Fascinating Fascia and it’s Role in Trauma and Emotional Stress
Myofascial release is one of the most effective forms of therapy to release stored up emotional trauma from our body. Hopefully with this post I have helped to highlight the role that fascia plays in our mental and physical health, how we look and how we live our life and relayed that the health of our fascia is essential for us to function our best.
It is no coincidence that the words fascia and fascinating start with the same 5 letters as fascia is indeed the most fascinating part of the human body (in my humble opinion). Made up of a network of connective tissue that creates much of the structure and shape of our body (if you were to get rid of all your bones – you would still maintain your shape thanks to fascia) – it also acts similarly to our nervous system. Given this significance we would expect that everyone would be talking about fascia and how it affects our physical and mental health and really – our entire life. But alas one of the things that makes fascia so fascinating is its elusiveness because not everyone can feel the adhesions or knots that can build up in the fascia. Many who can really feel the fascia (like myself) consider it a gift to be able to. You know when you’re getting a massage or myofascial release treatment and you feel that crunching over certain areas – those are knots or adhesions in the fascia being released. Sometimes you’ll get a treatment and not feel any of the crunches and then you’ll see another practitioner and feel lots of crunches. The practitioner who you feel the crunches with is one that can feel the fascia.
So that’s fascia. But the part that makes it so fascinating is its role in emotional stress and trauma. Different layers of fascia have different levels of innervation and research has shown that the visceral (around your organs) fascia is rich in autonomic innervation, the superficial fascia shares with the skin mechano- and thermic-receptors, and the deep fascia has a role in proprioception. But where there is little research is when it comes to trauma and fascia’s role in memory storage. In my over 16 years of myofascial release and manipulating fascia – this role is what lead me to consider fascia - fascinating. I have had patients recollect memories from childhood, burst out in tears, be engulfed with anger, tremble for hours after treatment and experience states of euphoria as we released adhesions in the fascia.
There was a patient who I saw early in my practice who was seeing me for chronic low back pain. She had tried everything under the sun including physiotherapy, massage therapy, acupuncture, chiropractic and spinal decompression. Nothing worked and a colleague referred her to me for myofascial release to see if I could help. As is the case with most people with lower back pain – her hip flexors were very tight and there were significant adhesions in the fascia surrounding her psoas muscle. As I released those adhesions she started to cry. I stopped and asked if the pressure I was using was too much as I thought that was the reason for her tears. And she responded “I was sexually assaulted as a child. I was sexually assaulted as a child. Somebody touched me. Can we stop for now?” It was a revelation as she had dissociated from this experience and blocked it from her memories and instead stored it in her fascia. The fascia around the psoas is one of the most common areas I have seen patients store trauma.
It makes sense with trauma that when our brain is not able to process what is happening it stores it away in the fascia. Our brain and sympathetic nervous system are concerned with survival so it can’t process what is happening at that moment – it just needs you to survive so provides a ‘fight or flight’ response. What does it do with all that information its ignoring for survival? In my clinical opinion – it stores it in the fascia. I have actually felt this trauma in my patients. I had a patient in her early 20s who had come in for headaches and shoulder pain. As I was working along the fascia I was drawn to her elbow and when I started to release her elbow, a deep feeling of sadness overtook me. I asked her if anything ever happened to her elbow and she replied “no injury but as you were doing that, I felt my ex grab me there. He was abusive and use to grab that elbow and throw me to the ground”. It was an eye opener for me – by feeling the facia I was also feeling what was stored there and that’s the day I started to read everything on fascia.
I think the fascia is one of the keys to addressing trauma and its sequelae. We know from books like ‘The Body Keeps Score’ that we are storing trauma in the body and its significantly affecting our mental health. If emotions and trauma are stored away in our fascia it means that we won’t be addressing it. It’s like the stuff we store away at the back of cupboards or under beds only discovering them years later when we eventually organize or move. It’s a difficult task to address trauma that has been moved to the background so it requires a release to heal. I think that releasing the fascia in conjunction with psychotherapy is a method that can significantly change people’s lives. When we talk about the mental health benefits of yoga, dance, tai chi and exercise some of this release is because with all of these we are working the fascia.
