What is a muscle spasm?
What can you do if you get one? How can you stop them becoming regular?
Muscle spasms usually occur in the lumbar region of your back, or in your neck and shoulders –
often the upper trapezius muscle. Spasms can be very painful, stopping you from moving. They are
your body’s way of protecting you from harm or perceived harm.
As such, they can be helpful for short periods of time. They are certainly not helpful when they carry
on beyond the event that caused them.
They can be triggered by very small events, which seem out of proportion to the pain of the spasm.
But these events usually come on top of pre-existing niggles or weaknesses. If you experience a
sudden spasm, have you perhaps felt warning signs in the past and ignored them?
They are often associated with times of stress: we have found that pretty much everyone who
presents with muscle spasms is experiencing a degree of stress in their lives.
Now, our bodies are creatures of habit, and so these spasms can become learnt behaviours, luring us
into a cycle of regular spasms, which can be difficult to break.
Trying to override this inclination can take a lot of willpower – or “mind over matter.”
Understanding, avoidance, treatment
How we can help is threefold: we can help you to understand why the muscle spasm has occurred,
give you a strategy to minimise the chances of it occurring in the future, and teach you simple
exercises to practise if it does.
There are various ways of treating spasms, including relaxation techniques, stretching, heat and
acupuncture. Working on another part of the body can often cause you to let go of the spasm,
because your body cannot tense the muscles in two different areas of the body simultaneously.
Our treatments can work very quickly indeed, or certainly within 48 hours, to give you relief from
your spasms. And you can go away from the clinic with, as we say, a better understanding of what is
causing your spasms, techniques to help you avoid them, and a treatment plan if they do recur.
As always, if you have any questions about this subject, please do contact us or speak to your
regular Grosvenor team member
