Frozen Shoulder Alternative Treatments with Yoga and Trigger Point Therapy

Read my disclaimer and terms of use.     

Overview

I come from a family with four generations of frozen shoulders. My maternal grandmother used to say she had a "bum arm". She was unable to lift her arm over her head or bend over to clean her floors. When I was a little girl I remember that my grandmother's right arm and shoulder were so immobile that she used to clean her floors by attaching a rag to one of her feet and then sliding her foot around to wipe the floor. Interestingly, another relative was diagnosed with bursitis, but the net effect was that she, too, was unable to lift her arm over her head just like my grandmother.

As I aged I noticed that my shoulder started to freeze up as well. I almost ended up like my grandmother. At one time I reached the point where my shoulder was so immobile that I could not even lift my right arm up enough to use a hair dryer. My younger son has also developed the same problem when he was in first grade. Technically, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, thoracic outlet syndrome and scoliosis, and my son was diagnosed with a pulled trapezious muscle. But the underlying root cause was that my son and I were the third and fourth generations of a family that had a genetic predisposition to have tight connective tissue, resulting in scoliosis and a frozen shoulder on the lowered shoulder side of the spinal curve.

Fortunately for my son and myself, we were able to fully regain use of our shoulders and arms through trigger point therapy and yoga. The rest of this section will outline the treatment tips and exercises that helped us. I think about my grandmother a lot these days, and how unfortunate it is that she never knew how with a little daily self massage therapy and yoga she might have been less disabled. My grandmother died before I figured out how to help my son and myself, so it's too late for me to pass along any information to her. But perhaps some of you reading these pages may be able to use the treatment ideas below.

Recommended Books:

Structural Yoga Therapy: Adapting to the Individual by Mukunda Stiles

Frozen Shoulder Treatment Tips

1. An important point to note in selecting a treatment plan for your frozen shoulder is that even though your shoulder may be frozen, it doesn't necessarily mean that the source of your problem is in your shoulder. Your shoulder may be the result of tight muscles somewhere else in your body pulling on your shoulder and "freezing" it into place. In my case, my son's and (I suspect) my grandmother's, we all had scoliosis (spinal curvature) which caused us to have uneven shoulders. Our lower shoulder on the concave side of our curves is the shoulder that would freeze up.

My son has not had TMJ, but he has had the same neck pain problems, mild scoliosis and plugged ears that I have had in the past. In his case he seems to have tight muscles and trigger points in his thighs, but the resulting problems are similar to mine. It took reading a lot of books on yoga and body alignment and many months of searching for a knowledgeable physical therapist to help me figure all of this out. Most PTs simply do not understand that the part of your body that hurts the most may not be the actual source of your pain. (For a diagram of how tight muscles in other parts of my body caused my frozen shoulder, click here.)

(For more information on how we corrected all of these problems and how they interrelated with frozen shoulders, see my respective pages on TMJ (temporomandibular joint disorder), a common condition in people with fibromyalgia, scoliosis exercises, and chronic neck pain.)

Most of the physical therapists I saw for my shoulder pain only had me do shoulder exercises. In hindsight, this was a short sighted and simplistic treatment methodology. My shoulder was already tight from being pulled down by tight muscles in my leg and higher shoulder, and yanking on my lower shoulder just either made the pain worse, or at best, shifted the tension point somewhere else in my body. Only yoga and trigger point therapy really worked to free up my shoulder permanently and eliminate my chronic pain in my shoulder and elsewhere in my body.

Related Pages in My Site -

Shoulder popping

Fibromyalgia Diet

Fibromyalgia Treatment

Neck Pain - AlternativeTreatments

Frozen Shoulders and Diabetes - is magnesium deficiency a common link?

Winged scapula (shoulder blades that stick out funny).

TMJ - alternative therapies

Scoliosis Exercises

Scoliosis Exercises - Part II

Popping Jaws and Creaky Knees

Disclaimer: Statements and information regarding any products mentioned within this site have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration and are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease or health condition. Any information on this site should be considered as general information only and should not be used to diagnose or treat any health condition.

See your health care provider for a diagnosis and treatment of any medical concerns you may have, and before implementing any diet, supplement, exercise or other lifestyle changes. This site may contain errors.   Use it at your own risk.  Read the rest of our disclaimer and terms of use.

Copyright 1999 - 2008 Pine Canyon Media, LLC. All rights reserved.