Shouldn’t it hurt?
In: Biology
I work at a PT Clinic as a PT Tech and my boss (who has a DPT and is a PT) actually talked about this to a patient one day because they were in the topic of chiropractor and how he doesn’t think it’s a good method of treatment.
He basically said that when you pop something like your back for example, it immediately sends a signal to your brain that tells those muscles around your back to relax and gives immediate relief to that area and it feels really good. However, the relax feeling wears off and those muscles that were told to relax by the brain eventually go back to where they were. This is why he doesn’t believe in seeing a chiropractor for pain because usually what you see a chiropractor for is almost always muscle imbalances/tightness in the body and it will feel great and amazing for a bit, but eventually the muscles will go back to the state they were in before you popped whatever it is you popped.
You’re basically relieving pressure build up and releasing endorphins. It’s similar to stretching first thing in the morning and helps you feel refreshed.
My theory is that it’s a combination of the stretching of your muscles and tendons that make it feel better and relieves the stiffness. The other is that you’re redistributing synovial fluid and the disturbance of the popping of bubbles in and out of solution kind lubes everything up.
I am totally making that up but I do pop my joints often.
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