Fascial Unwinding – Parts 1 and 2

Charles:

Charles was a violinist, and quite an eminent soloist, but he was no longer able to perform because his shoulder had gradually become tighter and tighter over the years and had not only lost the flexibility required to play, but had also become increasingly painful, even on lifting his arm. There had been no specific injury; the condition seemed to have arisen simply from the persistent pattern of use. He had received many different treatments, including regular Cranio-Sacral Therapy – but not including Fascial Unwinding.  Fascial Unwinding was able to release the restrictions in his shoulder and arm very rapidly and he was soon able to resume his playing career.

Judith:

Judith was in her 40s, suffering from various symptoms on her left side – tightness in her chest, pain and numbness down her left arm to her little finger. This had been developing for several years, gradually getting worse. The obvious immediate concern suggested by her symptoms was a possible heart condition. She had been to her doctor and undergone various tests which showed no cardiac pathology - and yet her symptoms were suggestive of a heart condition.
Tuning in to her cranio-sacral system, there was certainly a distinctive quality around her heart and her pericardium (the pericardium is the fascial sheath that envelopes the heart) – but not the qualities of a heart pathology, more the qualities of contraction, holding on to something, holding on to sadness, holding onto grief. As I engaged with her system, my hands resting gently around her heart and pericardium, I told her about the qualities that I was feeling and asked her if it meant anything to her.
She explained that a few years earlier her husband had died. She had two small children so she had tried to be strong and supportive for them, and not upset them by showing her grief. She had tried to get on with life. As she talked, she began to cry. She continued to tell me her story and continued to cry gently as she spoke. She told me that she had never had a chance to express her grief, had never really cried about her husband’s death, and how it was such a relief to be able to talk about it and cry about it now.
As she spoke, the fascia of the pericardium started to unwind and release, and the quality around her heart softened, loosened, relaxed, and opened up. Her symptoms, both in her chest and down her left arm, disappeared instantly - those symptoms that were indeed indicative of the heart, but not as a heart pathology, not anything that a cardiac test could reveal, but grief held in her heart.

Arabella:

Arabella was 12 years old and her right knee had been painful for a long time – she wasn’t sure how long but it seemed like years. It was preventing her from playing sport, or running, and even day to day activities with her friends were constantly disturbed by her knee pain. Within the context of overall treatment, it was immediately obvious that the imbalance was coming very specifically from the knee itself, but neither she nor her father could remember any injury that might have caused the problem. Since it was evidently appropriate, I included Fascial Unwinding of the knee in the treatment, and as the knee found its own way to a point of release, Arabella suddenly had a vivid memory of an incident a few years earlier when she had been sitting on the side of a boat with her legs dangling down the side, and the boat had moved up against the quayside, squashing her right knee. It hadn’t seemed like a significant injury at the time and it had been several years ago, but that injury had been lodged in her knee ever since, disturbing its fluent function and gradually causing increasing strain on the surrounding tissues. With the release through Fascial Unwinding, her knee recovered instantly and no further treatment was needed.

Anne:

Anne had been suffering from persistent pains in her right arm for more than two years. She had no idea what might have caused it and couldn’t remember any injuries or accidents. Various medical tests revealed nothing and several weeks of physiotherapy had not helped. She had lived with it for months, but was finding it increasingly limiting and frustrating.

As I engaged with her cranio-sacral system and initiated the process of Facial Unwinding, her arm seemed to have a mind of its own. It started to twist slowly and to pull back, further and further, far beyond what one might have expected to be comfortable (but with no discomfort) until it was fully stretched behind her back into an extremely twisted position (still with no discomfort). At this point, her arm came to a standstill, the movements in the arm settled into stillness, rhythmic motion reached a still point – and after a few seconds, there was a powerful sense of release and softening. As the arm released, Anne suddenly remembered an incident 3 years earlier when she had been taking her dog for a walk. The dog had seen a cat going in the opposite direction and had taken off at high speed in the direction of the cat, dragging Anne’s arm with it. The forces imposed upon Anne’s arm and the patterns of tension set up by the sudden pulling had been held into the tissues ever since, gradually becoming more and more consolidated. Allowing the arm to find its way back to that original position of injury enabled the release of those forces, and as so often happens in Fascial Unwinding, as the tissues released, a vivid memory of the incident came to mind. Anne’s symptoms disappeared immediately.

Cynthia:  

Cynthia was 82 years old and not very mobile. She was bent over, using walking sticks, and shuffling along somewhat uncomfortably. Her weekly physiotherapy sessions seemed to have done all they could. She had been receiving acupuncture for some time, and she just wondered if Cranio-Sacral Therapy might possibly help at all.

