Treatment for Conditions and Injuries
You will often hear people say Rolfing® has helped them find relief when nothing else has. So, it may come as a surprise to learn the main focus of Rolfing is actually whole body structural integration and functional efficiency, as opposed to symptom relief. This key distinguishing feature of Rolfing from medicine and many other body-based approaches is what makes the Rolfing method so powerful: In the process of balancing the whole body many symptoms and conditions improve. Nevertheless, it is usually an unresolved chronic symptom or condition that first brings most people to give Rolfing a try.
Click on an item in the list below to learn how Rolfing approaches these common conditions.
Muscle and Joint Stiffness
Strain in the connective tissue membranes (fascia) that surround and penetrate muscles is what restricts and limits fluid movement.
Rolfing restores flexibility and fluidity to the whole body by releasing and reorganizing the body’s fascial layers.
Headaches
When headaches are due to muscle imbalance and strain Rolfing can sometimes reduce or eliminate the pain. If you suffer from headaches contact Rolfing®Works to discuss your condition.
Neck and Shoulder Pain
Similar to sagging roof structures on buildings, neck and shoulder pain often lingers because support from body structure below is lacking.
Rolfing not only relieves local strain in the head, neck and shoulders, it also helps to sustain it by improving support from the ground up.
With Rolfing your head neck and shoulders balance on top with less strain.
Low Back Pain
Even in a healthy spine compressional forces in the lower region are huge. When these forces are not balanced strain and related injuries can develop. Compensatory patterns soon develop in the feet, knees, legs, hips and even further up the spine.
When working with back problems Rolfing is able to decipher the particular problems of the low back and balance them with the rest of the body so the lower spine can balance with less strain.
Injury and Surgery Rehabilitation
During the months and years after healing from an injury or surgery the body creates compensations that contort the balance of the connective tissue web. In the long run these contortions can interfere with comfort, balanced posture and fluid movement. Rolfing helps prevent tissue strains after injuries or surgery, correct contortions and compensations, and helps the body feel whole again.
Time and exercise are not adequate to fully recover and rehabilitate from injury, accidents, and surgery.
If you feel that you have not completely healed from the an injury, accident or surgery, contact Rolfing®Works today to discuss how Rolfing can help you reclaim your natural balance and movement.
Repetitive Motion Injuries
When repetitive movements become ingrained in your body they are difficult to release and unwind without help. Whether repetitive strain happens as a part of work or recreation, Rolfing can help you untangle the pattern and learn options to prevent it from recurring.
Rolfing works with all types of repetitive motion strain by re-balancing and aligning the whole body structure to restore fluid and efficient movement. During your Rolfing sessions you will learn ways to address the movement aspects of your activities so you can remain balanced.
Much of today’s work at computers puts people at risk. Long periods of time spent in front of the computer make it easy to forget or lose touch with our bodies.
Another form of repetitive motion problems come from exercise which can create well-worn movement pathways that become shortened with repetition. During the months and years after healing from an injury or surgery the body creates compensations that distort the balance of the connective tissue web.
In the long run these distortions can interfere with comfort,balanced posture and fluid movement. Balancing the tissue strains that develop after injury and surgery prevents the development of compensations and helps the body feel whole again.
Aging
Don’t be resigned to the decline!
As we age, health and quality of life are largely dependent on how easily we are able to move and do the things we enjoy. Our experience of aging is partly defined by a reduction in our balancing ability, our range of motion, and our ease of fluid movement.
Because Rolfing helps restore suppleness, balance and fluid movement, it is one of the most effective therapeutic manipulation methods available for aging. It creates balance through alignment and ease of movement in stiff joints.
Simply put, Rolfing is one of the most effective kinds of help you can get to maintain your physical, mental and spiritual vitality. You don’t need to be in trouble to benefit from Rolfing.
After Rolfing a retired engineer, who had never even had a massage, said,
“I used to feel OK, but now I feel better!”
Postural Problems
Most people believe their posture is not good. At Rolfing®Works we help you to understand and implement the principles of effortless upright posture. By gently releasing and realigning the body balanced posture emerges. Throughout the process of Rolfing you increase your understanding of your body structure and how live comfortably in it.
Foot, Knee, and Hip problems
These three joint areas of the body function together. When one area is problematic, the other areas have to adapt. Rolfing treats the segments of the leg as one functional unit by balancing the interrelated strains of the foot, knee and hip.
Sprains
Soon after sprains the body shifts its balance to compensate for the injured body part. Long after the acute injury heals balance and movement remain affected. Rolfing minimizes the compensations, restores balance and improves motion.
Tendonitis
Tendons are a seamless end portion of muscle that connects to bone. Often irritation develops through overuse or distortions in body balance and alignment. When the body is realigned with Rolfing the strain on tendons is relieved allowing irritation to fade away.
Arthritis:
For the past ten years I’ve spent quite a bit of effort dealing with symptoms caused by a thyroid immune system problem and food allergies.
Among other symptoms, I’ve experienced joint aches and reduced range of motion. Naturopathic and Ayurvedic medicine have improved my overall health tremendously, but I found Rolfing to be the most effective treatment for the build-up of arthritis from over the years.
Russell is very knowledgeable and intuitive. Many of my sessions with him involved working on something that I had no idea was contributing to the overall problem. The improvements were gradual but permanent. It was fascinating and wonderful to experience the improvements in my body during the time period that Russell was treating me. Yoga workouts provided an excellent marker of my renewed abilities.
It’s now been a few years since those initial rolfing sessions and it’s hard to remember how limiting my arthritis was.”
Injury Rehab:
“During a serious fall in 2000 I broke many bones and severed the right peroneal nerve. During rehab my physical therapist suggested Rolfing, and worked with me and my Rolfer to ensure that our rehab work maintained my lower extremity’s symmetry.
I have found my Rolfing sessions to be an invaluable support to my physical therapy program. I am certain that I would not have made this restoration to normalcy without Rolfing.”