It’s Not Your Muscle - Lyssa Gettys Uchida

It’s Not Your Muscles. It’s Your Fascia.
We’ve all experienced body pain and stiffness. And we often attribute it to creaky joints or “tight” muscles. 

And maybe you do a quick stretch or take a collagen supplement, but you can’t quite seem to get at it.

What if I told you that the main source of that stiffness, achiness, and lack of flexibility could be a body part you never knew existed?

Hello Fascia. 
It is believed that fascia contains approximately six times as many sensory nerves as muscle tissue. No wonder you are in pain!

So what is fascia, and how can you reduce discomfort caused by it? 

Fascia...
Fascia is a type of connective tissue that forms a web around all of your internal “stuff”. It surrounds your bones, vessels, muscles, nerves, and organs. It basically connects all of our internal structures together - kind of like a three-dimensional flexible scaffolding inside our bodies. It helps to transfer energy across structures and helps to transform the work of our muscles into smooth movement.

Proteoglycans provide hydration and swelling pressure to the tissue enabling it to withstand compressional forces. Water in the fascial system helps keep it supple, while its two proteins, collagen, and elastin, give structure and elasticity providing flexibility. Think of it as a giant sheet of thin rubbery material - flexible enough to take on the shape of whatever it surrounds, but strong enough to maintain integrity.  It’s the “Elastigirl” of your insides. Okay, not really, but it’s a fun analogy. About 70 percent of fascia is water, which is why hydration is such an important part of the healing protocol and a necessary healthy habit to maintain. 

Fascia stretches and moves….until it doesn’t. Sometimes fascia thickens or gets stuck and that translates into stiffness, lack of flexibility, dehydration, and even pain.


What causes “tight” fascia? 🤷
Fascia can stick - both to itself as well as to the material it surrounds. It can stick to surrounding structures or you might feel little knots or bumps. This can be caused by a number of factors.

• Repetitive movement. Doing the same thing over and over again such as running or cycling.

• Too little movement. Sitting at a desk or in a car all day, every day thereby not providing your body with a full range of motion.

• Trauma. Injury of any kind (including surgery) can also result in fascial adhesions, those knotty lumps and bumps you’re feeling.

Fascia and movement 🧎
Fascia helps us to move smoothly and effectively by connecting all of our internal structures together. It allows muscles to move, nerves and vessels to slide between joints, and organs to shift and move as influenced by the body.

Fascia enables the transfer of energy and the distribution of tension so our movements are smooth and coordinated.

Fascia and emotions 🎭
Something that may surprise you is how fascia is tied to emotions. 

Because of the high number of nerves throughout the fascia, dysfunction in the fascia can result in emotional changes as well as physical discomfort. 

Have you ever felt weepy while experiencing widespread achiness? Me too.

Fascial pain can lead to emotional changes which can lead to further postural changes (the way you slump forward when you don’t feel great). So reducing physical pain can help improve the emotional aspects of pain as well.

Is it fascia pain?🧐
Typically when there is a dysfunction in a muscle, you will experience pain with a specific movement. If you hurt your bicep, pain occurs when you use that bicep.

But with fascia pain, your discomfort usually isn't triggered by a specific movement. Widespread achiness and stiffness is a common complaint. Some people even complain that their skin hurts or they experience more intense pain across one area of their body.

With myofascial pain syndrome, fascial adhesions can worsen over time and develop into trigger points 👀.

Unlike with muscle injury, gentle movement often decreases fascial pain and improves range of motion.

Ways to reduce fascia pain
Heat 🔥
Applying moist heat, the keyword here is moist, to an area of fascial pain. Moisture from a hot pack or long soak will travel through the skin layers to your fascial tissue and help them to restore elasticity allowing you to stretch and move more effectively.  So get in that tub or sauna, or ask me about my microwave hot packs!

Water 💧
Remember fascia is made up of about 70% water. In order to effectively repair your fascial tissue, hydration is key. Staying properly hydrated is important at any age, but becomes even more important as we get older since that is when our body’s molecular makeup begins to slow down causing a faster rate of dehydration and our fascia to inevitably thicken. So never skip your daily water intake of 2-3 Liters a day.

Move more 🧘🏃🤸
Stretching, especially full-body movements like gentle dynamic stretching, tai chi, and fluid yoga, all manipulate the fascia and help to reduce pain and stiffness. The key is to move the area in all directions. Be sure to twist and bend and stretch in as many directions as possible in a slow fluid movement to allow the fascia to release.

Massage 💆
Massage therapy provides targeted treatment in specific areas and allows you to address an issue more comprehensively by generating heat, calming the nervous system, and treating muscle and fascia issues simultaneously. 

Massage therapy can also address any trigger points you may have since trigger points are often hard to self-treat.

Conclusion
We all experience pain and stiffness from time to time. If chronic achiness and stiffness have been troubling you, a consistent program of heat, hydration, movement, and bodywork can be enormously effective in reducing discomfort and improving performance. Stay the course and be consistent 😉