Chronic Pain, Myofascial Release, Panic

[Chava]

I have chronic upper back pain. Before it was bad, but tense I went in for a good massage. Too good. I felt like a different body when I left. I woke up at 2am and, out of nowhere, wanted to kill myself. It was a panic rage...I knew I didn't want to kill myself. I found some numbers to call, left a message for my doctor. No more massages!

I have a lot of trauma stuff in my back...very protective. After therapy (somatic therapy, SE) yesterday., I felt better, like I had released some of this insane energy. I was folded over and pushing for like an hour. Today, I laid down in my office to stretch my back out the other way...laid over a little ball and it felt good to pop some of that stuff in my back. Then I felt instant dizzy-panic. I sort of sat through my work and managed for the next hour, not moving more than I really had to. Not too bad...just that dizzy feeling that comes with panic....like I might pass out if I move too quickly (am sure my arrhythmia thing was going too)...all for like 1 minute of stretching my back out nicely.

The muscle or myofascial stuff doesn't make sense to me...how it holds or releases emotions. ?? Or is it more like allowing protective responses and fight responses to have their exit out of the body...and that's just good and creepy? I'm careful about popping or stretching my back. One day it can lead to a tension headache. Another day I can get dizzy if I got it really good. That passes and my back feels okay for a while. What is in there??

My back has protected me in so many ways...shield against violence, the muscles in my back also held onto sacs of air that were escaping my lungs and into my back. And then my back held onto my collapsed lungs for a while. Then scar tissue that had to be beat out of there. Feels like psychosomatic fibrosis (I should have pulmonary fibrosis for all the problems I had as a kid, but I breathe okay...just feels like scar tissue in there...30 years later)/...Nobody can touch my back. It's loaded with stuff I can't quite sort out....but do you guys believe SE, or even myofascial release, done the right way, can help untangle some of the stuff that is in there? Or does our nervous system just revolt if we force our spasms to be still....and like think of suicide after massage. What am I even talking about? Any thoughts? I'd like to manage my tension better through gentle yoga, a little myofascial release, but not feel I'll let my inner exiled murderer loose or something....or at least have a panic attack. I was really dizzy today, but it was good for my back.

 

[joeylittle]

Have you ever been to a Rolfer? I do think that the body stores a whole lot of powerful stuff, but also that it wants to return back to an open, balanced state, with the necessary amount of tension to be well-functioning. Anyway, I've had some pretty wacky things happen after being rolfed, but they all turned out good.

 

[Chava]

No..haven't gotten that far. I'm rural...nothing but a couple bars and churches. But I can travel more in the summer...took some Feldenkrais classes (TOO MUCH for me after SE), but Pilates lessons were amazing. I like the idea of using springs to move my whole body...like a weight lifting machine and the ocean had a baby. At least helps me lay on my back to "rest" those muscles a bit while working with other energy. Sometimes I want to tip my car with my legs. The right movement helps modify the back tension. But I do not do massage anymore. Rolfing sounds more gentle. For now I think I will stick with my own little therapy balls and just be careful....if it feels too good, I'm going to get dizzy or weird shortly after.

 

[greenleaf]

Hi @Chava -- it sounds like maybe part of you wasn't ready to have that much of your back relax at once, maybe? Definitely not good to get suicidal... I'm really sorry that you had such a bad experience after feeling so good and relaxed. :(:(:(

I'm really glad the SE is helpful though! :):):) I hope that will help get some of the trapped trauma out of your back.

Massage has been either neutral or great for me, never bad; my muscles just don't seem to relax in certain areas though no matter how much work the wonderful massage therapist does there. I guess my dissociation or whatever is still working there.

There are very slow, careful massage types, like "cranio-sacral". I have really come to think that the chakras are a way of describing real aspects of our nervous system. However, it really seems like our science is still way behind in understanding these systems-level aspects of our nervous system... science is better at little component parts like neurotransmitters... with a few tools like MRIs to look at blood flow in the larger system but that seems inadequate here.

I suspect that our muscle problems like this are from parts of our brain, not really the muscles, since I can have muscle areas really relaxed some days, then a sort of blob of emotion comes up, I fog out, and later I realize that my muscles stiffened up sometime in there without me noticing it.

Some thoughts... cranio-sacral... or maybe have a massage person just work on a small area of your back at once? There is also just having the person press on a single tight muscle, and trying to feel and process a smaller, safer amount of feelings at once? So muscle work that is less overwhelming, through careful experimenting? Maybe the SE therapist would have ideas too.

It does sound like you have an amazing back that has been very protective though, so I'm glad it seems you're starting to try to figure out how to treat it kindly. It is a very deserving, good back.

 

[Chava]

thanks @greenleaf ...lots of good ideas and thoughts. I do have a pretty strong back and legs...not sure what they want to release, but I love the idea of sitting against my garage wall and tipping my car (I won't, unless I get really desperate :eek:)

 

[Hashi]

...Nobody can touch my back. It's loaded with stuff I can't quite sort out....but do you guys believe SE, or even myofascial release, done the right way, can help untangle some of the stuff that is in there? Or does our nervous system just revolt if we force our spasms to be still....and like think of suicide after massage. What am I even talking about? Any thoughts? I'd like to manage my tension better through gentle yoga, a little myofascial release, but not feel I'll let my inner exiled murderer loose or something....or at least have a panic attack.

