Trigger Point Release and Fascial Lengthening
The sternoclediomastoid muscle can house several trigger points causing headaches and other pain in the areas shown here in red. Release them with trigger point therapy.As much as tight muscles can encourage trigger point formation, trigger points keep muscles perpetually tight. It's like a feedback loop that keeps repeating. When the trigger point is released or dissolved, the muscle will be allowed to relax. Some trigger points are so powerful that they can be responsible for creating what is called "satellite" trigger points in other muscles. So not only do they cause pain in their own referral zones (see the red patterning) but they can cause other muscles to be tight through neural pathways and fascial connections. Sometimes when these "key" trigger points are released, satellite trigger points are released simultaneously without the therapist ever knowing it. This is why it is so important that a therapist work thoroughly and not just where it hurts. The SCM muscle in particular is known for housing key trigger points.
Myofascial release therapy can help to loosen and lengthen fascia which can then release muscles that have been bound up in adhesions and kept dysfunctional.Along the same lines, tight fascia can keep muscles perpetually tight. Fascia that has been put in a shortened position for a too long (like the hips sitting in forward flexion at a desk all day) can affect the tone of associated muscle fibers. The fascia can tug at, bunch up with and adhere to muscle that it touches. Also, when fascia arranges itself into a jumbled formation in an overworked area such as your upper shoulder blade and begins to harden, then you may find what is known as a "knot" formed there. These painful areas are adhered fascia (essentially scar tissue) compromising the length, function and tension of the muscle fibers beneath.
Lengthening fascia, breaking up fascial adhesions and releasing trigger points all contribute to muscles being better able to respond to massage and therefore experience change in tonicity.