Excessive Force and RSI

I was driving a bright red plastic economy rental car with no acceleration through Connecticut when I realized I had a death grip on the steering wheel.

You see I had been visiting my parents at their home in NJ and decided to drive up to Massachusetts to visit a couple of friends. I stayed overnight and would have had to dig the car out of 4 inches of snow the next morning had it not been towed already for snow plowing. It was January –why I picked that month –I don’t know…ugh. I’ve been living in Southern California for over a decade –so I can wear shorts and a t-shirt in January not layers, coats and gloves. Ok, I admit it I’m a weather wimp. I like it hot.

Eventually, I get the car back and I’m on my way to mom and dad’s in NJ. I know the car wants to slip and slide and I haven’t driven in snow for a long time. (In Los Angeles rain is a big deal weather event) Fortunately the highways were fairly clear. Yet there I was gripping the steering wheel with a death grip. I’m sure there were white knuckles under my red leather gloves. I caught this after 2 hours of driving. When I let go I relaxed and realized that overpowering the steering wheel was not any more effective at controlling the car and it was putting considerable tension throughout my body and mind.

As a physical therapist I see this behavior frequently in working with those who have RSI and nerve entrapment conditions (like thoracic outlet syndrome or cubital tunnel.) One reason this happens is because as the injury progress the nerve is becomes more damaged. So initially the sensory component of the nerve is affected. This is the part that transfers the information from the external world to your hand to the spinal cord to the brain. When this is impinged you can experience odd sensations in the fingers perhaps ‘falling asleep’ feeling or tingling. Then as the condition worsens it affects the motor component. This is the part where the signal from your brain travels via the spinal cord into the arm to the muscles that operate your fingers so your can move and do things. And if this is impinged then the movement that was directed does not get executed properly. So sometimes people with these conditions drop items and describe the experience as having “butter fingers” –and this is one of the symptoms of carpal tunnel or RSI.

The feedback loop from brain to arm & hand and back can get a bit fuzzy over a long course of injury. Changes in perception and in brain processing can occur.

The lack of strength from deprived neural input to the muscles also sets the system up to recruit greater than the necessary amount of motor units. The result is the force applied to lift a 50 lbs suitcase is used to lift an 8oz glass of water. This is excessive force. So is white-knuckling a pen for writing. And when you generate great tension in your arms for using the computer this is excessive force. Co-contracting, muscle tightening on both sides of the forearm, will further squeeze blood vessels and nerves here. In this way it can easily aggravate the forearm musculature and tendons leading to tendonitis (inflammation on the tendons) or the overuse syndromes.

The excessive use of force fatigues the system more quickly and therefore the endurance for daily activities is lessened. The trick is to pay attention and only use the amount required and no more.

Using Conscious Direction

Conscious direction can retrain the body and improve/regain important sensitivity.

Doing less for greater control may at first seem counter intuitive. Understandably some people equate this to being ‘lazy’. Actually a more accurate interpretation is a movement towards elegance and efficiency. Doing the amount that is necessary and no more. There is a beauty and simplicity that leads to dexterity and coordination that over efforting will never accomplish.

And so as I loosened my grip tension was released from the hand, forearm, shoulder, neck, and jaw…my mind lightened up…and breathing relaxed and deepened …and my responses were quicker…a much safer way to travel.

Experiment for yourself this type of letting go and you be delighted in what you discover.