The fascia also plays such a large role in our posture, alignment, how we move and how we feel and can also affect the production of feel-good neurotransmitters like endorphins and stress hormones like cortisol. This is why most of my work is based on the fascia and I use myofascial release to improve posture, fix chronic injuries, take years of aging off the face and help people heal from trauma. When we talk about adhesions and knots in fascia – a lot of that is caused by inflammation so think about how the fascia is affecting inflammation in our body and how by releasing these knots we can alter inflammation in our body. This is important since inflammation is the cause of so many chronic illnesses and disease. They say laughter is the best medicine but I’d say myofascial release is a top contender given its array of benefits.
Myofascial release is one of the most effective forms of therapy to release stored up emotional trauma from our body. Hopefully with this post I have helped to highlight the role that fascia plays in our mental and physical health, how we look and how we live our life and relayed that the health of our fascia is essential for us to function our best. It’s truly FASCInating!
Some interesting articles on fascia:
Fascinating Fascia | Myofascial Release, Trauma and Chronic pain
Approximately a year after starting my own clinical practice in 2008 – I had a patient who changed the way I looked at chronic pain and facia forever.
She was in her early 40s and spoke very softly and timidly. Her shoulders were curled forward and she resisted making eye contact. She had come to see me for chronic lower back pain after trying physiotherapy, acupuncture and massage therapy for years with no relief. She attributed her lower back pain to her job in administration where she spent most of the day sitting at a computer.
Whenever someone comes in with low back pain the first area I check is the psoas muscle and its related fascia. While the psoas is primarily involved in flexion of the hip - it also attaches directly to the lumbar spine (lower back). As I began to work on the fascia around the psoas she burst into tears and became distressed. I immediately stopped the treatment and asked her what she was feeling. She said that as I was releasing her psoas - she had flashbacks to being sexually abused as a child. She hadn’t mentioned it when I asked about trauma earlier on in the visit and said that she never talks about it and was surprised at how overcome she was during the treatment. We discussed what happened and I recommended that in addition to the myofascial release treatment she also see a therapist to discuss what was being released as we worked through the fascia and psoas muscle.
Prior to this patient – I had never learned about the connection between fascia and trauma despite countless myofascial release and osteopathy courses, a degree in pharmacology and a doctorate in chiropractic. It was at that point that I became fascinated with fascia and its link to trauma.
And over the years I found that every patient who came in with chronic pain had some form of trauma. And the trauma varied - car accidents, disconnected caregivers, abusive relationships, assault, wars, bullying, toxic workplaces, death of a loved ones, divorces and more
And often as we worked through the fascia and talked about the emotions and memories being released into the conscious mind – slowly but surely patients got better. When we experience trauma - our mind can only deal with some of it in the moment and these rest gets stored. Some in the subconscious mind and as we know some now – also in the fascia. This can lead to digestive issues, inflammatory conditions, autoimmune issues and chronic pain.
When we store trauma in our body its primarily in our fascia and this ‘holding’ of tension not only leads to pain but also prevents healing. Imagine walking around in a suit of armour – the weight of it – the effort it takes to move through the world. Perhaps by releasing some of the trauma and tension from the fascia we can help to remove the armour. I find that in practice the fascial work I do helps to at least loosen the armour up so that my patients are more open to facilitate their own healing. Sometimes you need someone to at least unscrew the armour so that you can then take it off yourself and that is the basis of myofascial release for chronic pain.
For example – I’ve had patients who have tried yoga before to help with their chronic pain but quit early on because they couldn’t get into many postures or find their flow. However after a couple of myofascial release visits they were able to get into a new yoga routine and stick with it – finding their balance and peace in the postures.
If you have experienced trauma – and this can be anything from micro-aggressions, a disconnected upbringing to an accident that lead to injury – you will benefit from myofascial release.
Additionally - an area that is often overlooked is the fascia in our face and how the emotions expressed at the time of trauma may be stored in the fascia. This is likely the reason why stress and trauma seem to accelerate aging – especially in our faces. This is why patients will often comment that they feel like they are floating or that their entire bodies feel amazing after my face fix treatment. By releasing the fascia in the face as well as the rest of the body – significant gains can be made in both physical and mental wellbeing.