Category: Treat Your Own Trigger Points
Universal shoulder/infraspinatus/subscapularis stretch
Universal Shoulder/Infraspinatus/Subscapularis Stretch
If you could do one stretch to help with shoulder pain, what would it be? One stretch that would help to loosen up tight shoulders. Whether they are tight in the front, sides, back of the shoulder, or armpit (axilla), what would it be?
First, we want to look at how our shoulder is designed.
The arm bone is held into the shoulder socket by the wing bone/ scapula/ shoulder blade. The shoulder blade makes up part of the shoulder socket. The arm bone (humerus) attaches to the shoulder socket. Whenever the arm and hand move, the shoulder blade stabilizes them.
Whenever the hand, arm, and shoulder move, four rotator cuff muscles contract and relax to make those fine motor motions. When you are typing on the computer, your rotator cuff muscles are helping to fine-tune the movements in your hands so that the muscles in your hands can move your fingers accurately.
When we hunch over, whether it is a steering wheel, phone, or keyboard, we are contracting a major rotator cuff muscle and irritating it. It is the subscapularis.
The subscapularis is a big rotator cuff muscle that sits between the shoulder blade and the spine. The muscle raises your shoulders to your ears. It pulls the shoulder blade up and back. When you are reaching for something, it gets stretched out.
It’s like sitting in front of a computer, hunching over and leaning forward to get as close to the computer screen as possible to help you focus. This motion will irritate your entire shoulder, into your upper and lower back, and into your neck.
When the subscapularis goes into spasm, it hikes the shoulder blade up to the ears, making it hard to relax. It might feel like your shoulders are permanently shrugged. Some people will say that they feel like there is a button underneath their shoulder blades. Others will say they feel pulling in the front of their shoulder or behind their shoulder blade and into their neck. The subscapularis will be involved no matter what type of shoulder pain they feel.
The best way to avoid shoulder pain in general and to prevent it from coming back is to watch your posture. Be mindful about how you sit and move. When you sit, try to have something behind the small of your back to maintain the curvature of your lower back.
I like rolling a towel into a cylinder, wrapping rubber bands around it to keep it in place, and putting that in the small of my back. You then lean your upper back against the seat, which will keep your back in a good position and in good posture. Bonus if you can have something to rest your head back onto.
When you lean back against the seat, with the lumbar roll behind the small of your back, it pulls your shoulder blades down your back, relaxing the subscapularis. It also maintains the lumbar curve, which helps to keep your lower back, hips, and legs in good posture.
You can also try to squeeze your shoulder blades together. That will bring them down your back and get them in a good position. The best stretch for this area is a yoga stretch.
If your right shoulder is painful, place your right hand behind your back, palm out. Try to reach the bottom of the left shoulder blade. Even if you canโt touch the bottom of the left shoulder blade, that is fine. Get your right hand as high up the left side of your back as possible without bouncing or pushing. Make sure to tuck your right elbow into your side.
Now, lean back against a wall. Touch your heels against the wall. Touch your head against the wall. Look straight ahead.
You might feel that stretch going into your neck, upper back, back of the shoulder, front of the shoulder, and even down into the arm.
This stretch will stretch all of those areas out. If I could recommend one universal shoulder stretch that would affect most shoulder issues, Iโd recommend this one. I do it daily to manage my shoulder pain.
Iโd recommend the same for you.
I hope that you have a pain-free day.
Is Your Levator Scapula To Blame?
Levator Scapula Pain Relief
Do you have shoulder pain?
Were you told that it might be coming from your levator scapula?
Do you know what your levator scapula is?
It can commonly cause neck, upper back, and shoulder pain.
The levator scapula is the muscle you are trying to reach and rub when you put your hand behind your
back, from the top, and the top of your shoulder blade. It is the area between the top of the
shoulder blade and the spine.
The levator scapula is a muscle that attaches the top medial portion of the shoulder blade to the neck.
It raises your shoulder blades. This muscle helps you to shrug.
If you keep your shoulders raised high and up by your ears, you can cause your levator scapula to
spasm. Once your levator scapula goes into spasm, it will be painful to lower your shoulders and
do many other motions with your shoulders.
The primary irritant for our shoulders these days are computer work, driving, and looking down at your
phone.
These actions cause us to hunch our shoulders.
When we hunch our shoulders while looking down, our shoulder blades come up to our ears. This will
cause our shoulders, upper back, and neck to all tighten up.
Throw some stress on top, causing us to clench our teeth or clench in other areas, and this motion can
easily cause a flare of the levator scapula and the surrounding areas.
The subscapularis is one of the main muscles that move our shoulders up to our ears.
You’ll recognize the muscle if youโve read any of my other blogs.
It is the big rotator cuff muscle between your shoulder blade and your spine.
This muscle causes you to shrug your shoulders.
When you are sitting in front of a computer for hours, getting stressed out, these muscles will tighten up.
When driving for long distances, even over 30 minutes, hunching over the steering wheel and
having a death grip on the steering wheel can cause these muscles to spasm.
When you are sitting at home, scrolling on your phone, and looking down at it, then your shoulder
blades will be coming up your back and tightening up.
All of these motions can cause your levator scapula to go into spasm.
How do you calm down the levator scapula?
This involves stretching the hips into the upper back, shoulders, and even the neck.
On my website, https://cohentriggerpoint.com/courses/, youโll find stretches and exercises for all
these areas. I recommend starting at level 1. Under the blog section of my website, you can find videos
explaining and demonstrating how to trigger point and foam roll your achy and painful muscles at home
and calm down these inflamed and irritated muscles.
