Elbow Pain

by Patrick LeRouge | May 22, 2014 | video tips

Hi, everybody. Patrick Lerouge here, from Evolve Restorative Therapy.  You can find me at livepainfreeprocess.com.  I help people who need to live an active life, eliminate pain for the long-term, and enhance their performance, folks.  So, this week’s weekly tip is all about elbow pain.
Elbow pain is all over the place and it happens a lot.  You might hear a lot of doctors talk about golfer’s elbow as well as tennis elbow.  I’m not going to be referring to where they reside. I’m going to show you one muscle tissue that actually plays a role in both of those.  And as you guessed it, it’s all about tricep.

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Tricep plays a major role in the hinge joint that we call the elbow. Pain in the outside of the elbow and inside the elbow can refer to the heads inside of the tricep. The tricep – three, tri, three — tricep has three heads. Two that are attached to the top part, one attached down low. What a lot of people don’t realize after they know that, is the tricep actually has two layers of muscle tissue. One in the upper head that has two heads at top and one that lies underneath that altogether. The two points that we’re going to focus on is all about the lower end of the tricep and underneath the tricep itself. You can see the point on the outside of your head of your tricep, so if you make a tricep muscle with your hands out straight, the head that reaches to the outside of your elbow will refer pain on the outside of your forearm by your elbow.
The next point that you’re going to focus on is right smack in the middle right above your elbow itself. That point refers pain to the inside of the elbow. It’s the layers that are underneath that tricep area. As you make this tricep muscle, it’s the areas that run close to the elbow. Not the hard bony part of elbow, right above that hardy bony part that you want to start focusing on, especially when we’re looking at the aspect of trigger point work. But, as you know in Restorative Therapy, we’re talking about doing something in a functional pattern, in a functional way, let’s say. You want it to get it to start learning how to move. So you want to get it to foam roll first. You want to foam roll those areas. Then you want to trigger point that area with a hand ball of some sort. Then you want to stretch the area. But you have to remember, everything needs to run in the pathway that it’s supposed to learn how to do.
If you keep that up, folks, your elbow pain will start to diminish more and more because now it’s actually not being twinged and tweaked as you move this hinge joint that’s only supposed to do this motion.  It’s only supposed to open and close, open and close. But once we start doing things in this manner, that’s when you start– in an outside manner and not a straight manner, let’s put it that way. It starts to grind at that elbow joint and then your tricep. Mainly for this videotape, your tricep is going to be the one that’s going to be giving you a lot of the headaches.
So clean those up and I guarantee you your elbow pain will start to diminish quicker than you know it. And folks, if you know somebody that needs to live an active life, share this, share this, share this. I appreciate it and I guarantee you they will appreciate it. If you guys are not on the list already, that’s not getting this in your inbox every Thursday, please sign up. I’ll be right there so you don’t have to search me out. Until next time, folks, bye.

Video Tip On Neck Pain

by Patrick LeRouge | May 8, 2014 | video tips

What’s up everybody? Patrick LeRouge here, from Evolve Restorative Therapy. You can find me at livepainfreeprocess.com. Folks, I help people that need to live an active life, eliminate pain for the long term and enhance their performance. Today what we’re going to be talking about is neck pain a levator scapula issue. So, a common mistake that a lot of people think is neck pain is only a bony issue. There’s many things that go wrong. Now, we’re going to take it even deeper; a deeper look into it. We’re going to look at one muscle that actually helps with non-moving neck muscles. Levator scapulae is a muscle that runs in the back part of your head and neck, that runs slightly on an angle. Massage therapists are known to be working with this a lot because it’s so easily accessible. But I’m going to show you one area that a lot of people make their mistake at. This is not a knock on them, we’re just trying to make you that much better by looking at it a little bit deeper. Within the levator scapulae, a lot of people have this knot that runs right through here. It attaches through here to here and it shrugs your shoulder up, that’s the main job of it. So right here becomes at here and it causes more tissue to form this. It’s a big lump that happens here.

