and strain our upper back muscles often. We work on a line, at a desk, holding our babies, cooking, or other things. All of them require us to hold our arms and hands in front of us for long periods.

The upper back muscles get overstretched and very often complain. They ache. They hurt. They cause headaches. Ouch!

Try these simple movements to strengthen your shoulders and make them feel better.

Let your breastbone lift by pretending there is a hook attached to it pulling you skyward. That will move your head back over your shoulders where it belongs.

Now lift your shoulders up toward your ears, and then let them roll backward. Move them down toward your waist. Lift, roll, move down. And do it again. Try squeezing your shoulder blades together as you bring your shoulders back and down.

Lifting and rolling your shoulders back and down does many good things:

1. It gets circulation going around your shoulders and neck.
2. It loosens the muscles around your shoulder blades.
3. It strengthens the muscles that hold your shoulder blades toward your spine.
4. It gives your poor, overstretched muscles a break!

If it feels good to you to roll your shoulders in a big circle, front to back or back to front, then do it. But, if it feels uncomfortable when you move your shoulders forward, don’t do it. Just lift, roll and lower your shoulders behind you.

Please remember, if you do a movement which your muscles haven’t done in a long time, they may get sore from the new movement. So, start slowly, just do a few, two or three.

As you muscles start to remember what they used to do, and become used to the movement again, you can start to increase the repetitions.

Lift, roll, squeeze your shoulder blades toward your spine, drop. Repeat.

Feels so good to get the muscles moving again!

Ahhhh.

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Four Stories about Bodies Healing Themselves

Healing Story Number One:

Years ago I worked with a woman who fell asleep reading in bed. She fell asleep with her head propped forward. After several hours, she awoke in pain. She could hardly move one of her arms. Over the next month, she came into work only two half days. You could see the pain in her face. She had to go home.

She had been to a chiropractor and a neurologist, but neither could help her.

One day, her daughter came over and said, Mom, could you watch the new baby for just a few minutes while I go down the street?

Well, the new baby started crying, and the woman tried to reach down to lift the baby from its seat on the floor with her good arm. As she did that, her neck popped, and her pain went away. She was back to work the next day.

Healing Story Number Two:

A few years ago, a woman had shoulder pain. She went to a physical medicine doctor who sent her to physical therapy, and her shoulder got better.

When her other shoulder started to hurt, she had deep muscle massage and it helped, but still her shoulder hurt. So she went for physical therapy again. By the fourth session, she realized that it was making the shoulder pain worse, so she stopped going.

That weekend, she helped her husband lift a six-foot long counter top. Her pain stopped and her shoulder has not hurt since.

Healing Story Number Three:

A construction worker came home in pain. He had hurt his shoulder. His boss said to go to physical therapy. He went for four sessions, but didn’t think it was helping.

Then he came home one day with a big smile. His pain was 90 percent gone! He had lifted something heavy at work, and his shoulder popped and the pain left. Now it is almost completely well.

Healing Story Number Four

A woman tripped on her doorstep. She fell face first into the room. It was a jarring fall, and it hurt. For the next several days, her back hurt and she could barely get comfortable in bed.

One night, she couldn’t sleep, so she got up. Her husband came out and said, come back to bed and I will rub your back.

When he pressed on her back, it popped loudly! He jumped back, afraid that he had hurt her. “What was that? Did you hear that?” His wife said, “Yes, I did. I felt it, too. In fact, I think I’m better now.” And, she was.

What Do These Stories Mean?

Well, let’s see. They could mean that sometimes we get a dislocation in a joint. That sometimes we just need a little movement to correct a problem.

That bodies want to heal themselves and be well. That sometimes we need to allow our body to heal in its own time. That sometimes the correct counter-movement or counter-pressure can get things back to where they were.

They could mean that bodies want to be well, and that sometimes we need a little assistance or a little time to heal.

Physician, heal thyself. You can be your own best physician.

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Can Your Back Heal Its Pain?

We have really, really strong backs. Really, we do!

But, sometimes when something happens, like a spasm or a “catch”, we start to think that our back is frail, or fragile. We think we have to “baby” our back.

When we start to baby our back, or move tentatively, we are setting ourselves up for injury. We start to move stiffly, instead of smoothly. We are more likely to get hurt when we move stiffly instead of gracefully.