There was a considerable accumulation of tightness throughout her body (82 years worth), and there was plenty to do in terms of treatment, but her hips were the main source of restriction that were preventing her from walking freely. I treated her once a week and within the context of overall treatment, included some Fascial Unwinding of the hips. I started very carefully, just a little bit of brief very gentle unwinding, to see how she would respond, and not wanting to disturb years of accumulated compensations and adaptations too suddenly. She responded well. Within a few weeks she was standing upright, had abandoned her sticks and was walking freely and confidently. As we continued the treatments, she commented one day during the hip unwinding, as her left foot floated past her face “I think I might take up ballet dancing”.

Harry:

Harry was a carpenter. At least he had been a carpenter. He was only in his early forties, but he was no longer able to work because his shoulders and arms had seized up so badly that he could hardly move them and certainly couldn’t do his job as a carpenter. He had no explanation for his predicament; it had just gradually developed over the years, steadily becoming worse and worse. Of course he had been to the doctor and had had extensive physiotherapy and osteopathy, but his shoulders and arms simply continued to seize up tighter and tighter. They were certainly very restricted. It was difficult to get any movement out of them, especially the right shoulder.

Within the context of overall treatment, I worked particularly with Fascial Unwinding on his right arm and shoulder. Progress was slow. For the first few sessions, there was only a slight increase in mobility, but Harry felt that there was at least some progress. During the sixth session, we were working as usual on unwinding his arm; as usual there was very little movement, but at least there was a little more each session. We reached a still point, and as so often with Harry the still point lasted a long time. Suddenly he felt a sharp pain and at the same time he announced: “I’ve just remembered something very strange. When I was 16, I was an apprentice carpenter, and me and the lads were working on this old house, cutting out rafters from the roof. We had to saw through these thick wooden beams above our heads and it was tough. My shoulder got really painful, but of course I didn’t want to look feeble in front of my mates, so I had to keep sawing. I’ve just felt that very same pain again in my shoulder. It’s really weird. I haven’t thought about that for years.”

Harry hadn’t wanted to look weak in front of his mates. He had suppressed the pain in order to carry on working. He had suppressed the pain by tightening up the surrounding muscles and he had been doing that ever since, building up layer upon layer of tension to prevent the old injury from rising to the surface, until his shoulder was so tense that he could hardly move it.

 As we gradually unwound the layers of tension that had accumulated over the years, we eventually uncovered the original injury. At that point he re-experienced the pain of the injury, and simultaneously experienced a vivid memory of the incident – something he hadn’t thought about for almost 30 years - as the tissue memory was released. As that happened, there was a profound release in his shoulder; the tissues softened and his whole shoulder and arm became vastly more mobile. The pain passed fairly quickly and Harry was pleased with the new found mobility in his shoulder and arm. He needed a few more treatments, but soon he was back at work, able to do his job as a carpenter again after years of feeling that he would never work again.

Ralph:

Ralph was 67 years old and had been suffering from a headache for over 10 years - not headaches, but one continuous headache. He was otherwise healthy and there was no apparent cause for this persistent and debilitating pain.

 Naturally, during all these years he had undergone many medical investigations including X-rays, scans and everything else. He had tried many different treatments. Nothing was relieving his headache, nothing was touching it at all. He had been asked many times to go through his whole history and he couldn’t identify anything that might have caused or contributed towards his headache.

 When I tuned it at his head, there was an evident pattern drawing his head and neck down into his body and twisting to the right. As the fascia of his neck started to unwind, I allowed this pull to develop; it drew down very strongly; it was very forceful, an exceptionally strong pull drawing deeper and deeper down into the right side of the body. I followed into that pull as far as it wanted to go, which was very deep and very intense over several minutes – checking with Ralph that he was comfortable despite the apparent intensity of the compression. Finally, we reached a point of release at which the whole neck and head suddenly freed up, unwound and let go. Exactly at that moment, Ralph suddenly exclaimed “Of course I was blown up in the war!”.

 As we reached the fulcrum of his fascial pattern, he had suddenly experienced a vivid memory. Thrown by a nearby bomb, he had been blown right up into the air, crashing down on his head. This was during the Second World War, when he was 19. The headache had started when he was in his 50s. No wonder he hadn’t identified any correlation – until now. The vivid memory, just at the point of stillness within that compressive pattern clearly demonstrated the relationship; and this was confirmed by the dramatic release in the tissues of his head, neck and shoulder and the immediate improvement in his headache, which was substantially eased by the first treatment and gone within a few further treatments, for the first time in over ten years.