 
A lot of therapist just do cross-fiber friction there and it starts to break it up, but let’s take it a little deeper. Let’s take it one step further. Why is it there in the first place? It’s because that muscle tissue’s trying really hard to uphold. We have some last issues that need to be addressed. We have some movement and new issues inside the shoulder. All those things are true, but what we need to realize is here is not the true problem within this muscle. It actually is the binding that’s happening within this twist. Levator actually has a slight twist in it that you have to focus on.
So if you have trouble moving your neck, and you find this muscle tissue actually adhered, tight, painful, tender – and it normally is because it does so much work – don’t go after the big knot that’s there. Go slightly high, right smack in the middle, and you’re going to have to find that twist, and get that twist to start learning how to move slightly better. You’re going to confuse – this is a common thing – you’re going to confuse the twist of levator with your erector muscle, which is a muscle that runs long-wise. All you have to do is get them to separate and start learning to move individually. If you do that, your neck pain is that much better on the opposite side of pain. So it’s going to start moving more. It doesn’t mean you’re going to completely get out of pain. The majority of the time it does work where it stops the pain almost instantly, but it will subside. It will start to get it to come down, all because you’re going to start getting it to move.
Now, this is a common mistake as well. When we’re starting to work with the neck that doesn’t want to move, we’ll hit this point and think we’re going to get it really far. We’re talking about extra movement just a smidgen. And as you start to look left and right and get it to move more and more, this will start the process to move more and more. It’ll get your shoulders to drop a little bit more. So doing shoulder shrugs in this manner will start to get easier, which would then get more movement in the neck. It’s all about incremental movements, folks.
So if you can’t move your neck very well, this is one muscle tissue that actually works with you. It works with you, but it binds and you have to work with it ever so slightly. Get it to move ever so slightly. Shoulder shrug, move it throughout the day, not a couple of minutes. Get it to learn how to move all over again, and your neck pain will start to subside relatively quickly within that day, as long as you follow your body’s terms.
So, don’t go after the big knot at the shoulder. Go after the twist inside the levator and you’ll see a dramatic change in how fast things will go, how much your shoulders drop. The density within your traps will start to subside as well. That’s the tip for this week folks. If you know anybody that needs to live this active life, send them my way to ask questions, folks. I love answering these questions that you guys are giving me. I’ll answer them, video format. Show you exactly one thing that you can do to make it better. Until next time, see you later. Bye.

Lymphatic system for pain relief

by Patrick LeRouge | May 1, 2014 | video tips

What’s up, folks? Patrick Lerouge here with Evolve Restorative Therapy. You can find me at livepainfreeprocess.com where I’m going to help you communicate with your body physically, mentally and emotionally to eliminate pain, folks. We have to get your body to start talking with you, and you understanding what it’s talking about.
Today we’re going to be talking about is all about the lymphatic system. You know how I go crazy over the systems, folks. This is a big system that a lot of people don’t really think about when they do all the things that they’re doing.
This lymphatic system is designed to get all the sludge out of your body. All the toxic waste that your body produces, it comes through this channel first before the rest of the ways of getting out. Your sweat, your pee, your poop, all that has to run through the lymphatic system, but what people don’t realize is the lymphatic system is really molasses-slow. So we have to understand that if we’re going to do these massive detoxes, and all this movement-based stuff that’s going to get muscle tissue to move and do all this, our lymphatic system is going to be taxed. And if our lymphatic system is not up to par, if you’re not hydrated enough, if you’re not doing and eating the right things that’s keeping the lymphatic system up to par, that’s going to be really sluggish on top of the sluggish nature that it is.

I hear everyone going through all these detoxes and all these things to make the body better, but they’re not realizing that they can only move as fast as the lymphatic system will allow it. So we have to take that under consideration. Our lymphatic system is something that moves with peristalsis, for instance. It works with the fibers of your muscle. So the better your muscle can contract – because where they’re situated – that’s how your body is going to eliminate the toxins inside the body. As you can see the lymphatic system is widespread throughout your body, from the top part of your head to your tippy, tippy toes, but there’s also pockets of highly dense lymph nodes.
When people get sick and they touch around their neck or your armpit, they go, “Yeah, you’re going through something because your lymph nodes are swollen.” But that swollen nature is showing you the first sign that it’s active, but if it stays swollen, something’s up folks, so we have to get you moving. That’s why whenever someone gets sick, I tell people you do not want to just stay sedentary for seven, eight days or however long it takes for you to get sick. You don’t want to do that because we need the muscles to contract to get the lymphatic system to work properly. We have to focus around how the head moves–head and neck movement, around the shoulders, around the hips, around the knees, around the ankles. That’s where you have highly dense pockets of lymph nodes. We have to get you to start learning how to move those things to get better.
Think whenever you’re doing a detox of any sort or starting to pick up your movements, your workout regimen, you have to cater to this. Now, this is where it gets tricky because they’re very, very easily bypassed because they’re so close between the muscle and the skin that you can bypass it really, really quick and really easy. The things that you need to do is all based off intention: get your body to communicate with the lymphatic system, not with your muscular system. If you are sick, try foam rolling, but not foam rolling for tension release–foam rolling for lymphatic drainage. So you have to learn how to process up. You have to process how the lymph system is working in getting access to that.
That’s a whole communication basis all on its own, so that’s something that we’ll talk about on a later day. But you have to understand that the lymphatic system runs all the way across the body, it’s very, very slow and we always bypass it. So we have to start getting you to realize a deeper picture of the lymphatic system. We have to get you to recognize, “if my lymphatic system is not working, I’m going to swell in certain places. I have to get those places to start learning how to move through.” Let’s take a deeper look into the lymphatic system.
Within the lymphatic systems, I already told you there’s those pockets everywhere of highly dense lymph nodes. We know all around the neck, around the armpit, throughout the arms at every joint. You want to think about it as within every joint, there’s going to be a pocket of lymph nodes because that’s going to pull whatever toxins is in that extremity into the body and disperse them throughout the core of your body.
Your hips are a big, big lymph node area. Armpits, neck. Right here [points] as you can see, inside your chest cavity itself, there’s a swell there because everything gets pushed into that, so your liver and your kidneys, all your detox organs could start doing the job they need to do. What you have to do is you have to stay very conscious and realize, “I want to detox. I want my body to get better, but my body can only get better if the systems around it are functional.”
So keep in mind how your systems are working. Lymphatic system, in general, for this week, but you have to start getting in the thought of looking at the world like that, your body as an intelligent system. You want to help your body. You want to start learning how to communicate with your body. That’s top-notch, but don’t over-stress your body because you want too much too fast. Okay?
Realize, it’s a slow-moving system, and when you are sick, one of the reasons why your body hurts is because your lymphatic system is swelling and it can’t hold that type of weight. No, it can’t do that. So we have to cater to that system, and whatever sickness you have will start to speed up because you’re getting it out, as long as you stay hydrated, eat the right foods and keep everything moving. It’s all about moving, baby.
All right, so see you next week. If you like this video, pass it along. If you’re not on my newsletter, please sign up. It’s on my home page of my website livepainfreeprocess.com.
And until next time, folks! Bye.

