What's in your pocket?

Check your pockets right now. What’s in them? A wallet? Your phone? Keys? A pack of gum? Do you frequently wear a satchel on one hip or a bag that you always pick up the same way? The answer to these questions might be the key to understanding “mysterious” pains in your body such as stiffness in one hip or intermittent pain in your back or legs.

Over time, anything we habitually carry can have a long-term impact. Our neural pathways are constantly lighting up, making minute adjustments, and adapting to even the smallest stimulus. For a day or two, this is very unlikely to make much of a difference. But with time this leads to holding patterns in how we use our muscles which can cause discomfort, pain and tension. 

For example, recently a client was experiencing mild pain and soreness in his outer quad. His doctor gave him a round of anti-inflammatory pills and sent him on his way. While meeting with him, I began asking questions that the doctor hadn’t. I learned that for years he kept a pack of cigarettes and a lighter in his front pocket (for up to 12 hours a day!). He had also started working out again recently. 

Through this conversation, we realized that the muscle memory from carrying those items was unconsciously increasing his muscle engagement in that leg while working out. This was the cause of the quad discomfort.  I massaged the area to provide immediate relief, but by discovering the underlying reason, I suggested alternating which pockets he kept these objects in to get to the root of the issue. 

This is why it’s so important to be your own detective. While medical doctors are well-trained in their scope of practice, they have a limited perspective as to how these small everyday factors impact how tension is stored in the body. As your intuitive massage therapist, part of my job is to help you become curious about these things to find the root causes and make the necessary changes to feel great in your body.