Has anyone tried cupping (hijama) therapy?

I have not tried cupping, but know a little about it. I've tried many other alternative muscle/fascia/forced circulation healing methods, and do some on my own.

As far as detoxing, its not going to do anything internal deep besides detox your muscle/fascia tissues by a combination of what I call "forced circulation" and breaking capillaries (bruising) for re-healing.

I just did my home version of Graston and Gua-Sha this morning:

/trainedto.com/iastm/gua-sha-vs-graston-what-is-the-difference/

I wrote a post titled "muscle scraping" last week, but of course that sounds so bazaar to people here that it was mostly ignored.

I'm thinking cupping is easier where you can reach. I can do Graston/Gua-Sha/"muscle scraping" myself using a smooth bathroom counter top edge on my hamstrings, a besnt stainless tube and a theracane where I can reach better. I use Arnica Montana gel instead of old people smelling menthol gels. I learned from a practitioner / chiro and seen that it was not rocket science.

So what I'm mentioning uses rubbing friction or top of skin "scrapping" tools to irritate the tissue and breakdown adhessions and its trail will creat a void to "draw in" new blood for healing. The cupping has similar results from an opposite method- vacuum. This draws up the skin and fascia, creating a void for new blood to flow into. I dont think it would help adhessions as much as my method. However, the cupping works better on irregular body parts like a hip, shoulder ect. The methods I stated are best for smooth longer muscles - legs , arms , low back ect.

With both methods, bruising is what you want. No bruising- no healing. Thats forcing new blood into a damaged area. Old injuries and adhessions have low blood flow, thus sometimes never fully heal.

The studded firmer foam fitness rollers would work on a similar principle if you could roll fast and hard enough to bruise your skin. Just rolling is still good maintenance though.

For deeper muscle or tendon issues, trigger point therapy or active release technique is better with deep pressure (thumb, golf ball, theracane ect), but takes more applications.

Info overload? I'll stop now lol.

Lyme Forum Mod

Post Edited (astroman) : 11/25/2017 7:11:33 PM (GMT-7)

Well.............I was a worse case example, and I'm fixing tissue issues that have added up from 25-30 years. Yes its working, slowly. I've incorporated this with all those other forms of tissues healing I mentioned.

I was a wreck with many muscles sticking to each other that should slide over, and hard adhesions/knots from old injuries that would not heal properly.

When doing this alone, the different techniques make it possible to treat my whole body. I've saved about 5K over the years self treating all this. I would like to try the cupping on my left shoulder, lots of kits for it out there. Before ABX, I had less progress with my treatments, the lyme was still there, prob candida too as it was in my blood. But it was still better than doing nothing.

I kind of go crazy treating certain areas sometimes daily, then let them heal and workout again noting any improvements. Not enough and not much progress. Too much and I'm too sore. Its a fine line.

Any of these treatments will work better than just PT- and regular chiro can not repair tissue, it just realigns joints. Joints get out of place from muscle and tendon tension, so loosening tissue will help chiro adjustment stay in place.

Graston (company owners last name) is just a modern version of ancient Chinese Gua Sha incorporated into Western chiro P/T clinics with patented scraping tools. He only "invented" the muscle tools he sells, NOT the technique. There are a couple others out there to with trademarked names. Another company does the same thing with what looks like a plastic car window ice scraper tool. You can almost trademark a fart sound now days LOL. Ancient Gua Sha used smooth horn pieces and smooth rocks.

Post Edited (astroman) : 11/25/2017 11:08:05 PM (GMT-7)

I did dry cupping about 20 years ago when I threw my lower back out. He also did heavy duty massage with this big handheld massager. It fixed me right up and I could walk again. I've never done it again though. He moved and I never found anyone else.