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Fascia

Greetings!

We chose a bit more of a scientific topic this time to help inform you more about a connective tissue that is paramount to our physical health, fascia.

Why, you ask?

Often, our clients ask us at what frequency should they receive bodywork in order to maintain good physical health. The answer is different when dealing with acute injuries (for another newsletter). However, this newsletter is focused on preventative, proactive, and informed bodywork to maintain your best health. Once we have helped rid you of injuries or pain, our goal is to keep you there and prevent it from happening again. By learning about fascia, you can understand what we are looking and feeling for in your body and why it is important to work it out through bodywork. My personal golden number for my maintenance massage clients is every 3 weeks, but the range is anywhere from 2-6 weeks for regular work.

It is not uncommon for our 60 year old and older clients to be swimming a mile at a time, running marathon, doing triathlons, even Ironman, or just be real comfortable spending a day bending over in the garden or doing long hikes. Making a regular commitment to your body will greatly effect your ability to be active later into life. And we love helping you get there.

In addition to our clinical information, we are happy to formally introduce Martina James, share a healthy salmon taco recipe, and highlight Pac West Athletic's awesome bootcamp to keep you in peak shape during the rainy season. Check out our music review by DJ Split, a great new product for your feet (a great holiday present) and our special discount for the month.

Cheers and see you at the studio!

Jenny Lightstone - co-owner

Peace out,
Psoas

Fascia and Adhesions
By Scott Schwartz

What is fascia?

Fascia permeates the entire body from head to toe. It surrounds, coats, protects, connects, supports and interpenetrates muscles, bones, organs, nerves, blood vessels and other structures. It is a matrix that is everywhere in the body connecting all structure from front to back, inside to outside and head to toe. It is extremely versatile; at times very soft and flexible and at other times, when in protection mode, hard as steel. It's tension level changes during pregnancy, athletic activities and direct trauma.

There are tons of articles out there explaining all the chemical makeup and scientific understanding of adhesions.

But here is what you really need to know.

Fascial Layers

Fascia surrounds single muscle fibers, groups of muscle fibers, and even groups of those groups. It surrounds full individual muscles and muscle groups - such as the four muscles of the quadriceps group. Fascia is like Saran Wrap; it can be both slippery and sticky, and it can be both flexible and stiff. It's very thin (although much thinner than Saran Wrap) and shiny. It softens to allow our muscles to slide independently of each other, and it will also harden to protect areas during injury.

Fascia is the shiny coating on an uncooked chicken breast. It's like the internal skin on a wedge of orange. It separates individual muscle strands of which there are thousands in each muscle. Each one has a slightly different function and receives its own impulse signal from the brain. Fascia, when healthy, allows each muscle fiber to act independently of other strands. When unhealthy it gets sticky and adheres to muscle tissue, tendons, ligaments, bones, organs, nerves or other pieces of fascia.

Adhesions

When we say that a muscle has adhesions in them, usually we are speaking of a muscle fiber's coating or fascia, sticking to another muscle fiber's coating. When this occurs, a muscle fiber that is "asked" to contract by a brain impulse will have to bring along the muscle fiber that is adhered to it. When it is two muscle fibers - not a real big deal. When it is multiple fibers, the body begins to become less efficient in its movements. Over time, unless relieved of the adhesion, more fibers will join the adhesion. Besides actual injury, this is the major reason the body gets tight, sore and inflexible.

These fascial adhesions starve muscles of oxygen, limit range of motion, pull on bones, ligaments and nerves, and are the majority of what we often call "knots." Muscles that are shortened for long periods of time tend to create adhesions. This is seen in the posture of many desk workers - raised, internally rotated and forward shoulders caused by sitting in the same position for long periods of time.

Inactivity, such as not stretching, especially after athletic endeavors, and overuse and over exertion are other causes of adhesion buildup. Since we live in a world that begs for more of our time, has us working harder and longer and yet lacks widely distributed information about these issues, avoiding adhesions completely is an unrealistic goal. Limiting adhesion accumulation and ridding yourself of minor adhesions can be achieved with increased stretching, liquid intake, avoiding overuse and inactivity, foam rolling and of course massage.

Bodywork for Life

Maintainance Massage - why massage can keep you healthy... FOREVER.

