What I want to concentrate on is precisely how The Alexander
Technique can be used as part of an adjunctive strategy along with other
techniques, with respect to alleviating your Fibromyalgia and Chronic
Fatigue Syndrome symptoms.
In this article I do not want to repeat all the information on the
internet about the history of FM Alexander and how he developed his
techniques.
All the techniques I detail have a way of dove-tailing into each other
and symbiotically deepening the effects of each other.
Basically, my angle on the Alexander Technique is that I want to take
what I need from the techniques and apply them directly to assist with
the musculoskeletal problems that are maintaining patients Fibro and CFS
symptoms.
Bottom line: There is a way of moving that your body likes and a way
that it doesn't.
When you have an injury or imbalance there is a way of moving that helps
the body heal and a way that prevents it from healing.
All musculoskeletal conditions have varying symptoms and present in
different ways, but all have one thing in common, they can all be made
better or worse by the way you align your head, neck and trunk as you go
through the movements and postures of your every day life.
The muscles which support your skeleton are usually asked to work far
too hard for the task or tasks that they are being employed and over
time this can lead to them becoming "stuck" in this state of
excess tension aka Trigger points. These may gradually worsen over a
period of years.
When you are then attacked by whatever initially triggered what you
consider to be the "recognized" start of your life with
Fibromyalgia/ CFS, then if your muscles were already habitually in this
state of excess tension, then post infection, one of your main symptoms
will then be the muscular pain.
When you go on to present at your chosen healthcare provider, you will
be labelled more towards Fibromyalgia rather than CFS and you will be
tested via the trigger point methodology.
Your primary diagnosis will be Fibromyalgia as oppose to CFS.
Let me make one point clear that is an over-riding theme through all the
therapy that I outline: Your body has an innate capacity to heal itself,
but as human beings in Western Society we are hell bent on destroying
everything that nature has taught us and switching to unnatural modes of
action simply because its fashionable or that is the way everyone else
does it, or that's the way things are made and manufactured etc.
Look at toddlers when they first sit up and stand, look at the perfect
alignment of the head neck and torso, and look at the ease and grace
with which they move. All humans are born with this grace and poise and
we "choose" to unlearn it as soon as we can possibly start
copying moody slouching, ill postured teenagers and adults.
Take the simple act of sitting in a comfy chair that maybe 200 million
Americans are doing right now as you read this. The reality is that that
chair is NOT COMFY just because it says so on the manufacturer's label!
The typical slouching position that people are forced to assume on a
daily basis is absolutely against all the natural laws of correct
posture and alignment of the spinal column and results in these millions
of people holding their body in a state of excess tension for all the
time that they actually believe they are "relaxing".
In third world countries where natural posture is forced in daily lives
due to the unavailability of "comfy" sofas, "bad
backs" are relatively uncommon and unsurprisingly so is
Fibromyalgia and CFS as defined by Western Society.
Fibromyalgia and CFS are largely diseases of modern
"civilized" society. We have evolved through the industrial
age in a few hundred years.
But by comparison, it took millions of years of evolution just for our
body to become bipedal.
Take the "comfy" sofa example again. What are manufacturer's
criteria in designing and building this item? The real design
specifications are that it is more fashionable than the competition; it
can be made more cheaply than the competition so the mark-up and profit
can be higher from each sale.
Do not for one minute believe they are sitting round their
brain-storming coffee mornings saying "lets design a sofa so our
buyers can relax in a natural position, realign their faulty posture and
avoid muscular tension."
If this was the case the comfy chair would not exist in its current
form.
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Another example of the misuse of our body forced upon us by tradition
and the manufacturers design specification is the W.C.
In terms of passing a motion comfortably this piece of furniture is
absolutely wrong and causes a requirement for a huge amount of pressure
to be applied by the lumbar area in order to expel a motion.
In a later article I will be diagramming the changes I recommend for
sitting posture and using the W.C.
You may not initially be overwhelmed by what I recommend, but your body
will.
I am not a qualified Alexander therapist, this takes four years of
training and so I recommend that you seek a trained therapist in your
area, but not until 6 months after you have begun the core therapy.
What I recommend is that you employ the simple strategies I outline in
my next article which will present quick wins in terms of your overall
musculoskeletal anomalies.
I have talked about the musculoskeletal anomalies inherent in
Fibromyalgia and CFS sufferers and how they are responsible for
maintaining your illness.
You may be suffering from recurring musculoskeletal pain but do not know
exactly what brings on the attacks. Often it is years of poor postural
habits which are causing your musculoskeletal imbalance, and we need to
address how to change these habits.
Examine the facts
Arthritic symptom severity can be reduced by postural habits, keeping
the joints moving.
Spinal surgery or a disc problem can be helped by learning to use the
abdominal and back muscles correctly.
General Back pain can be helped by correct movement as oppose to just
bed rest
Pinched nerves in the neck or lower back are usually the result of
compression due to faulty postural habits.
The first thing we need to learn is to reduce overall spinal compression
as this will reduce the flare-ups of musculoskeletal pain which are
contributing to your overall experience of Fibromyalgia.
As you are no doubt aware, when you are in more pain, your sleep is
affected and therefore so is your fatigue CFS.
Using your body correctly results in less pain, improved healing, better
sleep, less tension and therefore less fatigue. Sound good?
If you doubt the effectiveness of the Alexander Technique look at it
from this angle.
Modern medicine and modern science are in no doubt about the following
sequence of events.
Stress causes anxiety. The emotion anxiety produces an excess of the
chemicals cortisol and adrenaline which are known to cause ulcers, high
blood pressure and tension headaches and that's just in the short term.
Nobody doubts that the conscious mind can be utilized to interfere with
these thought processes, and similarly with skeletal muscles, the mind
can attain precise conscious control over the way they are used to
restore and improve overall health
That is all we are going to focus on by using the Alexander Technique.
Alexander's approach to musculoskeletal pain
Alexander's approach tries to address the totality of a body. This means
that in solving a specific problem, i.e. a problem that may occur in one
area of the back. This cannot be healed unless the entire back is used
in a well integrated way.
Being aware of, and able to control our supporting musculature.
Alexander understood this and teaches how to control gravity and work
with it rather than against it. This is essential for people with
recurring back pain
Learning to do less with the body overall. This is an important feature
of Alexander's work with respect to back problems. This doesn't mean
just being lazier, but rather eliminating unnecessary muscle tension and
bad postural habits at the root of back pain
I cannot express the importance of this to Fibromyalgia sufferers; in so
many Fibromyalgia patients the tension cycle is what exacerbates their
trigger points.
Pain causes more tension which in turn causes more pain and so on. By
learning to short circuit the pain cycle they can prevent a flare-up of
fibro without having to resort to muscle relaxants and painkillers, also
they don't waste the little energy they have on unnecessary muscle
tension.
In the next article I will focus on Alexander's concepts of "good
use" and then the specifics of how they can be applied in everyday
life to help Fibromyalgia and CFS patients reduce their musculoskeletal
pains.
Part
2: Tension, End Gaining, Release And The Four Concepts Of Good Use
Dr
Mark J Shaw
Copyright
Of The Mellington Clinic And Associates: 2007
Alexander Technique,Tension,Stress,Fibromyalgia,CFS
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