I'm not clear on how you've been doing SE and how you've found that. My idea of SE is that it's all about untangling some of the stuff that's in there. It should absolutely be done the right way for that. Would you be able to say something about your experiences of SE so far?

I've had it's close cousin craniosacral therapy (CST). @greenleaf is this what you meant? It's energy work and not massage, although maybe there's something else called craniosacral massage?

I had CST for releasing trauma energy held in my cells (my therapist was a trauma specialist). This is explained in Peter Levine's books. We also did a lot of work on the emotions held in the cells. As part of that my therapist taught me about Focussing (there's a book about this by Eugene Glendin). For me energy, tension, emotion, experiences, physical injury and trauma were all held in my muscles and other tissues.

My CST therapist was careful about pacing and containment, and I did a lot of work as well to keep the effects from being negative or overwhelming. I wouldn't have been able to just do stuff. I had to do a lot around the craniosacral therapy and Focussing to keep things safe.

Has the idea of safety come up in your SE sessions? I'm sorry, I don't really understand what your SE sessions have focussed on. Is it related to what you're talking about here?

 

[Chava]

@Hashi A lot of pushing comes up in my SE (like I want to push in all directions...arms, back, legs, forwards, backwards, and it's hard to manage because it works better if slowly, so it seems like little pieces and then some days things just don't seem to click as well for me). I either don't remember the worst traumas (unconscious, too little, or just don't remember) or just have little snippets, so it's helpful for me to not have to judge or figure out what is coming from where. But what seems to persist is a sort of possible "freeze" between pushing away and wanting to hold, connect, reach out, etc...so very confusing in my body. This would relate well to either attachment relationship or strange doctors strapping me down and hooking me up to life support to save my life. But I have not like pin-pointed a scenario where the body sensations connection to normal memories...though sometimes feelings, usually a lot of fear when I want to push away but "can't" (and this also involves some shaking in my arms). My back upper back stuff might be related to stuff I mentioned above, or just the stuff in my arms, but the back thing seems pretty stubborn....worse when I'm really stressed out, though some days have been good.

I feel okay today. Stressed out, but not in meltdown mode or dizzy or anything uncomfortable.

I though Peter Levine was describing somatic experiencing..? (my therapist is a trauma specialist too and uses other stuff, but focus seems to be on somatic experiencing type stuff most of the time). I think there are common themes in lots of the somatic trauma releasing methods though, I mean far removed from "talking" about my stress (which usually doesn't help me and often makes me more hyper).

Whatever I did a couple days ago helped release the tension that had me wanting to set myself of fire. Also lots of pushing and energy felt in my lower arms (where I burned the sh+t out of myself with a cigarette not long before the appointment...so stupid, but I was losing it). I just don't dare use my foam roller or mess with my back much right now. Seems like I can challenge it more (strengthening, stretching, even scrubbing the floor) if I'm in a better place.

 

[Chava]

p.s. @Hashi safety comes up all the time in sessions...and also what my therapist can routinely suggest via e-mail when I'm melting down. The stuff in my back is just very persistent and I guess I'm glad we're going at it slowly vs forcing the energy out (if even a massage can make me suicidal). My upper back and core are also a major source of protection and that's hard to release.

 

[Hashi]

I though Peter Levine was describing somatic experiencing..?

Yes, this is right. Peter Levine's books are also core textbooks for craniosacral therapy which uses the same principles of trauma energy being held in the body, and all sorts of other energies being held in the body as well. As far as I can understand the underlying theory is the same, and then somatic experiencing focusses on a conscious way of addressing past experiences while craniosacral therapy removes the conscious/cognitive part altogether.

I know that somewhere in "Waking the Tiger" Peter Levine says something about possibly not needing the conscious element in processing cell energy. This is definitely where craniosacral therapy is coming from. With craniosacral therapy I never had to think about anything in particular, I just left it to my central nervous system (with my therapist) to work on what it most needed to work on at that moment.

I've read what you've said in a different thread, about being in a really difficult place right now and considering inpatient treatment. When I read that I thought you seem to be taking a very good approach to being open to whatever's best for you right now. I also connected it to ideas of safety and coping skills. I would imagine (hope) that inpatient treatment would focus on coping and safety and I would really support that.

I'm always saying here on the forum that grounding, coping and safety skills are the biggest part of trauma work - whether the trauma work is somatic therapy (SE or CST), psychotherapy, creative therapy or whatever. I estimate that my healing as a trauma survivor has needed to be 60% on safety and the rest on trauma work. That means that in addition to the time I spend with my therapist I would be spending a minimum of 1 hour every day (but probably more like 2 or 3 hours every day) on my own practice for coping, safety and psychic protection. I did that 2 or 3 or more hours every day for some time when I was very symptomatic. And it helped me. And like many people here I didn't have the time (I did it anyway).

And now - much farther down the line - I spend only a few minutes a day on it, because the time I spent before has had the effect that was needed.

I think somatic therapy (in my case, craniosacral therapy) has been fundamental to recovery. I also think that a high level of safety work around that is essential. Healthy protection practice first, release second. Because then the release can be safe.

So I would hope that whatever next step you decide on, that wlll include a lot of work on stability and safety as you go forward with processing and healing from trauma.