Importance Of Pumicing Your Feet

by Patrick LeRouge | Apr 10, 2014 | video tips

What’s up folks? Patrick Lerouge here from Evolve Restorative Therapy. You can find me at LivePainFreeProcess.com. I’m here to help you communicate with your body so you can eliminate pain physically, mentally and emotionally, folks. We have to get our body and our mind together so they start chatting, and that’s what we’re here about.

So we’re going to do a physical topic this week. Our physical topic is all about our first foundation: feet. Our feet are our first foundation to the world. That’s how our body knows what’s happening.

But a lot of people don’t understand that our feet are a proprioceptive device. That means it gets all its knowledge by feel; it’s a touch thing. And the fact that we have these sneakers that are thick – they have those thick soles, that don’t really move – that doesn’t do anything.

Your feet naturally fall asleep. So with your foot falling asleep all the time because we are always wearing shoes, because that’s our society; our foot never really talks and communicates with our body until two or three steps in to a movement. That’s when your body says, “Oh wait. We’re moving, lets do this.” It normally cranks at something else, being your lower back, your knee, your shoulder, anything like that. It’s going to try to pick you up at all cost, using whatever it has available to it, on the second or third step.

That’s why so many people say, “I hurt myself as I was getting up out of a chair.” This happens because your body didn’t say, “Oh wait. The foot’s moving. Something’s happening. let’s turn on this muscle, this muscle, this muscle.” It waited until its first step and you are already bent over, so what it had to do on that first step is say, “Oh my God I am falling forward. Let’s use whatever we have,” which is going to be your low back. That’s where it’s going to get cramped because your quads are going to work and, click, it goes through.

We need to get access to our feet, but yet still, we have to wear shoes.

How do we do that? You try to be barefoot as much as possible, utilize what’s going on inside the foot. We teach this in the program. One of our first foundations and the first steps that we’re going to be doing, is getting your feet to work.

But a trick that you can do to get your foot to become a little bit more sensitive, is use a pumice stone. There’s different types of pumice stones, there’s the lava rock for example. That’s the big brick, and that’s just really, really hard and it’ll start to get a lot of dead skin out of the way. The dead skin is there because your foot is trying to protect itself, because it is being pummeled all the time. We have to get you to learn how to get that thickness away, so your body can feel. By using a pumice stone, you can actually clean up a lot of that dead skin, and a lot of the– the miscommunication that happens there, is something that’s very ,very important to get rid of.

So, using a pumice stone — there are these rounded ones. There are these brick ones, like the lava stones. Either or, they all work; but I want you not to think of it as a beauty thing. I want you to think of it like this: “Oh, my feet need to talk some more. They need to feel the ground more. They need to feel through the sneaker, through the shoe, through the sandal. They need to learn how to feel again.”

Remember, I use those words very carefully right there. Your feet need to learn how to feel again, because they have been asleep for so long. You have to start waking them up by doing things muscular, as well as getting the skin to start talking with the ground. Feel what’s going on and then your body is going to start responding better and better.

After you pumice, your first step down out of the tub, you’re going to feel so much more of that tub, that shower. You’ll feel so much more and that’s what your body needs to know — “oh wait I’m moving” or “wait this is happening,” or “oh wait, my ankle’s at this angle; I need to turn on these muscles, so straighten out my ankle so I don’t roll, so I don’t break something.”

This is your first attempt at gaining access to the world. Remember that. Your foot is your first access to the world. You need to keep it somewhat active all the time, even though we wear shoes, sneakers, and things like that.

Then, try to get to a minimalist place. We’re not talking about the whole minimalism lifestyle now, but we are getting you to be aware of how thicker the shoes are now — these highly orthotic padded shoes! I saw a commercial for memory foam in your shoe. All memory foam is, is it just takes away the pressure. Your body needs that pressure. It needs that feedback or else it’s just going to roll. You’ll hear a lot of people rolling their ankles with the bigger shoes. That’s what just is.

If you like this video, please share it! And if you’re not on the newsletter, hey, sign up! It’s free, it’s easy. It’ll get dropped in your mailbox every week, and I’ll tell you something new about restoring your body and communicating with yourself.

Until next time folks. Bye.