Informed Isn’t the Same as Correct

“The ease with which you can be convinced of something is based on how much you want to be convinced of it, so always subtract your desire to believe from available evidence.”

—Gurwinder Bhogal

Fascia is one of the hottest health and wellness darlings on social media these days. Thanks to the internet, podcasts, social media, and ChatGPT and other AI platforms, our clients and patients are coming in more informed about their body than ever—especially when it comes to fascia. But how many people are coming to see us because of misinformation from social media? While many people seeking out massage therapy and fascia-informed bodywork are more informed, it doesn’t mean they’re better informed.

Those well-meaning people online aren’t always wrong, but they can be far from right. And there have always been people ready and willing to exploit the latest trends. Often, good, sensible information online is overshadowed by the sensational. The sensational often rises to the top of the algorithm. And that means we need to level up.  

Wayward Knowledge

Let’s look at some social media posts about fascia and apply critical thinking.  

“Ugly Cry”

A video with 5.2 million views shows singer LeAnn Rimes receiving what appears to me like a rather forceful intraoral treatment. She starts to “ugly cry.” After she’s done crying, she expresses surprise at how much tension she had in that area of her body. The accompanying text purports the video shows: 

1. “A physical letting go of things we didn’t even know we were carrying.”
2. “The exact moment the tension breaks and the emotional weight lifts, leaving her visibly lighter and more aligned.”
3. And that using these “maneuvers signal safety to the nervous system,” which allows for “stored energy to move.”

Let’s examine these claims point by point:

1. Absolutely the video shows this. Whether we’re treating a trigger point referral, a path of interconnected fascial tension, or something similar, we’ve all heard a client say: “Wow. I didn’t know I hurt there.”
2. We see the moment the tension breaks—after the practitioner’s gloved finger is removed. The crying begins. Afterward, Rimes is much calmer. The way it’s edited, we don’t actually know how much time elapses until she calms down. She appears “visibly lighter,” perhaps because she’s no longer crying? Is she more aligned? We are shown nothing about her alignment before the treatment and the camera angle gives no visual markers. We’ll just have to believe the text. Does that constitute proof?
3. Given the treatment as shown, I see no such safety signals. Do you?

One Frequency Only?

A post with over 10,000 likes and 4,200 shares claims: “One sound can completely restructure your fascia.” That’s a bold claim. The research cited, if you can find it, are two papers about using shockwave therapy, which uses acoustic waves to promote healing. I’ve seen it used successfully for pain after joint replacement and used it myself for an Achilles tendon injury. It takes multiple treatments that last 10–15 minutes, and the frequencies used vary from treatment to treatment. That’s a long way away from “one sound.” And, for as magical as sound baths and as mystical as music can be, the use of the phrase “completely restructure” strongly suggests a much more magical result.

Quantum Biology?

Speaking of magic, quantum biology is another trend being used to explain the more mysterious properties of fascia. An emerging but non-mainstream branch of science, quantum biology claims that events on the subatomic level influence larger, complex biological processes. How small are we talking about? A molecule is made of even smaller atoms, each of which has a nucleus that is 100,000 times smaller. If you picture an atom as the size of a baseball stadium, the nucleus would be a baseball on the pitcher’s mound. And everything in the molecule, except the empty space, is made of smaller subatomic, or quantum, particles. 

The idea that something on such a tiny scale could have an impact on our large bodies is a tantalizing but so far unproven concept. For every physicist who says it does, there’s another who says it doesn’t. I’m open to the idea, but my math isn’t good enough to know who’s right. And even if it’s true, it doesn’t help me treat a frozen shoulder successfully.

Subscribe Away Your Age

Another post with over 72,000 likes and 53,000 shares/reposts states your physical problems aren’t because your fascia is “aging,” nor are they because your fascia is “stuck.” Just try the movement exercise shown in the video and buy a subscription to more movement videos and all your problems will be solved.

Stuck Happens

When it comes to fascia, we really do get “stuck.” I learned that from a toddler.

Eric was 3 years old when his mother brought him to see me. He was developmentally slow for his age and extremely nonverbal but did not fit any particular diagnoses. I was part of his treatment team (which included a speech pathologist). Clinically, I was able to palpate a coherent line of tension in this little guy. Using the Anatomy Trains model, I assessed he had a tight superficial back line. So, I treated that pattern—often 10 minutes of contact time in a 30-minute appointment. He was, after all, 3.

During his fifth treatment, Eric was curled up on the sofa in my treatment room with a blanket pulled over him. I let him have such freedoms because it was easier for me to adapt to him than the other way around. I was treating his plantar fascia. Eric pulled the blanket down, looked me right in the eye, and said, “Stuck.” 

“Yes, stuck!” I replied, pointing at his foot. I mimed therapy motions with my hands and said: “Unstuck.” We went back and forth like that several times. He got it (and I thought about hiring him to be my director of marketing).

Unstuck Happens Too

Stuck often happens because of a change in viscosity of hyaluronan (or hyaluronic acid), the biological WD-40 that exists between the epimysia, the more discrete fascial coverings of each muscle. Generated by a cell called a fasciacyte, hyaluronan keeps muscles gliding on each other. 

Injury, surgery, and immobility can contribute to this miracle lubricant undergoing densification, a literal thickening of this fluid. Muscles stop gliding on each other and, like snags in a sweater, movement becomes difficult. It will also generate painful, nociceptive signals because the specialized nerve endings located in the sliding zones between the epimysium of one muscle and another don’t like it either. Fortunately, shearing motions that treat the tissue at parallel angles that mimic layers sliding on each other (instead of straight-up compression or stretching) stimulate the fasciacytes to produce fresh hyaluronan and restore glide. 

I told a research colleague that I was writing a book, The Fascia Connection, about the importance of fascia for the general public. I was surprised when they couldn’t understand why someone who wasn’t a clinician or researcher would want to read such a book. I wrote this book to empower people with better information, to understand their body better, and to make better-informed choices. Likewise, it was impossible for me to write it without it being informed by over 30 years of clinical practice and two decades of being immersed in the research. I hope it’s delivered in a way that gives every reader a deeper understanding of fascia that they can explain in their own words. That’s true empowerment.

A Deeper Dive—A Fascia Self-Care Exercise

Ida Rolf, creator of structural integration, said if she could only treat one area, it would be the complex around the 12th rib. A crucial hub to over a dozen myofascial units (including the obliques, quadratus lumborum, and diaphragm), this complex is a hub for the torso, lumbar spine, and pelvis.

This one simple stretch is a great reliever and reviver.¹ It’s also the single stretch I recommend to my patients at UPMC, and I encourage you to share with your clients. 

1. Stand with your feet comfortably wider than your hips.
2. Raise your right arm toward the ceiling and then extend your arm farther. Reach up as if you could touch the ceiling. Simultaneously, push into the ground with your right foot, creating a sense of length along your entire right side. (Now you’re creating traction, which engages the fascial tissue.) What do you feel, and where do you feel it? How far down do you feel it? To your rib cage? Your waist? Maybe even all the way into your legs and feet? Good.
3. Bend to your left at the waist, as far as you can comfortably.
4. Come back to center. What do you feel? 

Try this again but focus your breathing to engage the diaphragm.

Repeat steps 1–3.

4. Engage the diaphragm by breathing deeply.
5. Exhale and come back to center.
6. Repeat two more times.

Take a brief walk around your treatment room or down the hall. Notice the difference in the side you stretched and the side you didn’t.

Now, do three on the opposite side.

Note

1. Adapted from The Fascia Connection (Hachette/Balance 2026) by David Lesondak and used with permission.