Table of Contents
Typical symptoms
When you suffer from muscle aches, you sometimes hear people mentioning nerves being crossed, but the nerves in fact cannot overlap. What often happens, on the other hand, happens at the muscle level and let’s see what it is. When the muscle contracts excessively, it is stiff and the fabric slightly swollen. Contracture occurs involuntarily and insistently and occurs when the muscle is asked for too much. When the effort is excessive, the contracture is a real signal, something that tells us to slow down or stop. We feel that part of the muscle district is being pulled in a significant way and it happens as a small “jolt”, a strong stimulus that slows us down.
Contracture manifests itself with a ache constant and sometimes pulsating, which passes for a sharp moment and then varies. The muscle in all respects stiffens, although there are no real injuries to the muscle fibers, which instead happens when one does tore up (and even with the naked eye you can see a real groove inside the muscle). In case of stretching what is felt unexpectedly passes through an acute phase of variable pain that in some cases becomes duller in the medium term but prolonged.
Causes
In effect, the muscle is making a request to vary movement, slow it down or make it less heavy when a major contracture occurs. The request also reports a lack of oxygen, nutrients, blood. When a muscle contracts it is essentially telling us that it is running low and that the effort has exceeded the physical limit possible. Usually the condition of contracture has gods among its common causes sudden and violent movements or the management of a load of excessive weight or the occurrence of repeated stresses with non-existent recovery times.
It also happens very often that the contracture is due to one lack of heating or in the distracted and casual management of this absolutely important phase. Without warm-up the muscle does not get adequate oxygen and at the first excessive effort, it contracts too much. Even the presence of evident postural imbalances that are not re-educated and balanced leads to poor management of movements and increases the risk of contractures: for this reason it remains essential to know your body, to know how to vary the exercise in respect of the misalignments or how to regulate with foot support or spinal paramorphisms. Ultimately, contractures often occur when they are there metabolic pathologies which alter the value of nutrients in the blood, as in the case of diabetes. Even in the case of diseases affecting the cardiovascular system we find a higher incidence.
Remedies
Identifying the contracture and not confusing it, for example, with a tear or a sprain, becomes very important to know how to act. The contracture it must be treated with heat and not with ice or instant cold ice. Usually the contracture affects specific areas of the body that can affect the leg area (twin muscles and soleus muscle or hamstring muscle), the thigh (sartorius muscle and adductor muscles), the neck area (trapezius muscle) or finally of the back (lumbar and dorsal muscles). The practice, whatever it may be, must be suspended immediately. Then we must go towards active functional stretching, going to lengthen the muscles in an important way. Theaerobic activity, to increase blood supply.
In addition to hot packs, you could choose mud or self-heating thermal wraps, which come to loosen the muscle fibers. If you really want to apply ice, you must do it just after you feel the acute pain. Breathing and muscle relaxation also help rehabilitation; Believe it or not, meditation, getting the mind inside the body, is for healing. Also excellent are the phytotherapeutic products based on devil’s claw or arnica. Even with nutrition you act effectively: drink enough water, replenish with omega 3 (fish for example), antioxidants (vitamins, minerals, polyphenols, etc.), avoiding all foods that create inflammation such as those loaded with sugars and flour or gluten.
At the level of treatments, excellent i decontracting massages, massage therapy that relaxes the tissues, especially the deep muscle groups. Kinesio taping is also excellent, adhesive bandages put on traction that work on the fabric. Sometimes the physiotherapy technique of tecar therapy is also used, where a condenser acts on the affected area. Another technique used, Tens (subcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) which is carried out through electroconductive plates that send electrical impulses. Laser therapy, on the other hand, uses lasers to increase metabolic activity, vasodilation and drainage of liquids. Also there magnetotherapy and ultrasound has a positive effect on muscle mass.
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