WHAT IS A TRIGGER POINT?
I will show you how to find your trigger points
and how to treat them. You can take what you learn and continue your
consistent treatment in the privacy of your own home.
Call Kindra @ 360-909-1267 to schedule your self trigger point therapy session.
The Physiology of a Trigger Point
The part of a muscle fiber that actually does the contracting is a
microscopic unit called a sarcomere.
Contraction occurs in a sarcomere
when its two parts come together and interlock like fingers.
Millions of sarcomeres have to contract in your muscles to make even
the smallest movement. A trigger point exists when over stimulated
sarcomeres are chemically prevented from releasing from their
interlocked state.
A Microscopic View
The drawing is a representation of several muscle fibers within a
trigger point. It’s based on a microscopic photograph of an actual
trigger point.
This particular trigger point would cause a headache over your left eye and sometimes at the very top of your head.
Letter A is a muscle fiber in a normal resting state,
neither stretched nor contracted. The distance between the short
crossways lines (Z bands) within the fiber defines the length of the
individual sarcomeres. The sarcomeres run lengthwise in the fiber,
perpendicular to the Z bands.
Letter B is a knot in a muscle fiber consisting of a mass of
sarcomeres in the state of maximum continuous contraction that
characterizes a trigger point. The bulbous appearance of the contraction
knot indicates how that segment of the muscle fiber has drawn up and
become shorter and wider. The Z bands have been drawn much closer
together.
Letter C is the part of the muscle fiber that extends from the
contraction knot to the muscle’s attachment (to the breastbone in this
case). Note the greater distance between the Z bands, which displays how
the muscle fiber is being stretched by tension within the contraction
knot. These overstretched segments of muscle fiber are what cause
shortness and tightness in a muscle.
Normally, when a muscle is working, its sarcomeres act like tiny
pumps, contracting and relaxing to circulate blood through the
capillaries that supply their metabolic needs. When sarcomeres in a
trigger point hold their contraction, blood flow essentially stops in
the immediate area.
The resulting oxygen starvation and accumulation of the waste
products of metabolism irritates the trigger point. The trigger point
responds to this emergency by sending out pain signals.
A trigger point can also refer pain elsewhere in the body.
Trigger points can be the source of the
pain in such joints as the shoulder, wrist, hip, knee, ankles and more. I will show you how to find your trigger points and how to treat them. You can take what you learn and continue your consistent treatment in the privacy of your own home.
Luckily, the pain and other symptoms caused by trigger points occur
in predictable patterns. When you know where to look, trigger points are
easily located and deactivated with simple techniques of self-applied
massage.
Massage of the trigger point flushes the tissue and helps the trigger
point’s contracted sarcomeres begin to release. In dealing directly
with the trigger point, massage is the safest, most natural, and most
effective form of pain therapy.
With trigger point massage, myofascial pain can usually be eliminated
within three to ten days. Even long-standing chronic conditions can be
significantly improved in as little as six weeks with consistent treatment.
