The Posture Police

This first edition, brought to you by Shoulder Pain

       There you are.  Minding your own business.  Working at your computer, getting things done.  Excellent!  When, out of ‘nowhere’, your upper back between the shoulder blades start to hurt. Man!  You weren’t even doing anything different!  This is so frustrating!

       Well, guess what, you are doing something.  And I’m here to tell you, that sometimes, where it is it ain’t. (Coined by the amazing Ida Rolf.)

       I want to introduce a term I learned from a skilled veterinarian: Acute on Chronic.  This term means that there is an injury or introduction of pain based on an imbalance that was already present in your body, but the level of dysfunction increased such that you are now suffering from the pain.

       All of us have some poor posture habits.  This is not a note to judge any of us.  I want to offer an opportunity of learning.  So let’s start with our example of shoulder pain when working at your computer.

       The posture of sitting at the computer requires that muscles in the front of the shoulder girdle contract in order to have your arms/hands in front of you to type or mouse.  If you lean on one side to support your bodyweight so that you can mouse easier with the other side, you will have pain in both shoulders, but from different muscle groups.  Lucky for you, both of these muscle groups are found in your armpit…  Ok, I’m kidding.  It’s not necessarily lucky, because releasing these muscles can be tender, and they are located in an area that many massage therapists refuse to treat.

       But here, at The Medical Massage Clinic of Durham, LLC, we are all trained in the proper release of these contracted muscles.  Our main job is to educate you in why in the world we want to address muscles in your armpit!  We work by bringing balance across the joint.  So, we release the contracted muscles in the shoulder girdle, which allows the muscles in the back to relax because now they are not overstretched!  This idea is repeated over and over across all the joints in your body.

       Look for our next edition of The Posture Police.  I will continue to expand on different ideas to make it easier to you to learn about your body!

Rebecca Manitsas, PhD, LMBT, Owner

The Medical Massage Clinic of Durham, LLC