Ribcage Ache · 16 May 2008
I am hearing about ribcage pain from so many. It’s in the deepest forward bends but also the deeper backbends, a bony ache. Maybe it’s the intercostals; maybe it’s in the bones. I don't know if you're all experiencing something similar or not.
For one person I’m hearing there is a sharp catching in which might be the pleurae—the membranes that encase the lungs. Does anyone else get that?
I don’t know about the ribcage ache. I did, early on, snap an intercostal muscle right off—ping, just like that—the one of two dramatic ashtanga injuries I’ve sustained. And occasionally—if I have a big sublaxation high in the spine—I’ll get a sharp tug on a single intercostal attachment just like the sensation that preceded that tear. But that is another topic.
The people who tell me about their ribcages tell me the ache goes away eventually.
Meantime, if the ache is with you, something else for consideration. In anatomy, they say muscles do concentric and eccentric contraction. In sports medicine, there is talk of stretching and counter-stretching. So I am wondering, if you are stretching your ribcage in new ways that are causing stress, doesn’t it make sense to balance this by stretching it from the inside?
I have no idea, but here are two things that happen when I started pranayama practice two years ago. (Sama vritti followed by the first three ashtanga pranayamas.) First, my lung capacity increased dramatically in a short period of time. I had no idea of my lungs or what they could really do before I started lengthening my breath in sama vritti. The first few week were freaky, but control and depth came quickly.
Second, I came to ache for the inside-intercostal stretch of puraka kumbhaka (inhale retention). The same way the frontal hips or the groins ache to be stretched in the afternoons or evenings as the hips begin to open. The same feeling (!), but on the inside of the body. So where as a new asana practitioner I would sneak to my office to stretch the hips, as a new pranayama practitioner I would take these deep, long-held breaths while sitting at the Wilshire/Westwood stoplights or walking across the quad. Pranayama works on the mind-body boundary—all breathing is a play of "spirit," whatever that is. A lot of what is happening in that practice is facing fear, experiencing first-hand your raw love for your life and freezing it for a moment, playing with the heartrate, tripping yourself out on oxygen-deprivation. Nevermind that, honestly. It’s weird.
But the purely physical stretching of the ribcage from the inside is too nice not to experience. It is like being massaged by gentle water-balloons, inside and behind your ache.
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Categories: astanga yoga
, having a body
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I’ve been informed before that various ribcage aches of mine were due to a stretched plura but I don’t believe that. The plura is much more stretchable than are the muscles, which are more securely limited because they’re attached to ribs and other rigid elements. I discovered that a particular ache I had for many years, beginning during childhood, and that was described as a “stretched plura,” was actually due to a rib bone whose end once in a while became misaligned with its mating joint. Chiropractors popped it back for me with no problem but then I took up this here yoga and it’s never been a problem since.
Also due to the yoga, I’ve been correcting a sideways arch in my spine, which caused some misalignments of the ribs at their joints with the vertebrae. Each morning when I get out of bed, I pop these back with little trouble.
For me, the rib misalignments bring a range of achiness from dull immobility of a particular region to an intense, breath-inhibiting sharpness that’s felt when the area is flexed. When I was a kid, I used to lie on my side, reading in bed and I got that kind of pain now and then. When I was about 9 or 10 or so, I happened across an article in Readers Digest that described a similar kind of pain and attributed it to angina. So for a few years I thought that I had occasional bouts of angina.
There’s a distinct difference in feeling for me between muscles that have been worked and stretched, and soft tissue that’s impinged by misaligned bony parts. If it’s a shallow ache that kinda feels good, then I know it’s purely muscular. If the ache causes me to feel like I shouldn’t move a particular way or it causes any sort of limitation of motion — other than simply tightness that comes from exertion — then it’s due to a ribcage or spinal bone that’s been bumped out of place.
Pranayama practice rocks. I need to do it more. It’s one of the most amazing things I’ve done for myself.
Posted by: Carl · May 17, 11:33 AM · #
I’m in rib stretch mode. Yes, it hurts, though less than the learning supta kurmasana collar bone pain. And yes, there is a definite sweetness to the rib/backbend pain.
I always understood that I had tightness to work out of my hips. I am surprised how off-the-radar my rib tightness was, though. Now that I’m digging into it, it seems obvious — but I had absolutely no awareness of it beforehand.
Posted by: karen · May 17, 12:33 PM · #
“had for many years, beginning during childhood…intense, breath-inhibiting sharpness that’s felt when the area is flexed.”
Carl, this sounds really similar to my experience. Left side of the ribcage, just below center chest, in an arc of varying size, sometimes all the way from the outside to sternum. Lasting anywhere from 2 seconds to 15 minutes. Variable intensity. All sensation of discomfort goes away when I hold my breath and don’t move—sensation’s 100% connected to a threshold with ribcage expansion (from inhaling), as well as some twisting motions. Where the threshold is set (i.e., how deep I can inhale before hitting it) is variable also.
First came on sometime in pre-adolescence and persists into my early 30s. But from this long view, it’s been really intermittent. In adolescence it was pretty regular and my pediatrician called it “growing pains” (some diagnosis, huh?). Well, I’m grown. There have been stretches of maybe as long as 6 months where it never comes up. Other times, it’s more regular.
But in the past week or so—since coming back into a more intense practice after 3 weeks or so of half-assedness—it’s been flaring up daily, either with the full blown sharp pain scenario, or, more often, with a sort of proto-pain irritation that threatens to bring it unless I back off, stretch, and give it a massage.
My theory is that this most recent bout has to do with starting to practice the Bhuja Pindasana-to-Baddha Konasana B series of postures, and trying to get more hardcore about pickups. Lots of strange forward contractions.
But maybe it’s just a rib.
Sorry, rambling about physicality. Something I really really (really) try not to do (and don’t think I’ve ever done in public). Damn the OWL and her “physical turn”!
Posted by: R · May 18, 07:03 PM · #
I am speechless.
Posted by: (0v0) · May 18, 09:43 PM · #
Carl, now when you get this sensation of a rib bumped out of place, what do you do?
Who told you that your pleurae were stretched?
Posted by: (0v0) · May 18, 09:44 PM · #
Owl, relating to others one’s physical and internal changes must be among the oldest traditions of yoga. Whether it’s due to blogging that allows folks to be candid about these things, I don’t know, but it’s interesting and helpful. At the very least, it gives me some amount of foresight into what I’ll be bringing on to myself.
My ribs don’t seem to displace painfully anymore. That was a condition that only affected the mid-rib joints, or whatever they’re called. But mostly, I sat still and breathed very calmly and slowly until the pain went away. There wasn’t much else I could do, the pain was so intense. But it always went away within a few minutes.
Backbends mostly just stretch my abdominals yet so we’ll see what interesting changes the future may hold for my ribcage.
Posted by: Carl · May 19, 10:01 AM · #