Back Pain Mistake #2

Only Treating The Painful Area

If you’re new to myotherapy and SLM especially, you may notice that we do things a little differently.

One of the biggest differences is that we treat the body as a whole not just an individual muscle on its own.

“Where you feel pain is not always the problem. ”

So, regardless of what muscular pain you have, the treatment is always a FULL BODY treatment.

Why?

Because we work on the idea that where the pain is that you’re feeling is not always the problem- there is usually another corresponding muscle or group of muscles that are the main contributors.

“We tend to feel pain in another part of the body because that is where the tightness has gravitated to.”

We tend to feel the pain in another part of the body because that’s where the tightness has gravitated to.

You see, when a muscle tightens or shortens due to exercise, poor posture or injury, you may feel the pain in that area for a short time.

However, because you are still wanting your body to function the same way, the shortened and tight muscle needs more support so it will then pull on another muscle to give it strength.

This will generally continue until there is no where for the muscle to pull to get its strength and we start to feel the pain.

This can often explain why many people can go for treatments of some form and feel alright for a few hours or days but the pain generally comes back.

“The real problem is not being addressed, only the painful areas.”

That’s usually because the real problem areas are not being addressed, instead just the painful sites.

I remember I had a client come in who had been experiencing a lot of back and neck problems.

He had been seeing another therapist for quite a few months and was only getting about a week’s relief.

As usual, I always treat the entire body and discovered quite a few areas that needed in-depth work.

Apparently, the therapist he had been going to for all those months had been focusing on his lower back only as that was the client’s ‘worst’ area.

At the end of the treatment, when I explained to the client what seemed to be happening with his body, he told me that his other therapist had said ‘I think it’s time we start working on other areas as we’re not getting anywhere with the lower back’. 

Wow!! No wonder he wasn't getting much more than a few days relief from his back pain. Not only was this type of approach wasting both my clients time and money, it was also a waste of the therapists time as well. And, there's only a certain amount of times someone will come to you before they will move on if they haven't gained any relief.

It is situations like this that I realize how powerful the myotherapy technique is and the results simply speak for itself.

So, make sure what ever treatment you get that it works your entire body, not just the painful areas.