03/06/2019
In Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy, we are working with the fluids of the body. Fascia is a semifluid substance that surrounds everything. Through its many complex and interconnected layers, the work we do in one area of the body has a positive effect on every other part of the system. It is the reason that some people get up from a BCST session and feel that they have just received the perfect massage. It is only very recently that we have developed cameras small enough to observe this tissue in its living state.
TISSUE QUALITY
The concept of body tissues being “healthy” is often discussed in therapy and training practices. Is tissue quality determined by “macro” characteristics such as strength, flexibility, tension or fibrosis? As these magnified fascia pictures help us see, micro dictates macro and the “tissue quality” is a by-product of the micro environment of its components. These pictures show the fascia is a network of “water tubes”. The primary component of fascial tissue is WATER. The work of Dr. G. Pollack has shown us that water changes it’s fundamental composition when it lives inside our fascial tissues. In the fascia, water molecules undergo a constant transition from “free water” to “bound water”. Free water is what we commonly know as H2O and is in its most fluid state. But this is only one phase of water in the body, the other is when the water molecules bind with hydrophilic (water-loving) tissues such as collagen, another component of fascia. Once the water interacts with collagen, the water literally changes composition into H3O2 and becomes Gel-Water (bound water). This is what Dr. Pollack calls the 4th Phase of Water and a major key to tissue quality. This Gel-water is more lubricating and behaves like a trampoline when compressed, making the tissues more viscoelastic and compliant to forces. Exercise and manual techniques that influence hydrodynamics (fluid flow) can help stimulate this conversion at the deep tissue level and improve our tissue quality. Slow, long duration tissue stretching in manual therapy has been shown to stimulate these positive molecular-chemical changes in the tissue after 3 minutes of loading (Standley, Pollack). Once established, the tissue can be more compliant to dynamic tissue loads such as those in athletics. One can’t have an optimal environment for healing or developing strength/mobility without this micro tissue quality!
