How to Relieve Neck Pain with Bill Parravano

Full Transcript

0:00:04.1 S1: Okay. Hello, it’s Bill the knee pain guru. Welcome to the Pain Education Podcast, brought to you by the Comella Foundation. We’re gonna dig in this week, we’re gonna talk about neck pain, the format for this week’s podcast is gonna be a little different, normally I’m interviewing someone on a special topic around pain, and what you’re gonna begin to see with all of these different podcasts is how they tie together the interview on the gut, how it ties in with lower back pain, interviews on I tension, how it ties in with what’s going on with your neck, so there’s an integration, and I think that’s really what the podcast is bringing to the… Bringing to the table is beginning to broaden your perspective on how pain can affect multiple parts of your body, and what we may equate as pain… What we may be experiencing in our body today, we may not equate as pain, so pain can show up in a lot of different ways, and what I wanted to do last year, we recorded a number of videos around neck tension, and I wanted to do this podcast is give you a little bit more of a structure around that series that we recorded, probably qualify as a course, there’s a ton of information, a ton of benefit you can get from it, and it’s all about getting your body into a relaxed state where the body can heal itself.

0:01:52.4 S1: Drop down and let go. And when it’s in more of a relaxed state, anything you’re trying to do as far as getting the body to heal itself is gonna happen much faster, much quicker… With a lot less time, energy and effort. So what I thought I do in this week’s podcast is give you a little bit about my background, how I came about this journey, and then go into the structure around getting the most out of that next series, what we recorded last year, so I’m gonna do that. I came about this work, it wasn’t my intention. Honestly, I was invited to go skiing in December of 98, 1998, a good friend of mine, Dr. Constante out of Louisville, Kentucky invited me to go skiing, I was not a big skier, I didn’t do a lot of skiing. My main love was Judah. I love throwing people. Anyhow, I go skiing, first trip down the hill, I face planted, and in the process of face planted, I partially tore my ACL, didn’t know it at the time, and didn’t go to the doctor, didn’t get an X-ray, CT scan or MRI, and ended up injuring my knee three more times until I completely tore the ligament in my left knee, and that started…

0:03:17.6 S1: It’s now a 23-year journey in exploring and understanding the body, I found it fascinating how it worked, how it functions, how there are interconnected systems that are going on at the same time, how the digestion can affect tension in the physical body, how the neurology affects the speed of the body’s ability to heal.

0:03:43.3 S2: These are all things that were absolutely fascinating to me, and it was more out of my own experience, having issues with my neck and back and injuries from when I was young, to high school in the college… Into my Judo career, and there’s a lot that goes into the physical experience of pain, and as we get older, it gets more difficult to heal, it takes more time to heal, and a lot of times people equate that… Well, that’s just what happens when you get older. And what I found that that was not necessarily the case, if you understand some few key principles that will support your body’s ability to heal itself, so this is an accumulation of the past 23 years of experience in.

0:04:43.7 S1: Martial arts in body work, and I wanna share with you… The body work that I studied, I became a practitioner in my healing journey, I became a practitioner and an instructor of an osteopathic ally-based style of body work called Ortho-Bionomy. How this ties in was after my knee surgery in the physical therapy.

0:05:13.4 S2: My knee was mechanically sound, I mean everything was going as far as the medical model was concerned, everything was good, nothing was broken or torn in the knee, I had the surgery to repair the torn ligament, they took out two pieces of meniscus to make the joint stable, and on the other side of the surgery and the physical therapy, I still had lots of issues with my body, swelling in the knee, compensation in my hips. I lower back, if I try to exercise or push my body in any way, I get the spasm, they would go up my back into my neck, I couldn’t turn my head for a week and a half. It just wasn’t a fun place to be. It wasn’t a fun place to be in, especially in my late 20s, early 30s, when I still had lots of desire to get back out on the Judean and throw people…