Deep Tissue

So now that we know what fascia is and how adhesions form, let's move on to how they affect you over time and how to avoid the postural deterioration, discomfort and pain they can bring.

Over time, a single adhesion, left untreated will grow. Other fibers will join and cause that muscle to get tighter and eventually pull on its attachment sites: bone. As this get's more painful, the body will start to accommodate by utilizing other muscles to avoid discomfort. The newly used muscles will eventually become overworked, new adhesions will be formed and the circle will continue.

At Psoas, we see clients who come in for any given ailment and during the course of treatment, we trace the initial problem back to another area of the body. There are many patterns that are so common that we often have a pretty good idea of the original site of trauma or adhesion buildup just by watching a client walk to a treatment room. Sometime a simple postural bodyscan is all that is needed to determine where muscles are adhered and sometimes we figure it out later in treatment. However, quite often treatment is necessary in body areas other than where a client pinpoints the soreness or pain, that we are always looking for these types issues and usually find them. For example, sometimes we start with a problem in the left ankle and find that it's being caused from an adhesion in the right hip.

The amount of time needed to deal with fascial adhesions is based on many things, such as the amount of time since the adhesions started forming, the age of the client, how that client tends to heal, how much rest they can find for those muscles, liquid intake, stretching etc...

Maintenance

Here is the key: once the adhesions are gone or maybe before they form, maintenance massage can greatly lessen the formation of adhesions and subsequent pain, loss of range of motion, compromised posture and bodily deterioration.

Maintenance massage is simply regularly scheduled massages designed to rid the body of adhesions that have been around for a while or just starting to form. A great clinical massage therapist can feel even the smallest abnormal muscle tissue and basically eliminate it before the deteriorating cycle begins. During massages our goal to continually minimize the adhesions in the body by decreasing buildup in current adhesions and finding and stripping any new adhesive tissue.

The clients that we see regularly are able to remain healthier than other people - much healthier. If you eliminate the first adhesion, the body doesn't accumulate more in that area or muscle, and it doesn't compromise for pain and discomfort; other muscles don't become overworked, etc...

Client A and B come into the studio complaining of soreness in their shoulder. They are both 50 years old and work at a desk. Client A is stiff as a board in the upper back, neck and shoulders. Client B is relatively loose and not particularly stiff. 90% of the time client A has never had regular massage and client B has. 90% of the time it takes significantly less time to help client B. It happens every day at our studio.

Those receiving regular mainenance massage are far more likely to be active later into life.

People are going to sprain ankles, get whiplash from car accidents, twist arms, fall down stairs and even sneeze too hard and cause themselves harm - and we will never be able to prevent these things. However, the vast majority of issues we work on at Psoas could have been avoided with maintenance massage. The key is eliminating that first adhesion before it starts to affect the body.

If you want to be active later into life, include regular, quality bodywork into your health regime.

Spotlight: Martina

Joining up with Psoas back in June, Martina James adds a wealth of knowledge to the already amazing Psoas team. Clients describe her work as "powerful," "intense," "knowledgeable," and "individually focused."

She has happily returned to the city that she loves after living and training in Cologne, Germany for several years. She spent the last 3 years working in Germany as a licensed physical therapist after receiving her degree from the Physio Cum Laude Institute in Cologne. She has extensive training in Swedish, Deep Tissue, and Trigger Point Therapy. Because of this unique blend of training and experience, Martina is truly gifted in helping with chronic pain sufferers, sports injuries, those feeling the effects of arthritis and aiding in post-op rehab.

Martina is dedicated to help clients discover, through massage and training, that one can optimize a better self.

"We are so excited to have Martina here at Psoas, not only for her fantastic bodywork, but she is a great resource from her physical therapy training for the whole Psoas team to bounce ideas off and discuss bodily issues. Martina really gets involved with her clients because she is truly invested in helping you get better. She is also just fun to have around."

- Jennifer Lightstone
Co-Owner

Dry-Rubbed Salmon Tacos with Tomato-Avocado Slaw

"This recipe was passed down to me from a Psoas client, and it is so healthy and delicious that we have it almost once a week at home. We use wild salmon when we can, and I love that it is pretty much dairy free except for the small amount of sour cream in the slaw. Enjoy!"

