Achy Back Basic Pain Solution

Painful achy upper back pain got you down? I’m going to break down why it happens and what the fix is for it. I find when I tell people that I’m a massage/restorative therapist their first reaction is to grab their lower back and tell me how they need help with it or that they hold a lot of tension in the upper back. They are not alone, so many people hold achiness in their upper back. It’s just there…and I’ll tell you why.

Try visualizing it like this; the way a muscle works is it intertwines, opening and closing like a door and while there are certain muscles that just contract, there are certain muscles that open. Now, depending on where the muscle tissue lies from anterior to posterior, your body is going to tell you two different things; one will be more prone to open and one is going to be prone to close. In short, I always tell people that the anterior side of your body is overused, therefore a common action for the muscle is to contract. Your anterior muscles are always going to contract along with your anterior side. Their dominant action is to keep you closed and also to protect your vital organs. The more the muscles contract, the more the muscles in your back open.

When a muscle contracts, it’s just like a closed door and not much blood flow goes through it. On the other hand, when a muscle opens it gives toxins the room to start flowing through and that’s when the muscle starts communicating to you that it’s in pain and needs help. If you can keep the muscle tissue moving it will communicate clearly. If it is ‘open’ all the time, it’s going to be mad and that’s why there’s constant pain.

Let’s take the concept of sitting at your computer. As you sit there and start getting into your work, you start rolling your shoulders forward as well as bending your body forward. Performing in this position starts opening your back and consequently muscle tissues start to open and that is the reason why you have an achy back. You have to start developing proper posture and straighten up. Looking at the bigger picture, however, you have to get the opposite muscles to stop doing what they’re doing or you’re you will end up with the same result. Unless you get your anterior side to open, you’re never going to get your posterior side to stop screaming at you.

The easiest way to apply this is to start to understand the posterior side of your body, there are many parts to it, but let’s focus on your traps since those are the easiest to work with. The natural job of the traps is to pull you in and in doing so the muscle is contracting. As this happens, the ‘doors’ are closing when it pulls in. So as you sit up straight, adjusting your posture and open up your chest, your back feels better because you’ve closed the ‘door’; the tissues have closed up and the toxins are not running through.

Oppositely, on your anterior side, we have the pectoralis muscle, pec minor, specifically. Your pec minor rolls you forward on an internal structural level, it’s not just a slight roll, it can actually rotate how your scapula moves and holds you there. People who consistently have tight, rolled shoulders…this is your culprit. This one muscle will rearrange everything how the upper back truly functions and speaks to you. You can do pec stretches all day long, but if you’re only hitting the top layer, your pec major, you’re always going to be stuck here. Your shoulders will roll back, but you’ll have that winged scapula. That will be your indicator that your pec minor is still stuck, but your pec major is open. Once you start realizing the basic concept of, if something on the front of your body kicks in and you don’t get the back of the body to kick in as well and balance it up; because your back is open and the pec is so much stronger, it’s always going to strain.

Take Away:

        The basic concept is, if you have an achy upper back, if you don’t get the pec to open up you’re never going to get the muscle tissue to actually close; resulting in you always being rolled forward. Even if we get the pecs to open you’ll have a winged scapula, where your shoulder blade is protruding from your back. The goal is to get everything to open up, allowing your chest to be nice and big and wide. Once you get that to occur your upper back achiness will just go away all on its own because it has a chance to balance out the way you stand, furthermore, the tissues now have a reason to close as well as open.