Musculoskeletal

Do you have a favorite client success story?

82-Year-Old Overcomes Neuropathy and Regains Mobility

Oh, do I have a favorite client story? You know, I have so many. I've seen so many miracles treating clients with persistent pain, but one that comes to mind is Rina, who was this strong older Russian woman who comes to my melt class and she said to me, somebody said you could fix my neuropathy. And I was like, well, I mean maybe we can help to mitigate some of the pain that you have. She came in with a walker and so, you know, she was a little reluctant with this frowning face and when I said we had to get down onto the ground, she says we're not getting down on the ground. I said, well, just sit in a chair and watch us and see if you understand it. About halfway through the class, she gets on to she kind of peels herself off the chair and gets onto the ground and starts melting with us. And at the end of the class, she gets up and kind of moves around and she looks at me and she says, I'll be back. And over the course of three months, she came to every single class I taught and she went from walking in with a walker to walking in with two canes, one cane, and then there was this one day where she walked in with that cane and when the class was done, she left the class and we all noticed that the cane was there and a bunch of us sat there waiting for her to come back. And when she came back into the class, she was like, I forgot my cane. And the entire class applauded her and she's been able to regain her life at 82 and she says that she walks 20 city blocks every day without a walker. So I think that's a pretty amazing success story for me.

Reena was an 82 year old Russian woman who came to my math class with a walker and, over the course of three months, she regained her life and can now walk 20 city blocks without a walker. We all applauded when she forgot her cane one day and left the class without it.

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Oh, do I have a favorite client success story? I've witnessed numerous miracles while treating clients with persistent pain, but one that stands out is Rina's story. Rina was a strong older Russian woman who attended my melt class. She approached me and mentioned that someone had told her I might be able to alleviate her neuropathy pain. Though skeptical, she came to class with a walker. When I mentioned that we would be getting down on the ground, she hesitated and said she wouldn't join us. I suggested she sit in a chair and observe. However, about halfway through the class, Rina peeled herself off the chair and joined us on the ground, melting alongside everyone else. At the end of the class, she got up and moved around. Looking at me with determination, she declared that she would be back.

Over the next three months, Rina attended every single class I taught. She went from using a walker to two canes, then one cane. One remarkable day, when the class ended, we noticed her cane still sitting there as we waited for her return. When Rina re-entered the room, she exclaimed that she had forgotten her cane. The entire class erupted into applause. At 82 years old, Rina regained her independence and shared that she now walks 20 city blocks every day without a walker.

This success story of Rina's journey is truly incredible to me.

What are some signs in our body or tissues that tell us the body is overtrained or under recovered?

Recognizing the Signs of Overtraining: Stiffness, Soreness, and Risks

Hey guys, a lot of pain symptoms are caused by overuse, misuse, disuse, and aging. So this question about what are the signs in our body or our tissues that are telling us our body is over trained or under recovered. Look, if you're waking up in the morning feeling as stiff as a dried out sponge and even when you start to move around in the day, you kind of are feeling that stiffness lingers, that's oftentimes a sign of over training. Also, we know about DOMS, delayed onset muscle soreness, I like calling that DOFS, delayed onset fascial soreness. And after you exercise, you know 48 hours after, if your muscles kind of feel tight and achy, it's kind of a normal process of muscles rebuilding themselves and getting back to regulation. But if you're sore after a workout for three, four, or five days, you are over training and this can ultimately lead to connective tissue dehydration, meaning that the connective tissue's resilience is declining. And now you're increasing your chances of muscle strains, you're decreasing all of your short term gains in your overall athleticism, and you're definitely increasing your chances of having unnecessary tension and compression in your joints. Our nervous system is relying on figuring out where our joints are in relationship to gravity and if your joints are full of stuck stress because you're over training, you are going to pay the price over time. So think about that before you over train your body.

Signs of overtraining include waking up feeling stiff, having delayed onset muscle soreness for more than 48 hours, and experiencing connective tissue dehydration. These can lead to decreased athleticism, unnecessary tension and compression in the joints, and problems with the nervous system.

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Signs in our body or tissues that indicate overtraining or under-recovery include waking up feeling stiff and experiencing lingering stiffness throughout the day. Another sign is delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS), which can be considered delayed onset fascial soreness (DOFS) as well. It's normal to feel tight and achy in muscles for about 48 hours after exercise as they rebuild and regulate. However, if you remain sore for three, four, or five days after a workout, it indicates overtraining. This can lead to connective tissue dehydration, reducing resilience and increasing the risk of muscle strains. Overtraining also diminishes short-term gains in athleticism and introduces unnecessary tension and compression in joints. When joints are filled with stuck stress from overtraining, it affects the nervous system's ability to perceive joint position in relation to gravity. Considering these factors is crucial before subjecting the body to overtraining.