- Jennifer Lightstone
Co-Owner

TOTAL TIME: 40 MIN
SERVES: 4

Ingredients:

-- 1 teaspoon ground cumin

-- 1 teaspoon chili powder
-- 1 teaspoon brown sugar
-- 1/4 teaspoon finely ground
   coffee
-- Salt and freshly ground pepper
-- Two 8-ounce skinless,               center-cut salmon fillets
-- Extra-virgin olive oil, for brushing
-- Tomato (either 10 cherry tomatoes or 1 ripe tomato chopped)
-- 2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
-- 1 small jalapeño, seeded and quartered
-- 1 garlic clove
-- 6 tablespoons sour cream
-- 1 ripe Hass avocado-halved, peeled and pitted
-- 4 cups finely shredded red and green cabbages (12 ounces)
-- 8 corn tortillas
-- Hot sauce and lime wedges, for serving

Directions:

In a small bowl, stir the cumin with the chili powder, brown sugar and coffee. Season generously with salt and pepper. Brush the salmon fillets with olive oil and dredge them in the spice mixture.

Meanwhile, in a food processor or blender, puree the tomatoes with the cilantro, jalapeño and garlic until smooth. Add the sour cream and process until smooth, then add the avocado and pulse until creamy. Transfer the dressing to a large bowl and season with salt and pepper. Add the cabbage and toss to coat.

Preheat the oven to 300°. Preheat a grill pan. Lightly brush each tortilla with olive oil. Stack the tortillas and wrap them in foil. Bake for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, brush the grill pan with olive oil and grill the salmon fillets over high heat, turning once, until nearly cooked through, 8 to 9 minutes. (Or you can cook in a pan as well.) Transfer the salmon to a plate and flake with a fork.

Fill the tortillas with the salmon. Top with the cabbage slaw and serve right away with the hot sauce and lime wedges.

Enjoy!

Balls and Rollers and Sticks -
Oh my!

If you have some pretty bad adhesions, you are going to need some help. Good massage is your best bet and leave these techniques for after we work out where you are stuck.

But our goal is to give you tools for life so that you can stay adhesion free. These are 4 great techniques to deal with minor adhesions. They may be painful so ice if it gets to bad (20 minutes on, 40 minutes off, repeat if needed) and wait till you are pretty pain free to self treat again.

As with all stretching or self help programs, be careful, go slow and if anything feels strange, contact us here at Psoas.

Good luck and happy stretching and rolling...

Ilio - Tibial Band (IT Band) - more detail

The IT Band is on your lateral leg from knee to a couple of inches beneath your hip. It is common for it to adhere to the Lateral Quadricep muscle.
IT Band with Foam Roller

Lay the foam roller on the floor perpendicular to your body.

Now, position your self on your right side to work the right ITB by placing your right hand on one side of the foam roller with your right straight leg lying on the foam roller. You will have your left leg bent and your left foot placed on the ground in front of your right leg.

Use your left hand to stabilize your body as well, but try not to rotate your shoulders into that left hand.

Now, roll slowly along the side of your right leg from your knee up to your hip. When you feel tender spots, stop and work in that area for several repetitions.

You can roll in those tender spots or just hang out with pressure until it releases.

Plantar Fascia with ball - more detail

Another way to loosen up your plantar fascia is to use a tennis ball or golf ball (golf ball is deeper). You can also use a frozen water ball to apply ice at the same time, or even a rolling pin or can from your kitchen

Seated, place the item under your foot and slowly roll the bottom of your foot over the item.

Try to think of lengthening the area between the balls of your toes and your heels - like you would lengthen dough with a rolling pin.

Tibialis Anterior with The Stick - more detail

This is a hard muscle to stretch on its own so we often use "the stick" to help.

Sit down on a chair and grab the handles on the stick.

Place the middle of the stick on the meaty part of your muscle directly on the outside of the shin bone. Roll back and forth while loosening the muscle.

To add effectiveness, start with toes raised towards the knee (dorsal flexed) and slowly roll the stick on the muscle while pointing toes in the opposite direction.

Wrist Flexors - more detail Wrist Flexor Stretch

Extend right arm in front of you, palm up.

Extend fingers down towards the ground and reach with your left hand helping to open the palm side of the hand and stretch the flexors of the wrist and forearm.