The bones of the spine are called vertebrae. They are built in a way that allows them to bend, twist and move in a variety of ways. The vertebrae in the neck and upper part of the back are smaller, but the lower back bones are larger and sturdier.

Pads of tough tissue, called disks, cushion the bones and separate them from each other. The disks give us more ability to move.

Long, strong muscles run the length of our spines. They secure each bone to the rest of the spine bones so that the spine acts as one long unit. Muscles allow us to move. Muscles move bones.

Sometimes we panic when our back hurts. Sometimes we become afraid it will always hurt. We may make an appointment with a doctor or surgeon, hoping they will “fix” our back.

Now, I will admit, occasionally someone does have a back problem which requires surgery. For instance, a chip may have broken off a bone, maybe through an accident. If the bone chip presses on a nerve, it may require surgery to remove it from the nerve. That should correct the pain.

And, thank goodness that doctors and surgeons are available for the times when we truly need them.

But, can your back pain heal naturally? You bet!

Think about it. If you cut your finger, does it heal by itself? If you scrape your knee, does it heal? If you break a bone, will it heal? (If it’s a bad break, it will require repair, but the bone will heal, with or without repair. The repair will help the bone heal in the correct position.)

Our skin heals itself. Our bones heal themselves. We get germs, and get sick, and we get better again.

So, please don’t panic.

Ice helps muscle spasms. The rule of thumb is ice for the first 48 hours, and then you can switch to heat, or alternate heat with ice. Ice for 20 minutes on and 20 minutes off. Do this several times in rotation.

Take an anti-inflammatory like ibuprofen. If there is inflammation, or swelling, in the muscles, an anti-inflammatory is supposed to help reduce the swelling. Reducing the swelling may take pressure off a nerve, if you are having nervy pain.

Keep gentle movement going. Move with as much fluidity as you can. Try to be graceful, not lurching. Gentle movement keeps the muscles warm and keep fluids moving through our tissues.

If you have extreme pain, or lose control of your bowels or bladder, see your doctor immediately.

But, even with extreme pain, if you are patient, your body can usually heal by itself.

I had a client who had such pain that he could only kneel on the floor with his upper body supported on the bed for two days! He crawled to the bathroom and crawled back to his bed. Kneeling helped him feel a little better because with his belly supported on the bed, it took some pressure off whatever nerve was getting aggravated.

It took several weeks for him to feel well again, but it did happen. He resumed walking, but it was from picnic table to picnic table at the park. Eventually, he could walk normally again.

Lots of manual muscle therapy, or therapeutic massage, helped his tight muscles relax and took pressure off his nerve.

When he was first injured, his doctor said, “Well, you could have surgery, if you’d like.”

The problem is, sometimes surgery helps and sometimes it doesn’t. Back surgeries are done less now than they used to be, because often they didn’t help.

Often muscles are the cause of our pain. Really often.

And muscles are really good at going into spasm, but they are not so good at releasing their spasm. If we keep moving gently, use ice and an anti-inflammatory on a consistent basis, and get manual muscle/massage therapy if possible, our backs can get better.

Posture plays a big part in back injuries. If you suspect that your back is not as strong as it should be, that would be a good thing for you to work on.

You can find more information about getting a strong back at Simple Strengthening

Strong backs rule!

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Are You Sitting Down? What Hurts?

I wonder if you are sitting down while you are reading this?

I’d pretty much bet you are. And, I’ll bet there is a good chance that something is hurting you while you are reading this.

How about trying something different?

Stand up to read. While you’re at it, reach up to the sky with both arms. Big stretch, that’s good.

You know how a cat or dog stretches their back legs when they wake up? One leg at a time goes into a backward stretch, away from their body. While you are standing, stretch your right leg out, behind you. Ahhh, that’s nice. Now stretch your left leg (while you are standing on the right leg, of course.)

Reading while you are seated is not bad. It is fine, as long as…

1. You are using your strong posture muscles to be upright.
2. You aren’t collapsing forward.
3. Nothing hurts.

Otherwise, try a different position to read. You could kneel, or stand, or sit on a big, round ball which will cause you to balance and use your muscles.

Or, start a program which will develop your strong back muscles so they can hold you up while you read.

My goal is for you to be pain free!

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Release Back Pain, Part Two

Last time we talked about a simple back pain relief method.