What conditions might the MELT foot treatment help with?

Revive your body's balance & ease pain with MELT foot treatment

This is the Milt Hand and Foot Therapy Kit, and in it there is four different types of balls. And if you have any type of condition like knee pain, back pain, hip pain, or you have instability or poor balance, the foot treatment is the best treatment to use for those types of conditions. We call that the indirect before direct approach. Your nervous system really relies on the sensory reception of your feet to be able to move you efficiently. So the foot treatment can help to mitigate some of the accumulative stress in the footing to help your nervous system reclaim its connection to your center of gravity. It's also an exceptional technique to do if you have foot pain like plantar fasciitis or an aching heel, bunions, neuromas, or any type of sprained ankle, calf strain, and again, anything up the chain of the body. Again, your feet are really the gateway to mobility. And before you start treating your back, if you had back pain, learning how to treat your feet with this one little ball can almost instantaneously transform the pain that you have. So I hope you'll check out MeltMethod.com and find out a little bit more about the hand and foot therapy techniques and what's in this little kit. You can also go to YouTube, type in Melt Method, and you can learn how to do the treatments for yourself.

The Milk Hand and Foot Therapy Cat is a ball-based massage therapy treatment that can help alleviate pain and other conditions, such as knee pain, back pain, hip pain, or instability. The indirect before direct approach of the therapy helps to mitigate stress in the footing and reclaim the connection to your center of gravity. It's also an effective treatment for foot pain like plantar fasciitis, bunions, neuromas, and sprains. Learning how to treat your feet with this one little ball can almost instantly reduce any pain you may have.

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The MELT foot treatment can be helpful for various conditions such as knee pain, back pain, hip pain, instability, poor balance, foot pain (including plantar fasciitis and heel pain), bunions, neuromas, sprained ankles, and calf strain. The foot treatment focuses on the indirect before direct approach, recognizing that the nervous system relies on sensory reception from the feet for efficient movement. By alleviating accumulated stress in the feet, this treatment helps the nervous system reconnect with the body's center of gravity. Taking care of your feet is crucial as they serve as a gateway to mobility. Treating your feet with the MELT therapy kit can have transformative effects on pain relief, even in other areas of the body like the back. To learn more about the hand and foot therapy techniques offered by MELT Method, visit their website or check out their instructional videos on YouTube.

The MELT Method: Rebalance, Restore, and Reconnect Your Body

The MELT method is a simple self-care method that adopts the techniques of using soft tools like a soft body roller and hand and foot therapy balls to restore the fluid state of the fascial system and restore balance in the nervous system and the neurological regulators of stress repair and digestion. And this concept of it is to teach people the 4Rs protocol, reconnect, rebalance, rehydrate and release. In MELT we teach you how to become like you're a body worker. We call it hands-off body work. And you're going to learn how to assess your body for accumulative stress in your connective tissue, rebalance the neurological regulators of stress and repair, rehydrate your connective tissue through tension and compression or lengthening techniques, and then release unnecessary tension in your neck and low back by creating gentle touch techniques. MELT is simple to learn. It's an easy, very, very fantastic methodology that will make you feel better in your body. It feels gentle, so it's really good for anybody, whether you're young or old, athletic or not. MELT can help restore the calm in your body so that you improve your performance and decrease your risk of injury, as well as to reduce pain symptoms, even the chronic ones. So I hope you'll check out meltmethod.com and find out more about what the MELT method is and how it can help you live better in your body.

The Melt Method is a self-care technique that uses soft tools, like body rollers and therapy balls, to restore balance in the nervous system and the neurological regulators of stress repair and digestion. It teaches people how to assess their bodies for cumulative stress and rehydrate their connective tissue through tension and compression or lengthening techniques. It's gentle and can help with performance and reduce pain symptoms.

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The MELT Method is a self-care technique that uses soft tools like a body roller and therapy balls to restore the fluid state of the fascial system and bring balance to the nervous system. It focuses on the 4Rs protocol: reconnect, rebalance, rehydrate, and release. Through MELT, individuals learn how to assess their body for accumulated stress, rebalance neurological regulators, rehydrate connective tissue, and release tension in the neck and low back. MELT is easy to learn and suitable for people of all ages and activity levels. It can help improve performance, reduce injury risk, alleviate pain symptoms (including chronic pain), and promote overall well-being. To learn more about the MELT Method, visit meltmethod.com.

