Why do your muscles hurt?
The most common reason for booking a treatment with Vitality Therapy is muscle pain due to your”knots”.
So what do we mean by “knots”? Technically speaking they are either Trigger points (or Myofascial Trigger Points to give them their correct name) or hypertonic muscles.
There are six key elements that cause acute or chronic muscle pain:
- Ischemia: the lack of blood flow to soft tissues that causes hypersensitivity to touch.
- Hypertonic muscles: very tense muscles or muscle spasms.
- Trigger points: highly irritated points and bands in the muscles that refer pain to other parts of the body.
- Nerve entrapment/compression: pressure on a never by soft tissue, cartilage or bone.
- Postural distortions: imbalance of the musculoskeletal system resulting from poor posture while siting at a desk.
- Bio-mechanical distortions: imbalance of the musculoskeletal system resulting in faulty movement patterns e.g. poor sports techniques.
A massage therapist has a wide variety of techniques in their toolkit to help release muscle pain including NMT.
Related Posts

What is the difference between sports and deep tissue massage?
Deep tissue is a very descriptive name and is self-explanatory. The confusion comes when it is compared to sports massage. The big difference is the focus. Sports massage is dedicated to
- improving sports performance
- prevention of and treating sports injuries
- You work out religiously, but aren't as relgious about stretching
- You cycle or run to work and don't think to stretch
- You play sports but don't cross train so have specific trouble spots
- Your performance (in a particular sport) has dropped
- You have a history of injuries and want to reduce the likely hood of further injuries
- You work at a computer all day and your neck, shoulders & back are chronically sore
- You are so tense your back feels like concrete
- You have tired achy legs
- You are in pain
- You are stiff (or are unable to move your neck/arm/leg freely)
- You are stressed or anxious
- You have a knot or a muscle spasm

Does massage help tense muscles or muscle soreness?
A lot of clients visit it us in clinic with tense muscles, which over time can lead to achy muscles and this in turn can then lead to episodes of muscle pain. Muscle tension refers to the condition in which muscles of the body remain semi-contracted for an extended period. Muscle tension is frequently caused by the physiological effects of stress. Massage is well documented to reduce muscle tension (see top two references). In addition what is also known to help are
- hot baths
- yoga
- stretching

