Rolf Method Structural Integration and its similar goals as Chiropractic
This type of bodywork is a scientifically validated system of body restructuring and movement education that releases your body from lifelong patterns of tension and bracing, permitting gravity to realign you. It has similar goals to chiropractic, but without adjusting the joints. This type of bodywork, unlike other therapies or forms of care that focus on muscles or only on joints, focuses primarily on connective tissue which connect everything together. Connective tissue is made mostly of collagen. It forms in bands beneath the skin to attach, stabilize, enclose, and separate muscles and other internal organs. This work helps correct and rebalance shortened, thickened, and dehydrated connective tissue that restrict and impart joint mobility, muscle function and proper posture alignment.
Rolf Bodywork combined with Chiropractic Care?
In a short answer. Yes! They are a great combination. Rolf Method of Structural Integration can make your chiropractor's adjustments more effective than with adjustment alone.
In chiropractic, they use a quick, high velocity thrust at a specific angle to take the joint past its normal range of motion to realign the joint. Unless the tension and strains in the connective tissue are balanced and reeducated, the bones, which are embedded in this tissue will find their way back into their old habits of misalignment or the tissue will be too stuck to be able to adjust the joint. When this happens, Chiropractors will use a massage therapist to loosen up trigger points around the stuck joint so that it will adjust; however, many times massage will not even free the area to be adjusted by the Chiropractor in some people. Rolf Structural Therapy balances the connective tissue imbalances using specialized training to elongate and realign connective tissue in the proper plane of motion so the bones fall back into their natural alignment while allowing more permanent posture change to occur. Rolf posture balancing has a neural muscular re-educating effect that addresses the cause of pain in a more effective way. Chiropractic alone is usually more focused on adjusting the joint. Rolf Method Structural Integration alone is more focused on the connective tissue and the body's aligned relationship to gravity. Chiropractic and Rolf work can be highly effective when combined.
