The various physical, mental and emotional stresses of life may cause our muscles to develop imbalanced tension and weakness patterns. There are a variety of ways these patterns, which cause nerve interference, can lead to the various painful symptoms we all experience at times.
One way is through the formation of trigger points in the muscles. These are felt as little dense nodules or knots under the skin. They may be caused by an injury where muscles were pulled or partially torn resulting in scar tissue and adhesions, or they may be caused from the muscle being in a partially tightened state unable to relax for long periods of time. In the latter case, the muscle is constantly over worked, continuously burning fuel provided by the blood through the blood vessels, and producing waste products or exhaust that is siphoned off by the vessels of the lymphatic system. A muscle is hard (or dense) when it is tight. This tightness creates a situation where the muscle squeezes down on its fuel and exhaust systems causing a deficiency in fuel getting in, and an excess of exhaust products (or toxins) depositing into the muscle.
In either case these trigger points put pressure on the nerves causing symptoms at the sight, and/or send signals through the nervous system causing symptoms elsewhere in the body. Another way is by the fixation, misalignment or subluxation of the vertebra (bony segments) of our spine. The spinal nerves, branching out from the spinal cord to control our body’s proper function, may become interfered with when the muscles controlling the movements of the spine become habitually tight, pulling the vertebra out of line causing them to put undue pressure on the nerve. Depending upon the function of the particular nerve affected, this can cause a myriad of problems anywhere in the body.
Many nerves running all over the body begin by running over, under, or through the back muscles. If this back muscle is overly tight, it can put pressure on the nerve, and cause an impingement. One common example of this is the sciatic nerve which controls much of our leg movements. When this nerve becomes impinged, we often experience this as sciatica or leg pain.
You may have heard of a slipped, herniated or ruptured disc. The spines’ discs are the cushioning between the vertebral bodies of the spine, and are made up of fibro-cartilage with a liquid/gel center that acts as a pressure re-distributor so we may move about comfortably. When the disc is compressed by tight muscles over a long period of time, or by a trauma, its’ gel like center can break through the layers of fibro-cartilage and result in a bulge, which may protrude putting pressure on the spinal nerve, or possibly even back into the spinal cord itself causing nerve impingement.
