Most of the time (notice how I said "most of the time"), pain is our body’s way of telling us that something may be wrong in the body. Pain is a signal that is normally transmitted from damaged muscles, bones, ligaments, tendons, etc. all the way up to our brain via nerves. This signal let's us know about the damage, so we can protect the area and facilitate healing. Think about it like a Ring doorbell detecting abnormal activity in your backyard, and sending your phone an alert. This alert allows you to take action, so you can prevent something worse from happening.
This may sound contradictory to what I said in the intro, but just because you are having pain in one area does not mean that’s where the issue actually is (again, I said "most of the time"). Remember that pain is a nerve signal... so what if the nerve itself was irritated? This is where things get a little crazy.
Let's say you've been having hamstring pain for a few weeks, but you can't seem to do anything to alleviate it. Stretching, strengthening, nothing seems to help. Little did you know that the nerve that serves the hamstring was getting pinched in the low back by a vertebral disc. So the pinched nerve is still transmitting a pain signal to the brain even though there is no damage to the hamstring, but the brain is perceiving the pain in the hamstring, the area the nerve supplies. WOAH!
So no matter how much you work on your hamstring, if you never address the nerve irritation in the low back, the pain will never improve.
You can also have referred pain from irritated tissues in the surrounding area that share a nerve supply. Let me explain... Let's say you have really bad pain on the front-side of your shoulder that is limiting your ability to lift your arm up over your head. You've tried massage, dry-needling, cupping, all of the things on the front of your shoulder, but the pain persists. What if I told you the irritated structure was actually on the backside of your shoulder? Since there is crossover between the nerves that supply the front and backside of the shoulder, the brain can perceive the pain signal generated in the back of the shoulder as pain in the front of the shoulder. Wild right?!
So again, if you only address the symptoms in the frontside of the shoulder, you'll never see any meaningful improvement!
Even if the pain signal is being generated by the tissue you perceive as painful, the root cause could still be somewhere else. Let’s use a more sport-specific example.. an athlete is experiencing right knee pain with squatting that is not getting any better despite regaining full knee range of motion and restoring full quad and hamstring strength. But what they didn't realize is that every time the athlete squats, their right knee collapses in because they never restored full ankle mobility after they sprained it a month ago.
The pain is indeed being generated by the knee, but the reason the knee is painful is because of an impairment in a completely different area. So same idea as the referred pain, if you never address this limitation of the ankle, the knee pain will never improve.
If you are having any pain or discomfort that is limiting you from participating in your sport or even daily life, you should seek out a physical therapist. If we simply just rest and wait for the pain to get better, you may not be addressing the factors contributing to the problem. We need to prioritize our bodies and health so we can be the best versions of ourselves each and every day.
We are based in Holly Springs, GA, which is north of Atlanta. If you are in search of a sports physical therapist in Holly Springs, Canton, Woodstock, or the surrounding North Atlanta area, we are happy to help.