0:06:13.1 S1: All of the time that I had put it into training for judo, biking and running and weightlifting and going to Judo, it was difficult to go back because of how my body felt. So a friend told me about some different workshops, I was going to learn different things, this was in the Lovejoy area, and ended up at a workshop in brand in Burke ducky, which is a little bit south of love. And go into the class, the instructor goes, Ortho-Bionomy, founded by a British osteopath who was also a judo instructor, and he took judo principles and applied it to an osteopathic concept to develop an entire style of body work, and I was like, Okay, I can’t do judo principles. And that really started the journey, once again, that was in fall of… That would have been fall of 99. So where are we? 20, 20, 21, so 22, 23 years, it’s been a journey. So I’ve been studying this work, and it’s all based on universal principles, this body work called Ortho-Bionomy. I’ll give you a little bit of detail on that right now. Ortho-Bionomy, the literal Greek translation is the correct application of the natural laws of life, no matter what, comfort is key, and this is all gonna tie into the neck series, that’s gonna be the bonus below this podcast.

0:07:49.3 S2: So comfort is key. Comfort trumps everything. If you’re wondering what to do or if you’re doing it right, as long as you’re comfortable, you’re fine, and this is a challenge for people, especially if they’ve had a lot of stress or tension or discomfort in their neck or jaw or upper shoulders or back or whatever, it is to recognize that. Comfort feels like you’re doing nothing. That’s a big part of this process. So this work address stress and tension in the body, it.

0:08:23.6 S1: Resets the proprioceptive nervous system. Now, the proprioceptive nervous system is when you go and do a doctor-to-doctor capture you with a hammer, your knee jumps can’t control, because the reflexes are engaged when he captured me with the little rubber mallet, your knee jumps, that is set off the jumping of your leg is set off by the reflexes, these reflexes that are with us all day, every day, as long as we’re alive, these are functioning, and.

0:08:56.7 S2: When we have an accident and injury of surgery, a trauma, what ends up happening is the nervous system kind of blows a fuse so to speak, the nervous system gets stuck in a place and a place of discomfort, and what ends up happening is when we put it in comfort and when way a sufficient amount of time, that proprioceptive nervous system resets. So we have a different experience in our physical body, and.

0:09:26.5 S1: It just re-educates your body to experience comfort, so that’s what we’re gonna do in the bonus section.

0:09:34.9 S2: Okay, The History of Art of Iona was founded by a British osteopath named in the mid-70s, a named Arthur Lincoln Pauls was a Canadian-born British osteopath. It’s based on osteopathy. Osteopathy was created by his name as Andrew Taylor, Still pretty amazing person, if you have any desire to do some research on that, I’ll put a link to Andrew Taylor skills and osteopathy in here. It’s also based on judicious judo principals that were developed by a man named Jigoro Kano, he was the founder of Judo, he recognized these principles in working with opponents, larger opponents then himself, that the judo principles that your opponent pushes on you, you don’t push back, you pull in the same respect, if your opponent pulls on you, you don’t pull back, you push while maintaining your balance, what ends up… Your opponent throws themselves. So some of the other components that are very important with or homonym is structured governance function. The rule of the artery is supreme, which means if your blood is circulating the way it’s supposed to what your structure is in place and your body is able to get the blood flow where it needs to, your body is gonna heal much faster, much easier, much quicker…

0:11:20.0 S2: Arthur Lincoln Pauls was inspired by an American osteopath named Lawrence Jones. And.

0:11:27.5 S1: Lawrence Jones wrote a book called spontaneous release by positioning. There are some other books, strain and counter-strain that he wrote her, the origins of this work, Ortho-Bionomy.

0:11:45.8 S2: So that was a little bit of the history of Ortho-Bionomy. Then we have the principles, we talked about The Judo, the push pull, you wanna maintain your balance, and that’s what we’re looking to bring to the body without causing pain, we wanna keep it in comfort all the time.

0:12:06.5 S1: There’s… We wanna exaggerate a pattern and we wanna increase self-awareness, so if your neck hurts going one direction, we don’t wanna go in that direction, we wanna go in the opposite direction, which doesn’t hurt, it’s comfortable, and.

