UnderGround Forum >> Rolfing is some amazing stuff

triphelin -  You can't fix a mechanical problem like degenerative facets or even disc bulging with this. May as well have someone ROLF all over your face, it will be short lived.

Bucephalus -

triphelin -  You can't fix a mechanical problem like degenerative facets or even disc bulging with this. May as well have someone ROLF all over your face, it will be short lived.

Rolfing absolutely can help with bulging discs.

Muzalini - 

Bucephalus -

triphelin -  You can't fix a mechanical problem like degenerative facets or even disc bulging with this. May as well have someone ROLF all over your face, it will be short lived.

Rolfing absolutely can help with bulging discs.

What about facets? My discs are bad too but the majority of my pain is in the facets, I've had 2 rounds of numbing shots ( 6 each ) and I was relatively pain free for about 3-4 hours

Joe Rogan - 

Muzalini - 

Joe Rogan -

What's really amazing is how many BJJ guys I've talked to that have bulging discs.  Either that, or herniated ones.

It's really shocking.  I talked to Marcos DaMatta and he has 3 bulging or herniated ones, and Ricardo Liborio who REALLY freaked me out when he said he has 7 of them.  He still rolls, but he's apparently in constant pain because of it.

I have 3 bulging and my facet joints are nearly gone. How long before you saw improvement with the Rolfing?

2 weeks in I started feeling much looser and better.  I still haven't started rolling again, it's been months.  I'm going in for DRX9000 spinal decompression next week.  It's supposed to be very effective.  Lots of grapplers swear by it.  I'm taking this thing very seriously, and if I can't heal my back up it might be the end of Jiu Jitsu for me.

 

BJJER - I spoke with a guy Doctor who is thought to be one of the highest authorities on spine surgery and is a Brown Belt in BJJ to boot about bjj and back problems.

He said that in his opinion one of the major problems causing so many back issues in bjj people is that the sport is very "front concentrate." I asked him to define that and he said that if you take a long look at bjj you will notice that for the most part the front of the body is always closing and contracting. Over time the front of the body gets very short and the back of the body gets overly stretched out or "hyperflexible." That compounded with the fact that many bjj players seem to find a need to do EXTRA crunches and sit ups, in some instances heavyely included in warmups only makes things much much worse.

If you read McGills books such as "Ultimate Back Strength and performance" this will make very much sense. If you think of the back as a wire that only has a certain number of flexeion repetitions in it before it breaks you can see how BJJ will break your back quicker than other sports.

philipee32 - A Ha joe rogan is into rolfing too. That stuff is old already 70's. A good massage therapist aka me, will rape a rolfer any day of the week. Rolfing is like cross between massage therapy and chiropractic theroy except rolfing believes the whole body is stacked nd needs to aligned instead of just the spine and its really deep massage therapy. I think alota rolfers just get lucky and happen to realease the muscle cuz they hit everything, a lot of their work is based on stuff that isn't even possible, like manipulating the spine.

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

Joe Rogan - 

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

Joe Rogan - 

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

I wonder if we'll start to see this with mixed martial artists when they retire.  These guys are doing kickboxing and BJJ every day, have you spoken to any ex-fighter about muscular imbalances and the resulting pain?

Regardless, good luck on your recovery.

Joe Rogan -

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

Rip0ste - 

Joe Rogan -

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

I'm so sorry to hear you've got bulged discs, Joe...same I injury took me out I Jiu Jitsu...I miss it, but not the daily pain, and inability to sit, sleep etc...

I'm interested to hear that your Rolfing and decompression is helping...have you heard of or looked into the Regenexx procedure? Kind of like platelet rich prolotherapy with stem cells - helps rebuild the disc wall and restore height and strength.

That's actually the first time I've ever heard of regenexx and bulging discs.  I'm going to look into it now.

Thank you!

Joe Rogan - 

So for a bit of an update, I've started DRX9000 spinal decompression.  Today was the first day.

One of the things that's interesting is that I'm becoming aware of muscular imbalances that I have.  For one, the right side of my neck is thicker and stronger than the left.  The doctor was kind of freaked out about it and initially thought there was some kind of an injury, but turns out what it comes from is arm triangles.

The arm triangle is my go to move.  I have quite a few set ups for it, and I've got it down to where I can pull it off at a fairly high percentage rate amongst good people.  I occasionally get them isolating the left arm, but the vast majority I get on the right side.  I use my neck as a lever, and over the course of 16+ years of jiu jitsu the right side of my neck has become strong as fuck from pinning arms to people's faces.

The whole right side of my body is stronger from kick boxing too.  My lats are more developed on that side, and all that imbalance puts pressure on my spine.  I'm going to try to balance that all out with weights and yoga.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the progress I've been making.  I haven't been able to roll in months, but I'm not in pain, and I'm definitely seeing progress.  Plus I'm really excited to be getting the spinal decompression done now as well.

isn't that a trip...

keep us posted Joe, never tried decompression before.

octowussy - Decompression, statistically, does not work. It's existed for a long time, only chiropractors have started giving it fancy names and charging and arm and a leg for it. It also won't cure any imbalances.

The actual effect of muscular and structural imbalances is a hot topic in the medical community. The science says that they don't matter, though I don't know how I feel about that. Structualism, as a whole, doesn't have a fantastic reputation with the scientific community, but I think there's something there. I do believe that poor posture and even imbalances (to a degree) can contribute to muscle tension, which I believe is the antagonist in most chronic pain. But a lot of things can contribute to muscle tension, including stress (see John Sarno's materials).

So it becomes a quest to discover the cause of your muscle tension and then remove it. That includes dealing with any sort of trigger points that may be caused by your muscle tension. I know I have a huge cluster of them in my shoulders that I use a tennis ball to remove before they reappear in a couple of days (as I'm still working on removing muscle tension).

Personally, I think it would be far more advantageous (as well as cost effective) for someone experiencing chronic pain to investigate causes of muscle tension other than the oft cited vertebral discs, etc. Look at stressors, postural (sitting, standing, etc) deficiencies. Etc. If you believe stress could be a factor, pick up a book by Dr. John Sarno and look into relaxation and meditation techniques. If you think that maybe your posture sucks (and most people don't realize it, but their posture DOES suck -- pulling your shoulders back is a terrible practice as that can cause enormous amounts of muscle tension), look into the Alexander Technique. Saveyourself.ca offers up some tremendous ebooks about trigger points.

As for Rolfing, the whole practice is based on the idea that you can manipulate and/or RELEASE fascia, but it's incredibly tough, durable tissue. To quote saveyourself.ca, if the stuff were any tougher, we'd be bulletproof.

The issue in the past with decompression is that the muscles around the spine contract to protect it.  The way they do it now with computerized machies is the machine pulls in pulses so that the muscles don't contract to protect it. Lots of people have had positive results with it.