Can tight scalenes muscles cause semi-paralysis?

[Martin Bollen]

At 12 years old, I had a violent head fall on the basketball court. Since that day, my breathing has been restricted. My upper body in general has been tight and fairly unresponsive to massive amounts of treatment. I've always known that my body was stuck in a trauma of sorts.

I did the whole somatic experiencing bit to satisfy the crying wolf folks who scream "it's emotional" the split-second they don't understand something. But I always knew it was a simple physical jamming somewhere.

I'm now 40. Yesterday, something clicked and I began rubbing and Wullstoning my scalenes. Just two, count them, two days of that, and my upper body is relaxing like magic. Also, my masseter muscles have finally let go almost on their own. I can smile now without it actually hurting.

It's a phenomenal discovery. In hindsight, I want to say that I was actually paralyzed without even knowing it. See, everything worked, but nothing worked well.

In looking at my anatomy book, the scalenes originate from C3 to C8. Concurrently, the brachial plexus serving all the upper body muscles originates from the same area.

My question is, did I suffer 28 years worth of a standard off-the-shelf "pinched nerve" or was it more akin to a "semi-paralysis"? Please let me know of any keywords or links to this phenomenon. Thank you very much.

Note: This process was like doing an Easter egg hunt. Only the eggs were in a different house, so there was a lot of inefficient hunting going on for 28 years.

 

[Mabelline]

welcome to the club. This is the reason why I do this work, from being in so much pain. Through years of yoga, self massage, and more recently, better sleep hygeine, I've gotten the pain down to a manageable level. For me it's mostly Fibromyalgia. I did have a head injury about age 6 interestingly, right on the meridian over the temporalis.

Also, check the zygomaticus major and minor next time your into your AP book, I work a killer triggerpoint there that releases all the way down the right side of my spine to the sacrum. I could also write volumes about my occipitals, but how boring is that?

Ok what else has damaged poor, pitiful me?
Archery since age 11 messed up my right shoulder (bowhunted with a 65 lb longbow, have since dropped to 55 lbs)

-Fly fishing, esp salt water (and fly tying) added to the pain
-bike riding handlebar positioning, along with two crashes, one pretty bad.
-day job in telecom pounding coffee all day
-intense pain in right eye, complete blindness in that right eye two months later from a "fast cataract" Sorry Folks BTW if any wierd typos. It's my acrylic lens install LOL. I relly do know how to spell, hee hee,


...so I had me a whole right side from scalenes down to sacrum of intense pain, unbeleivable triggerpoints and frozen shoulder so bad that few MT's could even approach it. I'm, a fairly muscular guy, which compounds the issue. So the fact that I looked like I was in good shape got me more criticism. Of course.

Try lying on a tennis ball, compressing the Rhomboids, I'll bet ya ten bucks that will help release the neck a bit more, from refferred nerve stuff.

I freed up my shoulder by experimentation. Heating a large hot stone (gathered it from my favorite trout stream) to
200 degrees in a conventional oven, wrapping a towel around it, and lying on it in bed, and doing range of motion exercises/stretches. Then I found out in massage school this is called "active release" "Applied Kinesiology" whatever, it worked.

It took about a year, but I finally got all my range of motion back. The cool thing is it equalized, no longer requiring repeated treatment.

This was a sort of "hot stone tiggerpoint yoga". I may do some tonight, works great right in bed, helps me sleep. Great bedwarmer too, it's an old cowboy trick.

Two massage tools I love are the "jacknobber" (massagewarehouse.com)
and the "Theracane" . I also have a stone tool and an accu-tool I made out of an old bass plug I found on the beach. I tipped it with a ball bearing to get more specific pressure. I may change this to a hematite bead soon, though, just to be more granola-crunchy.

Try some fun tools on yourself, experiment, It's awesome. I also use some light sand bags for neck stretches, this is an Iyengar Yoga "prop". A lot easier that using your arm/hand, and you can relax better.

Also, try ice. Here's my ice-roll invention: Take a Poland Spring water bottle, freeze it, cut all the plastic off so now you have a "tootsie roll" of ice. Put this on a folded towel, lie on it on your back and watch TV. This will completely nuke any scalene tension within half an hour roll your neck around on it. When done, put the roll and towel back in freezer, it's reusable!!

Yes, scalenes are important for breathing. The anterior moves the first rib, as a matter of fact...

I totally hear you on the emotional thing. People always get all antsy if you try to explain that you are in pain, which is just an honest attempt on your part to take some accountability for the irrational way you may be acting at the moment. Volumes have been written on this.

I really feel for the blind now. Just try walking around with one eye sometime, and you'll see how insensitive people can really be on the street.

There was a really great article on pain in Time a few years back. I have it buried somewhere here. Science is just starting to understand it, and the central nervous system.

But yes, total Kudos to you!!! Janet Trevalle, famous MT released her own muscular "paralysis" by massaging herself in her wheelchair. And she wrote a book about triggeroints.

As I go through this process, I am always inspired by the "survivors", those who are also willing to explore new things.

It's hard to answer your last question there of "what was it" As I'm careful not to diagnose, esp. online, but it sounds like something deep and connected. Just some keywords off the top of my head, not sure what will pop up...

Thoracic outlet syndrome (your brachial plexus thing)
Muscle armoring ("splinting")
muscle guarding
Scalene syndrome.
TMJ
Spinal Lordosis


Years go, a friend gave me the best two words of advice I ever got while I was going through a "hurdle"

"Embrace yourself"...

peace out,

Rob

http://www.hartfordmassageinfo.com/

 

[Momma]

A pretty good thread - addresses some breathing issues:
My Rolfing Experience