Nasty Trigger Point

[Ginty]

Hi,

Question for the guys following PT of the pelvic floor....

I've probably had around 10 or so physio sessions which has improved my symptoms a fair bit.

In the first few sessions I was happy to let the physio just go for it and really stretch the tightened muscles, the pain was almost good because I was excited by the prospect of it helping me.
And for the first few sessions the resultant improvement was pretty obvious, so it made it easy to put up with the short term pain.

I can feel myself that my pelvic floor is probably 50% less painful and tense than it was 10 sessions ago but there is one remaining trigger point in particular that is really making me start to dread these sessions.

I think it's on the levator ani muscles, on my left side (which incidentally was always where my symptoms developed from), and the pain whenever the physio goes near it is unbelievable, by far the worst I've experienced.
I've heard the phrase "hit the roof" mentioned around these things and this one is definitely in that category when it is touched.

So my question to anyone who has experienced anything similar is how did you get the area treated?
Was it best to just clench your teeth and get it stretched out, or slowly but surely ease the way into it over a period of weeks or months?
So far I've had two sessions where we've noticed it and I can't say it's got any better yet despite a good bit of teeth clenching on my part.

One thing for sure is that as the pain from this thing is so bad it has to be causing me problems day to day, I can't wait to see what benefits getting rid of it will bring.

All the best,
Stephen

[CppsDad]

I think you have to stick with it. I never had any trigger points that were THAT painful, but stopping treatment of them would be a mistake. You may have already GAINED some ground and just not known it yet. If you can gut it out, then hopefully in a few more sessions the pain will start to diminish. Perhaps lessening the pressure on that TP would be worthwhile until your tolerance builds back up, but you don't want to back off so much that the TP doesn't actually get treated enough to get better. This, of course, all assumes that it IS a TP that is causing that much pain.

[scotsman]

I've had some triggerpoints that were so painful it felt like the physio was a using salt covered finger to treat an open wound

The only way I got rid of them was to put up with as much as I could each session (which usually had me feeling like I was going to pass out) and eventually the raw-ness lessened until the triggerpoints were away.

Richard.

[Ginty]

I've had some triggerpoints that were so painful it felt like the physio was a using salt covered finger to treat an open wound

Good description, that's exactly what it feels like, it helps to know that you've experienced this and got rid of it.
Thanks

[scotsman]

It's always amazed me that a triggerpoint could feel so raw.

Richard.

[CppsDad]

Whenever my PT hit a bad trigger point, I would almost always ask the same question: "are you sure you aren't hitting any bone in there?". The tough trigger points felt SO solid that it was hard to believe it was just soft tissue. It felt like a knife being driven into my skin. Most of my really bad ones are gone now, but I have to do therapy at least once a week on my own to keep them from reforming. I'm hopeful that eventually, every other week will be allowable.