Ok you are right, and in my passion of sharing this work with people, I tend to get lost in the background noise of the research and studies behind fascia and bodywork. Here is how fascia, Ida's studies about fascia and bones relate to you.

When we were babies, our little human bodies were taking shape and form for the first several years of our lives. During that time, we learned how to crawl, stand, walk, and sometimes even run. As we adapted to our growth and get bigger, our biochemistry starts to change. Our bones that were once fused become to separate. We develop different joints and bony connections. Sometimes our muscles and soft tissues will grow even faster than our bones themselves. As we move into adolescence, our growth takes a huge boost in growth.

The form we once had from ages 1 month to 10 years develops the shape and identity of our human frame. As we progress into puberty, we all will experience a huge growth, and this is probably the first time you might remember experiencing back or shoulder pain. I remember being a tumble tot to my terrible teens on how many sports injuries or slip and fall accidents I've gotten into.

These start to become the beginning stages of our journey with musculoskeletal pain. This is just fancy for my muscles really hurt and ache, but I don't know why. If I could remember the first time I fell and slipped off a horse or numerous soccer injuries I've had throughout my kid years, I think I would have a genetic gift for an amazing memory. Instead, that's what my fascia does for me.

Think of your fascia, very similar to the texture and webbings of the white stuff that covers an orange or grapefruit. Do you remember what that looks like when you open up the skin, but just under the pith of the peel.... You will find what is a complex matrix of fascia, but for the orange fruit.

Imagine yourself dropping an orange on the ground from waist high? Did the fruit explode or splatter everywhere? Most likely not, and that is what makes our fascial system very resilient. It has the tensile and compressive strength, similar to steel, yet more flexible than hair (and smaller). It is the spider web of the human body.

Now, I know that you aren't a grapefruit but understand that our fascial system acts very similar to the fascial network of an orange. When our soft tissue/body sustains impact injuries, our fascia does an amazing job of protecting our skeletal system from harm. The downside is that our musculoskeletal system (muscles and bones) absorbs the damage from the injury.

If you ever had a really bad slip off a horse, you would remember how bad the pain was inside the muscles and bones. Maybe you had broken the bone? You probably had to get a cast for it to splint the damage. If you remember landing on your back, you probably are still feeling the effects of the pain from that day (and you can't necessarily put a cast on your back bones).

If any of this so far resonates with you, then keep reading to learn how therapies like Massage and Structural Integration will change your life as you begin to unravel the mysteries of your muscle pains.

As we age from puberty to early adulthood, we have graduated from our first stage of puberty and enter a second stage of puberty that happens from age 18-25. This is where Time starts to unravel those aches and pains, we accrued as children. Combine messy recess activities to the long hours of sitting in school all day, we develop movement patterns and habits that will shape and alter our structure through this developmental phase. Oh and, do not forget technology and how we like to stare at screens all the time.

As our physical bodies have graduated, our brain starts to finish its development phase. The growth hormones and healing factors we had as kids, starts to literally diminish over time. The slip and fall accidents or sports injuries that we have developed as children, also compile in silence as we age. Maybe you've heard of the term of "Trigger Points" in muscles or someone describing having a "knot" in their back.

We are going to take an imaginary ride on the Magic School Bus and enter the world of Osmosis Jones and think of molecular (or cellular). As a massage therapist, I commonly hear Trigger points referred to as knots, and most people will think of their knots similar to a really bad shoestring being tied. If you are like me and you've ordered take out dinner, had a hard time opening up the "knot" that was tied? That is how low back and shoulder pain feels to the nervous system.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), your muscles don't bind up that way, nor do they tie themselves in a knot during an injury. If we look at sport science and injuries related to lifting and body conditioning, we can see in lab image testing, microtears that develop within the muscle fibers. These little tears will start an inflammatory response which induces the cells to rebuild. As the natural healing of the body starts to occur, the soft tissue (muscle and fascia) begins to repair itself and splint the damage, creating new growth at times (in the lifting world, we call this hypertrophy if this growth accelerates).

On a micro level, I like to think of those muscle fibers like a Twizzlers Peel and Pull candy with the strings, but the little bits of the string are ripped off. Sometimes the structure of the tissue is damaged in ways we didn't know, which creates that growth to repair the damage. That muscular growth imbalance can resemble a trigger point (muscle fibers binding in a disorganized pattern) or a fascial adhesion (fascial fibers binding into the muscle, restricting mobility).