Why is it important to improve our tissues ability to slide and glide?

Unlocking the Secrets of Sliding Tissues for Optimal Performance

So I have a question. Why is it important to improve our tissues ability to slide and glide? So the tissue we're talking about is your fascial tissue. So fascia, we don't want it to stick, we want it to be slick. So the glide ability of connective tissue is important to everything about how you move, right? So connective tissue is the supportive infrastructure under your skin. It's like flexible scaffolding, primarily made up of collagen, and the bound water in fascia is kind of like a crystalline matrix. So collagen needs the water to allow it to morph and adapt as we move. And daily living causes this tissue to lose its supportive qualities and it's stiff to elastic balance. And then that is gonna decrease the glide ability of these fascial layers. And if our tissue doesn't glide, we tend to have an increased tendency toward muscle tension and joint compression, which can ultimately lead to persistent pain issues and a decrease in your overall performance, resilience, coherency, and wellbeing. So improving the supportive qualities of your connective tissue and making sure that your tissue is hydrated and juicy, or what we call melted in the melt method, is certainly an easy thing for you to do from day to day to improve your performance and decrease your chances of accumulative stress in your connective tissue system that would ultimately lead to persistent pain issues in your own body. I hope that helps answer the question.

Improving the glide ability of our fascial tissue is important because it helps minimize the tension and joint compression that can lead to persistent pain, as well as improve overall performance, resilience, coherency, and well-being. This can be done by improving the support of qualities of the connective tissue and keeping it hydrated and juicy.

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The importance of improving the ability of our tissues to slide and glide, specifically referring to fascial tissue, lies in its impact on movement. Fascia serves as the supportive infrastructure beneath our skin, like flexible scaffolding composed mainly of collagen. The bound water within fascia forms a crystalline matrix that allows collagen to adapt and change shape as we move. However, daily living can cause this tissue to lose its supportive qualities and become stiff, disrupting the balance between elasticity and stiffness. This results in a decrease in the glide ability of fascial layers. When tissues do not glide properly, it often leads to increased muscle tension and joint compression. Over time, this can lead to persistent pain issues and a decline in overall performance, resilience, coherency, and wellbeing. Improving the supportive qualities of connective tissue by ensuring hydration and promoting its melted state through techniques like the MELT Method can be an effective daily practice for enhancing performance and reducing the risk of accumulated stress in the connective tissue system that may lead to chronic pain issues.

Discover the MELT Method: Transform Your Body's Adaptability

I created the MELT method in the late 90s with a client who had chronic pain. And initially MELT stood for myofascial energetic length technique. And over the years when I started to combine all of the neurological techniques to decrease accumulative stress more in the mind than in the body, myofascia really didn't answer the question. And I couldn't call it NELT because neurofascia didn't mean anything. So I took the periods away and the acronym just has become MELT. And so MELT really is about taking a stiff, inflexible, unadaptable body and turning it back into a malleable, adaptable, changeable system, which is what everybody should have. If our bodies are functioning well, it means that we are adaptable, malleable, and changeable to our environment. If we have pain and it becomes chronic, it means that you are unadaptable and unchangeable. So if you want to restore your body's changeability, I would recommend that you check out the MELT method and restore your fluid body back into a more balanced state.

The MELT Method is a multi-method technique designed to help people with chronic pain restore their bodies to a more balanced state through increased adaptability and malleability. It combines neurological techniques to decrease cumulative stress in the mind and body.

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I created the MELT method in the late 90s to help a client with chronic pain. Initially, MELT stood for myofascial energetic length technique. However, as I started incorporating neurological techniques to address accumulative stress in the mind rather than just the body, the term myofascia no longer fully captured the approach. I couldn't use NELT either because neurofascia didn't make sense. So, I removed the periods and it simply became MELT. The acronym now represents transforming a stiff and inflexible body into a malleable, adaptable, and changeable system. A well-functioning body is one that can adapt and change according to its environment. Conversely, chronic pain indicates an unadaptable and unchangeable state. If you want to restore your body's changeability, I encourage you to explore the MELT method and bring your fluid body back into a more balanced state.

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Sue Hitzmann answers your Musculoskeletal questions. See all the advice Sue Hitzmann has and get answers to your own Musculoskeletal questions.

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Founder of the MELT Method,  International Neurofascial science & research educator, NY Times bestselling author, podcaster & seeker of consciousness 