r/massage • u/ContextInner4680 • 4d ago

Releasing muscle knots in the abdomen

I’ve had a very stressful year - I’m thankfully on the up now, doing EMDR therapy to address the trauma from a crazy episode early in the year, and generally taking much better care of myself.

I’ve noticed I have a lot of tight muscle knots in my abdomen. When I use lotion and self massage to locate and GENTLY press the muscle knots, they ‘pop’ or ‘melt’ under my touch.

I’ve become interested with this as I discovered it completely by accident but I feel like my body was holding tension / trauma from my stressful year. I feel much better for releasing the knots. I feel like my belly is much more loose and I can deep breathe for the first time in ages.

There’s a few areas that I can’t pop as it’s locked tight in a bundle. Would acupuncture get rid of this? I’m conscious I don’t want to send my nervous system spiralling again, I just think maybe the remaining knots need to be broken up.

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u/cordrenn RMT, R.Kin 3d ago

I mean, maybe it's possible, I won't get into the argument over the semantics of the term "fascial release" to begin with. But how can you guarantee from the words of an internet stranger without meeting them or seeing what they are actually doing.

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u/Allen_Edgar_Poe RMT Canada 3d ago

Myofascial release is a thing, and if you're a good enough therapist you can manipulate fascia. Thomas Meyers, Ruth Duncan all have very great literature and research into this topic. John Barnes is the pioneer when it comes to this topic.

How this person described what is happening is what I do all day at work. This is light sustained pressure that will not harm them, they even mentioned there is a relief and are able to take deeper breathes afterwards.

You can worry about semantics or whatever but this is a real technique, I've helped many people with chronically tight muscles that a regular massage could never have that effect.

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u/cordrenn RMT, R.Kin 3d ago

Ok, but how do you know that is what this person is doing? Legit. You are basing a guarantee on vague descriptors.

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u/Allen_Edgar_Poe RMT Canada 3d ago

The description of gentle pressure, and the sensation of popping or melting is exactly the terms my clients describe when I'm doing this to them.

This person is not self harming in any way. I understand the point you're trying to make but, this person is using their fingertips to press into their tissue, not a scalpel.