Visceral Manipulation
A gentle therapy to eliminate pain and restore normal organ function
Visceral Manipulation (VM) is a gentle hands-on therapy that locates restrictions or imbalances involving the organs, their supportive connective tissues, or the musculoskeletal system of the body. VM helps restore normal function and tone to the organs and often relieves long-standing pain anywhere from the hips up into the neck, shoulders and arms. A small restriction between your liver and stomach may not seem like a big deal, but consider that this restriction is being stressed and magnified over 20,000 times a day as your diaphragm moves up and down with your breath.
PHILOSOPHY OF VISCERAL MANIPULATION
Everything in your body is interconnected
Our bodies are made up of many different tissues, including muscles, nerves, organs, blood vessels, bones and joints. Enveloping these tissues and holding them all together is the connective tissue called fascia. Envision fascia as a complex sheet of Saran Wrap that surrounds and connects every tissue in our bodies. Through the fascia, everything in our bodies is interrelated.
Restrictions or imbalances in movement cause problems
Motion is a sign of life itself. Appropriate movement is essential for healthy tissues and organs. Unfortunately, damaged tissues lose their capacity for normal movement. Damage occurs in many different ways, including surgery, tears (sprains & strains), repetitive stress (small tears repeated over time), breaks (ruptured ligaments, tendons & fractured bones), and damage from infection or other causes of inflammation. All tissue injuries result in the formation of scar tissue. Auto accidents are notorious for causing this type of damage. The body creates scar tissue to knit itself back together, and its part of the normal healing process.
But there is often a side effect from scar tissue. Since its purpose is to glue things together, it commonly binds tissues that weren’t meant to be attached to each other. This can happen any time there is inflammation, which affects all the tissues surrounding an injury. Infections in the chest, abdomen or pelvis, and conditions such as endometriosis commonly leave behind significant scar tissue. Physical injuries and surgery are also frequent causes. Whenever scar tissue glues things together that are supposed to be freely movable, there is going to be trouble! Scar tissue binds up the fascia between two organs, around an injured joint, or within a muscle. It doesn’t work very well. With the formation of scar tissue, there is not only a problem locally, but eventually there would be problems in other parts of your body which connect to the part with the scar! Since everything in your body is interconnected through the fascia, scar tissue in one area will eventually affect other parts of your body as well. VM is particularly effective in locating and treating areas of restriction in the body’s tissues. Patients, unable to lift their legs off the examination table because of pain and weakness in their lower back have often found themselves free of pain with full strength restored just in one treatment of restoring lost motion in some part of their body.
Your body has a memory
Do you remember the times you fell down the stairs, wiped out skiing, sprained your ankle, hit your head on the bottom of the pool, or got in a car accident? Your body does! Not only is there some scar tissue left behind, but your tissues actually have a memory of traumatic events. As with the rest of the body, the organs can also carry old energies or emotions. The fact that each organ maintains its embryonic movement pattern suggests that the tissues do indeed have a memory. VM can help you release the energy held in your tissues from old traumas.
Your body has an innate ability to heal itself when restrictions are released
Just as your body carries memories of old trauma, it also has a memory of normal, balanced function. Living things have an innate ability to heal themselves when they are given a chance.
VM gives us the ability to address hidden problems like scar tissue restrictions between visceral organs, ligaments or membranes, and old tissue memories. These hidden factors have a powerful influence on the way our bodies function. VM can remove these factors, thus supporting our innate healing ability and giving our bodies a chance to heal.
Releasing a primary restriction will automatically release others
Everything in the body is interconnected through the planes of fascia that surround and support all the body’s tissues. A restriction in one part of the body will often pull on another area through the fascia that connects them. In fact, a chain of problems can develop over time, with one restriction as its original source. This is the primary restriction. When this restriction is found and released, via VM, the compensatory problems that resulted from it will often clear up on their own, like a line of dominos falling over.
Benefits & Results
The visceral organs are directly or indirectly suspended from the spine. However, proper balance and function of the organs also contributes to spinal support. So there is an interactive relationship between the spine (and its muscular system) and the visceral organs. What happens to one also influences the others.
It is well known in chiropractic that relieving spinal restrictions can improve organ function. Unfortunately, few health care professionals are aware that relieving restrictions in the organs and their supportive structures can greatly improve spinal function and relieve back pain.
Visceral Manipulation (VM) offers the ability to detect and correct many imbalances and restrictions in the body. This has both direct and indirect effects. Direct effects include improvements in motion and function, which help to alleviate the source of much pain and discomfort.
Other direct benefits include improvement in tone, function and fluid circulation of specific organs, and relaxation of spasms in the visceral muscles. Because of this, VM can be very helpful in cases of hiatal hernia and other digestive system problems.
People undergoing radiation treatments can benefit from VM, as radiation dehydrates the tissues, and VM helps to improve fluid circulation. VM also helps to dissipate stress in the system and facilitate relaxation.
VM encourages your own natural healing mechanisms indirectly through its effects on your nervous, hormonal and immune systems. For example, VM is thought to increase serotonin, a neurotransmitter influencing sleep and mood, as well as melatonin production. Melatonin is a hormone that modulates circadian (24 hour) rhythms in the body, in addition to immune and hormonal activity.
Can Visceral Manipulation help me if I’ve been in a car accident?
VM is particularly important in recovery from auto accidents, especially those involving whiplash type injuries. It has been found that the forces entering the body from these injuries tend to travel through the visceral organs, especially those that are fluid-filled, such as the heart. In this way, considerable force can reach the chest and abdominal cavities, creating injuries and scar tissue where it would not be suspected.
Can VM be used along with other therapeutic methods?
VM is a great adjunct to chiropractic and other treatment methods, and adds benefit to any form of therapy you are already receiving. It's gentle nature and effectiveness makes it an ideal form of therapy for just about everyone.
In addition to being extremely relaxing, visceral manipulation will: · Improve your range of motion
· Greatly improve mood by releasing serotonin (the feel-good hormone) in the brain.
· Ease chronic back and joint pain
· Ease tension and stress
· Help heal injuries and strains
· Aid indigestion
· Ward off infection
· Help relieve headaches and migraines
· Improve virility in men