Please keep in mind that a tight muscle will be a weak muscle. Even if the muscle feels weak, you want
Start by stretching it and loosening it up before you try to strengthen it.
You must work out the entire neck, upper back, and shoulder complex.
Trigger-point therapy is one of the best ways to get this worked out.
Trigger point therapy can treat all of the affected shoulder, upper back and neck, and even jaw
muscles that can contribute to the pain complex.
An excellent soft tissue chiropractor will be able to work out the trigger points to get the muscles to move the
the way they were designed to move.
Then, a good physical therapist will help reinforce healthy movement patterns and get the shoulder to
move how it was designed. Allowing for positive movement hygiene.
Deep tissue laser therapy is also a great addition to help speed up the healing process.
We can treat and relieve your muscle and joint pain at Cohen Chiropractic Trigger Point Center.
If you are suffering from levator scapula pain, come in and see us.
We will get the pain out.
Have a Pain Free Day.
Levator Scapula Pain Relief
Treating Your Jaw Pain and Your Headaches at Home
How do you deal with your stress?
Do you clench your teeth? How about shrugging your shoulders at a loss of what to do next? Do you swallow your screams instead of lashing out?
The truth is that many of us are finding ourselves more stressed than ever. Working from home gives us few escapes from โthe office,โ and that prolonged stress can add up.
All of the ways you cope with stress can wreak havoc on the body – particularly in your jaw, neck, and head.ย
Continue reading “Treating Your Jaw Pain and Your Headaches at Home”
Your Guide to Trigger Point DIY
It can be confusing trying to figure out exactly how to trigger point yourself.
How often do you do it? How hard do you go? Do you repeat it? How do you know if you are on the right spot?
These are all legitimate questions.
Expert Infraspinatus Pain Relief for Shoulder Pain
Introducing the Infraspinatus: Magic Relief to Your Shoulder Pain
The Cause of Your Shoulder Pain
When we hear that we have a problem with shoulder pain or our rotator cuff, we usually assume the worst.
Most of us know that the rotator cuff is a very important part of the shoulder. But besides that, most people donโt know much about it.
The rotator cuff is a group of 4 small muscles that hold the humorous (arm bone) into the gleno-humeral joint (the shoulder socket), and helps to stabilize the shoulder.
Every time that you move your hand, like when you type, write, knit, etc, you are using the rotator cuff muscles to stabilize your shoulder and hold your arm bone in place.
So it’s no wonder you feel the pain, we’re using it all the time.
Continue reading “Expert Infraspinatus Pain Relief for Shoulder Pain”
Getting to Know Your Body’s Trigger Points
Those of you who have thrown out their backs can attest, a pulled muscle can be more painful that a bone fracture or even than giving birth.
When you throw your back out, you are spraining or straining the muscles in the hips. A sprain or strain is a microscopic tearing of the muscle fibers. It is akin to fraying a rope. The muscle is made up of thousands of muscle fibers. When you pull or sprain or strain a muscle, you are tearing some of the fibers of that muscle.
And when that happens, the rest of the muscle reflexively contracts, to prevent further tearing. This is the start of a trigger point.
Continue reading “Getting to Know Your Body’s Trigger Points”
The Overlooked & Under-treated Causes of Your Shoulder Pain
You may not know that you have a subscapularis or a serratus anterior, or care. But if you have shoulder pain, you may want to tune in and pay attention.
Continue reading “The Overlooked & Under-treated Causes of Your Shoulder Pain”
Find Relief for Your Lingering Knee Pain
The human body is an amazing machine.
It is a big pulley system that all works together. Everything is connected. I am frequently amazed at how complex a machine the human body is.
Just as the flap of a butterflies wings on one side of the world can cause a tsunami on the other side of the world, a small muscle imbalance in one area of the body can cause immense pain and discomfort in another area of the body.
This is very accurate with knee pain. Most knee pain involves an imbalance of the muscles in the hip caused by muscle spasm. Whether that muscle spasm in the hip causes the knee pain or is from compensation for the knee pain can be hard to say.
Getting Rid of Your Pain With Trigger Points
Pain has become a much discussed and debated topic as of late within the health care communities. Pain used to be viewed as a side effect or symptom of a disease process. It was thought that once you fix, cure, or calm down the disease process, the pain will go away. The pain was looked at as a side effect.
Now research is showing that pain can become a separate disease process and not just a symptom of another disease. Research has been increasing in this topic since the Institute of Medicine released a report calling on academia, government, and physician groups to develop a plan for treating and managing pain.
Continue reading “Getting Rid of Your Pain With Trigger Points”
Your Iliopsoas: The Hidden Cause and Hip Pain Relief
Hip Pain Relief
The iliopsoas is a pretty cool muscle.
It’s one of the most complex muscles in the body, and it is the only lower back and hip muscle to attach to the front of the spine.
In fact, the iliopsoas is actually two muscles in one: the psoas muscle and the iliacus muscle.
The psoas muscle attaches along the lumbar spine, and the intervertebral discs then descends obliquely to attach at the upper inner thigh bone. The iliacus muscle attaches to the upper two-thirds of the iliac fossa then descends to join the psoas major tendon, with some of its fibers attaching directly to the femur near the lesser trochanter.
The primary function of both of these muscles is hip flexion. In other words, these muscles work to lift the knee and take your next step while walking.
Continue reading “Your Iliopsoas: The Hidden Cause and Hip Pain Relief”