Deirdre:

Deirdre had broken her arm two years earlier. The fracture had healed, but she had been left with persistent pain in the forearm and wrist. This was particularly evident whenever she tried to write, at which point the pain would increase rapidly and spread up through her arm into her shoulder, neck and upper back, leaving her feeling tense, uncomfortable and unable to think clearly. She tried to avoid writing, but this was obviously very difficult within the demands of everyday life. She had received various treatments, including Cranio-Sacral Therapy addressing the core but not including Fascial Unwinding. Nothing had helped.

 As her arm started to unwind, it performed the usual dance, finding its way to the position in which it had been injured. As it reached that point of stillness, Deirdre felt a powerful surge of energy, like a powerful wave surging through the very core of her body and every part of her body; she began to feel very hot; she became very conscious of her diaphragm and started breathing very forcefully; her whole body started to pull into a twisted contorted position, shaking visibly.

 The Fascial Unwinding process had connected with the shock imposed at the time of the original injury and held into her system ever since. As the trauma released, everything settled down. Deirdre felt weak and shaky and warm for a while, but she also felt very loose and felt a huge sense of relief. The quality of her whole body had changed, her face had changed; she felt relaxed and comfortable. The pain in her arm gradually disappeared over the next few days and she was able to write again without any discomfort.

Louise:

Louise was a medical secretary and she suffered from a variety of symptoms. She had lower back pain, upper back pain, neck pain, headaches. When the back pain became uncomfortable it affected her digestion and her neck and shoulders became tight. None of her symptoms were severe, but they were a constant discomfort and, most frustratingly, they had been troubling her for many years. She had received regular Osteopathic treatment for years and substantial Cranial Osteopathy and Cranio-Sacral Therapy. This treatment usually made her feel better temporarily, but the symptoms would always return.

When I tuned in to her system, I was immediately drawn to her right ankle. Restrictions in her ankle were exerting fascial pulls that were drawing her pelvis out of alignment, creating a series of imbalances up through her spine, leading to strain and pain at various points, mostly involving the standard mechanical pivots in the spine and especially affecting the Thoraco-Lumbar junction (T12/L1 vertebral level) disturbing her digestion, and the Cervico-Thoracic junction (C7/T1 vertebral level) with repercussions on her neck and shoulders.

She hadn’t mentioned her ankle, so I asked her about it and she replied that she had sprained her ankle about 15 years ago but it was so long ago that she didn’t think it was worth mentioning; and it didn’t trouble her – as long as she didn’t run.......or play sport....... or dance..........or go for long walks, which she used to love to do before her ankle injury. It seemed that her whole life had been changed by this ankle injury, but she had simply got used to the limitations, adapted her life and accepted that she would never be able to do any of these things that she loved doing.

The extensive treatment that she had received brought her body back into alignment and felt better for a while, but it wasn’t addressing the source of the imbalance, so these fascial pulls from the ankle kept re-instating the imbalance along with the various associated symptoms. No one had treated her ankle. No one had done any Fascial Unwinding.

Ten minutes of Fascial Unwinding on her ankle released the restriction. The Fascia was no longer pulling her pelvis out of alignment. Her body could settle into a balanced comfortable state again – and stay there. She felt the difference immediately, throughout her whole body. Louise didn’t need any further treatment, but she came back from time to time for an occasional check up, very pleased at being able to dance again and to resume her treasured long walks and all the other activities that her ankle and body were now able to carry out without any discomfort or adverse repercussions.

George:

George had a persistent pain in his left shoulder and arm, a sharp pain in the front of the shoulder which hit him every time he lifted his arm beyond a certain range. It had been with him for years since an injury while sailing. He had received substantial treatment of various kinds, but the pain persisted and he had become resigned to just living with the pain and the restriction that it imposed on his life. Within the context of overall treatment, as I took up his arm, it was very willing to unwind, but as we reached a certain point, George felt the pain and tightened up, preventing the unwinding process from proceeding. Easing off very slightly to the point where the pain was just barely noticeable, I asked George to take a deep breath and let go. As he did so the pain eased, and the arm moved a little further into its chosen direction. Again the pain arose and George tightened up; again I encouraged George to breathe and let go. Again the pain eased and the unwinding proceeded a little further. By now George was getting the idea; each time as the pain arose, we waited at the edge of the pain, George relaxed into the pain, the pain eased, the tissues softened and the unwinding progressed further. In this way the unwinding process was able to proceed gradually but steadily and George’s arm reached positions it had not encountered in many years - and without any pain. His pain was soon resolved and George commented that this concept of relaxing into the pain using his breathing had undoubtedly been the factor that had enabled the release of his shoulder which had been unresponsive to so many other approaches.