Scars & Fascia

Before we talk about scars, we have to talk about fascia. Fascia pronounced “fash-ee-uh,” is a connective tissue that covers everything in our bodies. It is like the white lining inside an orange: each segment and juice vesicle is enveloped. Fascia covers everything from our blood vessels to our bones to our muscles. Fascia’s primary role is to encase and protect. When healthy, it allows the components of our body to glide easily and helps with the alignment of structures.  It assists in allowing our body to function efficiently and free of pain. Like our skin, fascia is one continuous piece interconnected throughout our body.  

Fascia’s tendency to envelop and protect can be problematic when we get a cut or incision. During healing, our body produces scar tissue that tangles with the fascia, creating an imbalance in the total body fascia unit. The fascia and scar tissue become dense and less mobile, which can pull on other structures covered by fascia elsewhere in the body. As a result, imbalance and pain can emerge in the body.  

Here is a simple Treat Yourself activity to mobilize your fascia and keep it healthy!  

The Fascia Clock Technique: 

1. Find a scar that has healed.  
2. Place your flat fingers on your scar.  
3. Give your fingers a minute to connect with the scar.  
4. With your fingers flat on the scar, slowly and gently move the skin and scar in a 12 to 6 direction on the clock. The scar may move about a centimeter or not at all. It may move more in one direction than the other. This is ok! Never force the scar. 
5. Repeat the 12 to 6 direction two times slowly and gently. Next, proceed to the 1 to 7 direction on the clock, then the 2 to 8, and so on until you have mobilized the skin in all the axes of the clock. 

Repeat this three times per week. The goal is to have a scar that moves equally in all directions, but remember: never force the scar.  

You may find this activity emotional. Scars can harbor toxins related to the stress we experienced during the trauma that caused them. Loosening scar tissue can release trapped toxins. This is good, healthy, and healing for the body.  Express gratitude for your scar. To quote Michelle Obama, “Every scar that you have is a reminder not just that you got hurt, but that you survived.” 

Myofascial Release is a gentle and slow technique where pressure is applied to restricted fascia in the body. Restricted fascia can impede the ability of the bodily structures to function correctly. Loosening these restrictions allows for the body to realign and rebalance. The technique requires patience, as it takes at least 90 seconds to connect with the area before applying any pressure. From there, gentle pressure is applied to facilitate fascial release. Slow, gradual pressure is used as the body's response guides the treatment's progression, direction, and intensity. 

John F. Barnes, myofascial release guru, is famous for saying, "The body will light up like a Christmas tree," about observing the body's response to myofascial treatment. 

 Huh? That was my response for a long time.

This "Christmas-Tree-Effect" is because areas of constriction will begin to release toxins and increase vasodilation to clear out those toxins.  That creates redness in the area being released.  

For this reason, we often start with a generalized, gentle, total-body traction.  The patience in the subtleness of myofascial release is the key. It is very delicate.  If you go too hard or fast, you will encounter Shirley Sahrmann’s spring effect:  when two springs are stretched, the weaker spring will give way first, thus overstretching an already stretchy spring. Doing this will defeat our purpose. The toxins from the constricted area will not be released, and we may overstretch an already stretched area.

Our intent through slow, gentle, patient traction and pressure is to stimulate the tight/limiting spring to release its toxins and create an area of redness so that we can find it and treat it. From that location, the process begins again.