0:12:25.9 S2: When you… That’s the exaggeration of the pattern, and when we go to comfort require the nervous system, you gain more of an awareness of how this pattern that’s going on in your neck ties them in with other parts of your body. Let’s see, that was Principles, the philosophy of Ortho-Bionomy, homeopathic in nature. Two negatives make a positive.

0:12:49.7 S1: Once again, these are based on universal principles, these principles apply, no matter who you are, no matter where you are or what’s going on, these universal principles are going to apply no matter what situation or scenario you’re working with, as long as nothing is broken or torn in the body, that’s important, make sure you go to the doctor first, verify, get your extra a CT Scan MRI and make sure nothing is broken or torn, ’cause in that case, the pain could be… The pain could be from what’s broken or torn, and we don’t wanna make that worse for you…

0:13:28.9 S2: Okay, we’re going with the path of least resistance, we’re giving way to superior force, just like water flowing downhill, it’s not gonna go over the top of the rock, water is gonna flow around the rock going down the hill, tree falls with gravity in the direction… The path of least resistance. So now we’re taking all these principles that we see all around us in nature and in life, and we’re applying it to the physical body in a way that engages the self-corrective reflexes from the proprioceptive nervous system, so the body can hear itself. Let’s see. We wanna go with the flow. Big thing, less is more, a lot of times, just a little bit of comfort and give us a lot of relief, and above all else, we’re causing no pain, no pain, that’s first and foremost. Let’s see. So when we create this comfort, what are we looking for, we’re looking for this experience that it’s okay, we’re not… Feels like we’re not doing anything, but in that position of comfort, we’re gonna look for some cues from the Neurology, your nervous system, what is going on in your neck, and your shoulders, and your upper back and your jaw, we’re looking for some cues, and that could be…

0:14:50.9 S2: You could feel pulsing, pulsing is an indication that there’s a releasing of tension, you’re increasing blood flow in a certain area that was too tight before because of the pain, because of how your body was compensating for that experience, you can feel fluttering like a little fluttering underneath the skin, you can feel heat, you can feel cold, you can see a change in your breathing, you can take a side, your breath can go from deep to shallow, or it can go from shallow to deep breathing. You have a body part twitches, like that moment when you’re watching television, you’re laying on a couch, watching a movie, you just about to fall asleep, and I’m a sudden your wake up, that is an indication that your nervous system is shifting neurological states going from a 10 state to a relaxed state or a sympathetic state, to a parasympathetic state, and in that position of comfort is where the body begins to heal… Let’s see, breathing changes, your mind wanders that… A place where you’re looking out the window and you’re looking at the birds, at the bird feeder or leaves blowing on a tree in the woman, and all of a sudden it’s like you kinda zone out and your mind wanders, that’s a shift in a neurological state.

0:16:21.8 S2: We’re beginning to create this experience intentionally as opposed to it just being by accident, now we’re focusing our attention to an area of your neck, in this case, that is feeling uncomfortable, it’s feeling tight, it’s feeling tender, whatever you’re experiencing in your neck, and it begins to develop what this process is doing, it’s beginning to teach you to develop a trusting yourself, a trust in what works for you, when your body has let go of the tension that it’s holding on to and really get a better and deeper understanding of how your body works and functions. We’re going to hold the neck that we’re gonna position the neck in a position of comfort, and then we’re gonna wait for 10 to 30 seconds and then re-check to see if anything is different, and in the meantime, while we’re holding the neck in that position, we’re gonna wait for these cues from our nervous system, the pulsing, the fluttering, the heater, the call the breathing, change body part twitching, the mind wanders. Eyes blinking. That’s another one. Now, right before you’re about to fall asleep, and then you’re gonna check for change to see if that is even a little bit different, ’cause even if it’s just a little bit different, we just need to do more of that, more of comfort and that…

0:18:05.8 S2: What we focus on expands. So the more we focus on comfort, the more comfort is going to become the reality in your neck and in other parts of your body, and then we’re tying these in with these other podcasts that we’re doing these interviews on, you can see amazing things of how your body is gonna heal how quickly it’ll change when we’re not fighting it, when we’re not causing pain… Let’s see. So with this work, as long as we’re only creating comfort, the worst case scenario that happens is nothing changes.

