Treating Pain

Are you in pain?

Are you looking for a physio?

Could you need some help with rehab?

Do you need a massage therapist?

Have a read below to get some sort of idea about how I look at things.

To treat physical pain you could either use a physiotherapist, a naprapath, chiropractor, massage therapist, or a lot of other solutions. You just need to do the right thing. If you’re around Uppsala, and you need help with physical pain, I can often help with that. If you want to find out if I can help you – and would like to do so ASAP, contact me through Facebook. Friend request me to get my attention and then message me and we’ll see what I can do for you. If I’m not the right instance for you, I’ll do what I can to point you in the right direction.

It’s a quick and personal way to get a chat and some input, so please do your best to avoid wasting my time unless you need it for something. Use that option respectfully and I’ll help you as well and as quickly as I possibly can.

Message me with your situation and add what kind of help you’re looking for if you’ve got a decent idea. If you’re looking for a tax-financed healthcare option, I’m not the right instance, I’m afraid. I’m completely private.

Manual therapy and thought-through exercise are used when you suffer from physical pain.

It’s either done in a combination with the other methods where we “do everything” together, or as a smaller project in isolation, where we look at just that physical problem. If you’re bothered by long-term pain rather, I’m not particularly fond of doing something too small. That’s why I primarily aim to do bigger projects with people. To do enough to get the change you want. If you actually don’t need a lot of help to get the change you need, I’m all ears for smaller projects.

Pain is the most common reason why I treat with these tools. It’s definitely the most common reason to treat manually.

Stiffness, discomfort because something is “misaligned” (not my choice of word!), or issues with posture might be reason enough, but if so, they usually come with pain, rather than as an isolated problem.

Before, or for that matter while, we’re treating there are enough questions and tests to get a decent enough picture of today. I focus a lot on perpetuating factors, rather than just quick fixing things because that’s what solves things long term. We’ll reason why things are as they are, and what can be done about it more than just leaning on manual therapies.

We’d prefer to get rid of the cause of the problem rather than keep it around and treat the symptom of something for the rest of your life.

Where?

I live in Uppsala, Sweden so around there would be where we’d do things. When I took the step to focus on coaching rather than exercise and manual therapy, I got rid of my physical location with a gym. I noticed that I used it less and less and preferred the outdoors or some sort of home-delivery solution. So that’s what I’m offering today. I’ve been traveling some and done some flexible solutions, which I’m still open to, but the most cost-effective solution I offer today is to meet up close to where I’m located or have me come by where you live.

“PT” is wide. Is it personal training… or physio? Where does one draw the line?

Nowadays, I primarily focus on helping people with pain – or performance to get less pain.

A typical example is if you need help to rehabilitate pain from sports injuries or trauma. Other things could be “Prehab” to avoid getting injuries. That’s not necessarily a great word, according to some, and I agree, but it does get the point across. “Prehab” is practically to look at the physical aspects before things hurt because that’s more comfortable. I could also help you with:

• If you’re starting from zero and would like to find the least effective dose to get going from inactivity.
• We could look at exercise to change the physique to either gain weight or get smaller.
• Classic strength and conditioning for increased hypertrophy and performance.

To avoid making things sound fancy, I’d say big parts of exercise with me consist of learning foundational strength and mobility stuff. Developing good enough motor skills, decent mobility, strength, and posture are important to do so. We learn how to move and do things – and then load them with what they can endure, to make them better – to make you better.

Motor skills are what make you move as you’re intended to be able to generate power in a good enough way and to keep you free from injuries.

Mobility is important for things to work the way they are intended, both in everyday life and in the gym.

Strength isn’t important initially because we can practically always change how tough things are – but it’s crucial that you’re strong enough to endure your everyday life, regardless of how you live. That’s why we practice this.

Posture could be a bit controversial, but to some degree, it matters. However, if we manage motor skills, mobility and strength, that’s often solved as well.

A decent part of what tends to be done is inspired by power- and Olympic lifting. I prefer complex movements covering several joints rather than isolating one muscle at a time. That’s since it’s a useful way to use the body if you ever have to use your body out in the world and not only at the gym. To have that as a foundation seems quite popular since it’s often tricky to master fully – but getting the hang of it good enough to get going isn’t very hard – and suddenly, you’re lifting decent weights.

Machines might have their perks, but today I’m primarily using kettlebells, rubber bands, and bodyweight. It is mobile and works really well when you’re trying to learn how to use your body.

Dry needling is a lovely technique where muscles get worked on with needles to achieve relaxation and experience less pain through that relaxation.

The dry needling primarily aims to get what you call a local twitch response. Inserting the needle into a trigger point [a small part of the muscle that won’t relax even though you try to] makes the muscle contract suddenly and then relax. Or, by the look of it, twitch. It seems as if this makes the trigger point, and thereby the muscle, relax.

This is primarily used to treat dysfunctional muscles with trigger points because they might directly cause pain, affect motor skills and mobility or affect joints or muscles close by.

It is not the same as acupuncture, even though we use similar needles and share some “points”. The “points” here correlate with anatomy rather than medians. Could the acupuncture points be where they are because the trigger points happen to be there? The trigger points “appear” where they are because of where the nerve connects to the muscle rather than something else. Trigger points and treating them with dry needling is more western than acupuncture. We use both in western medicine, but dry needling aims more to treat the reason you’re in pain, whereas we use acupuncture as a reliever of the pain we experience.

Trigger points are something we can measure, and western physicians have tended to for quite some while by now, although not at all for as long as people have used acupuncture.

Except for needles and the slight overlap of where to put them, the techniques vary quite a lot since the needle’s insertion makes the big difference with dry needling, rather than just letting it be there. This means it’s more of an active treatment where we work with a single needle rather than making someone look like a porcupine.

Some get further relief from pain if you add electricity to the needles.

Massage

Massage is used to aid:

• Stress-related pains from increased tension in the muscles. The back, neck, shoulders, or jaw are common areas. If this is necessary, you must look at the perpetuating factors and do more than just treat things manually.
• Tension and pain in the back, neck, shoulders, wrists, hips, knees, or feet.
• Acute neck- or lower back pain/back spasm or chronic back pain.
• Painful elbows from epicondylitis, golfers, or tennis elbow.
• Impingement or bursitis in the shoulder.
• Radiating pain, numbness, or tingling in the arm or leg.
• TMJ, short for “temporomandibular joint”, or with a better word – a bothering jaw.
• Tension headache with or without migraine.
• Optimizing performance and recovery.
• Preventing pain from monotonous work.

When isn’t it a good idea to treat?

The most common reason not to get treatment, and not least for others, is when you’ve got an infection. That goes for most contagious things, from the common cold to more severe issues.

If you bleed more than others due to medication or pathology, it might be a good idea to think twice before using needles.

How quickly does it make a difference?

Entirely dependent on what you need help with. Some things get a lot better quickly if you do the right thing. Some have said that “x is better than it’s been for ten years!” after just a session.

Some things take time. If something needs to heal or change, that might take quite some time. How long depends on what’s bothering you.

If you need help and this sounds like something for you, either use the contact function here on the site or contact me through Facebook. Friend request me to get my attention and then message me and we’ll see what I can do for you.