You were to follow the directions in that article to lay on the floor with your legs at 90 degree angles at the hip and knee. Both calves were supported on a chair seat, or similar piece of furniture.

Here is the second part of the movement to relax your back.

Please read all of the directions first, so you understand what to do before you start.

You have determined which piece of furniture you will use. You have chosen something which is the correct height that will allow you to do the movement with both calves up.

Now, you have to determine whether that piece of furniture or another will allow the following movements. Also, you need to determine whether you can position yourself by yourself, or if you will need assistance from someone else.

For the second position, move over toward the edge of the furniture. One calf is still supported, but your other leg is now flat on the floor.

So one leg is still up on the chair or footstool with hip and knee at 90 degrees.

The other leg is flat on the floor, in line with your body.

Keep the toes of the flat leg pointed toward the ceiling. Don’t let that foot flop outward. If you need to, prop that foot with a pillow or some books to keep your toes pointed toward the ceiling.

And just lay there.

After half the amount of time you have decided you can allot, move over or move the furniture so that you can place the flat leg back up on the chair. Let your other leg be flat on the floor.

Remember, the more your back hurts, the longer the time you should spend in these positions.

A minimum of five to fifteen minutes per position would be a good starting place. That is a total of fifteen to forty-five minutes.

You may do this as often as you like. If you can manage several times a day, or more extended sessions, that is good.

And while you are laying there, pay attention to your breath. Breathe into your neck, your midback, your low back, your hips.

Breathe so your chest rises. Make your belly rise. Breathe into your thighs.

If you can’t really feel your breathe everywhere yet, then pretend you can.

Imagine the healing powers of your breathe, your body.

Your body wants to be well.

It can be well.

Sometimes it just needs some attention, some time to be still and heal, and some time to breathe.

Don’t be disappointed if you have a temporary relapse. That happens sometimes while we are in a healing stage. You know, two steps forward and one step back? And then two more steps forward.

You are on the road to wellness.

Kathryn

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Simple Pain Relief Tip for Back Pain

When your back hurts, you don’t feel like doing much. It may feel strained, or you may have way more uncomfortable pain than that.

Try this tip:

Read everything before you try this. Do it only if you are certain that you can get back up, as you feel now. Or, make sure to have someone around to help you, in case you need help.

Lay on the floor. Position yourself so that your tailbone is close to a chair or couch, or even a table. You will be placing your calves on this piece of furniture.

Have this picture in your mind before you start: Your hip joints and knee joints will be bent in right angles (90 degree angles.) Your calves will be parallel to the floor.

Get both calves onto the couch or furniture. Get your “sit bones” as close as you can to the couch.

Now all you have to do is lay there. Fifteen minutes would be great. The more pain you are having, the longer you should rest in this position. It relaxes the low back and all of the muscles which attach to the back.

You could use this position several times a day if you are in a lot of pain. Or you could use it once a day when you feel the need.

There is a second part of this simple back pain relief movement which I will share with you next time.

P.S. Remember, breathing is not only necessary, it is a good way to relax. When you are laying down, practice breathing in a way which will expand your chest and back.

And relax.

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10 Simple Pain Relief Secrets

I recently read an excellent book about natural pain relief.

It has a great disclaimer. It said, basically, if you think you need the protection of a disclaimer, then close the book now.  🙂

The author believes that the most important consultation is the one each person has with himself or herself. He believes in taking personal responsibility for one’s own health. I think he is very wise, and you will be very wise if you take responsibility for your own health and well-being.

Your body wants to be well and pain-free.

There are simple techniques we can follow to get out of pain. There are easy movements and simple “tools” which will help us get back to where we want to be.

There are logical ways to eat, move and live which will enable us to feel well.

So, what are the “10 Simple Pain Relief Secrets?”

1.  Be responsible for your own wellness.
2.  Take good care of your body:  feed it wholesome foods and avoid fake foods and additives.
3.  Reduce your stress.
4.  Improve your posture.
5.  Stretch in the correct directions.
6.  Breathe deeply.  Move your ribs.
7.  Get enough sleep.
8.  Drink sufficient water.
9.  Become knowledgeable about your body and the causes of your pain.
10.Do what you need to do to become pain-free, naturally.

These ten simple pain relief secrets are a good start.  I am looking forward to sharing more with you.

“Because You Deserve To Feel Better!”

Kathryn Merrow – The Pain Relief Coach

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