0:18:43.8 S1: Meaning when we put the body in a position of comfort, there are no contraindications.

0:18:50.2 S2: So if you’re trying to stretch your neck or twist Nick or whatever it is, and you’re straining it or struggling or causing pain, that’s not what we’re doing here, we’re focusing strictly on comfort, and.

0:19:04.4 S1: When the pain level is high, our comfort level is gonna be smaller, and when we focus on that smaller comfort level, once again, the neck relaxes the body reflexes engaged, and then that small position comfort begins to expand, the more expands, the more range of motion you get, and the more your body is able to come back online and begin to heal itself. And this is gonna be good. I’m thinking through this for someone who’s been slept on their neck, funny, or if they’ve been going to the doctor, they’re not getting relief and they’ve had whiplash or they’ve fallen on slipped or something like that, and they injured their neck somehow, but once again, just make sure you go to the doctor, there’s nothing broken or torn, and then we can begin working with is… The big part about this, as we’re creating comfort in the neck, that the… It may look silly. Meaning, your position, a comfort could be something goofy like this, and it’s goofy in the sense that you’re not used to it, but it doesn’t mean it’s wrong, for what’s going on, and recognize that the more we focus on this position of comfort and we’re not worried about…

0:20:34.1 S1: The outward looks, what ends up happening is the body begins to online in a very deep level, and comfortable range of motion expands, when the comfortable range of motion expands, that means you could start living your life more comfortably, and you can see as we relax the tension in the neck, we gain more awareness of other parts of our bodies, of our body, and then we could begin working with those areas instead of it being like this crisis all the time.

0:21:05.8 S2: So that is the introduction to the body work.

0:21:14.8 S1: So the further information about This is gonna be below, just click the orange bonus button, and that’ll take you to the page with all of the videos that were recorded last year, around the neck working with net tension. There is, I think, five or six, that is the foundational thing, I’m gonna break it down into specific directions, and then we’re gonna go into more dynamic… We’re allowing the body to unwind in a very dynamic way, or the neck to unwind in a very dynamic way, for those that are familiar with body work, that would look something like myofascial release, although it’s on that, there’s an element of that, there are other factors going on as well, and this is something that a person can do themselves, so hopefully that gives you a better context of what’s going on with this next series that we’re offering here at the cool foundation, all of the work here, the Comella Foundation, is based on osteopathic principles. Which are universal principles. So we can begin to get people out of pain so they could start living their life that they wanna live and not thinking that it’s because they’re getting older, they’ve abused their body or whatever that is.

0:22:38.8 S1: Although those factors come into play. It’s not as great of a factor. Those factors aren’t as great, once you begin to learn these these principles, so that’s… We’re gonna wrap the podcast up today. Go ahead, go down below this video, I will put information in the show notes about osteopathy and Andrew Taylor Stills, judo, Jigoro Kano, that’ll be below this. You can check that out, I’ll throw in a link to my website, the knee pain guru, you can check that out as well, and.

0:23:16.9 S2: Then the bonus section will take you to all of the links for the for the next series that we recorded last year. Okay, this is Bill Parravano, the knee pain guru, thanking you so much for being here. That’ll be… This week’s podcast, we’re gonna have some cool people that are coming up that we’re gonna be interviewing all around pain, and we’re gonna evolve from it, talk about cooler stuff, how you can enjoy your life, things like that.

0:23:50.3 S1: Make sure you sign up for the Comella Foundation newsletter, like and subscribe to the podcast or the video, wherever you’re watching this, and we’re gonna shoot for today, thank you so much. Have a wonderful day and we will see you on the next one. Have a great… Have a great one!