Precision Manual Therapy for Persistent and Recurring Pain
Manual therapy and individualized Chinese herbal care in Colorado Springs
I work primarily with people whose pain has continued, returned, or never quite made sense despite previous treatment. Rather than assuming that the first explanation is the right one, I look for things we can actually test: how you move, what changes the familiar symptom, whether nerves appear to be involved, and—when it is relevant—whether sleep, digestion, fatigue, post-viral symptoms or other parts of your health belong in the picture. The goal is to start where the evidence is strongest and keep refining the plan as we learn more. Not sure whether you need manual therapy or Chinese herbal care? You don’t need to decide before contacting me.When treatment helps, but the problem keeps coming back
Sometimes an imaging finding is real but does not explain everything. Sometimes treatment makes an area feel better for a while without changing whatever keeps aggravating it. And sometimes the first explanation simply turns out to be incomplete. That is why I try to build reassessment into treatment from the beginning. If changing something repeatedly changes your familiar problem, that gives us useful information. If it doesn’t, that gives us information too.I may look at the problem in a few different ways
Movement and mechanics
How are you moving? Where is your body taking stress during the activity that bothers you? Does changing the way one area moves change the symptom somewhere else? The point is not to make your body look perfect. It is to find changes that actually matter.Nerves and nervous-system regulation
Sometimes nerve sensitivity or the way a nerve responds to movement is part of the problem. Pain and other protective responses can also be influenced by previous experience, uncertainty, stress, attention and how well the nervous system is adapting to what is happening. That does not mean the symptom is imaginary or “just stress.” It means there may be another part of the problem worth understanding.Internal health and Chinese medicine
Sometimes pain occurs alongside fatigue, poor sleep, digestive problems, headaches, temperature changes, menstrual symptoms or persistent symptoms after an illness. Chinese herbal care can also be used on its own when those kinds of concerns are the main reason for coming in.What does treatment actually look like?
Usually we try to find something recognizable first. Maybe turning your neck produces the familiar pain. Maybe your knee hurts on stairs. Maybe gripping brings on the elbow pain. Maybe sitting reliably produces tingling down your leg.From there, I do most of the experimenting.
I may support or reposition an area, use hands-on treatment, change how a joint or nerve is being stressed, or ask you to repeat a simple movement so we can see whether anything changed. You are not expected to consciously control every part of your body or spend the appointment trying to move perfectly. Sometimes the useful answer is something you eventually learn to do differently yourself. Sometimes the important change comes mostly from treatment on the table. Often it is some combination of the two. The amount I ask you to do should fit both the problem and what is realistically manageable for you. Over time, what happens between appointments becomes just as important as what happens in the office.How do we know whether we’re getting somewhere?
Pain relief matters, but I also look for whether your life is becoming easier. That might mean:- symptoms happen less often or are less intense
- sitting, walking, reaching, exercising or sleeping becomes easier
- a movement that was restricted begins to improve
- an exercise gives you some control over the problem yourself
- flare-ups become shorter or easier to recover from
- improvement continues to hold as visits are spaced farther apart
What are we missing?
Sometimes that means changing the treatment plan. Sometimes it means looking at another part of the problem. Sometimes it means involving another kind of clinician. And sometimes it means deciding that continuing treatment here no longer makes sense.Common reasons people contact me
Low back, buttock and leg pain
Persistent or recurring low-back pain, SI-region pain, sciatica-type symptoms, and numbness or tingling into the leg.Neck, shoulder and arm problems
Neck pain, shoulder pain with reaching or lifting, pain between the shoulder blades, arm symptoms and nerve-related complaints.Headaches and jaw pain
Including headaches with neck or jaw involvement, chronic jaw tension, TMJ/TMD-type symptoms, and painful clicking or aching.Elbow, hand and wrist symptoms
Including tennis-elbow or golfer’s-elbow-type pain, gripping problems, carpal-tunnel-type symptoms, numbness and tingling.Hip, knee and heel pain
Especially problems that keep returning or have not responded well to treating only the painful area.Chinese herbal care
Common concerns include digestive problems, fatigue, disturbed sleep, headaches, menstrual symptoms, chronic sinus complaints, persistent post-viral symptoms and Long COVID.Is this likely to be a good fit?
I am often most useful when a problem has persisted or keeps returning, previous care has only partly helped, or there are still reasonable questions worth investigating. Sometimes the main problem is not simply the symptom itself. You may have seen several people, heard different explanations, tried reasonable treatments, and still feel lost in the middle of it—without a clear sense of what is happening, what matters, or what to do next.Helping you get oriented is part of the work.
That may mean finding something we can treat here, recognizing something that deserves another kind of evaluation, or simply leaving you with a clearer map and a more sensible next step. You don’t need to agree with every idea I have. You don’t need to want a detailed technical explanation. And you don’t need to be perfect about exercises or home treatment. What matters is that we can be honest about what is actually happening and allow the plan to change when the information changes. Sometimes another provider or another type of care makes more sense. That’s useful information too.