Sometimes I offer someone a treatment simply because I sincerely want to help and notice that many people do not yet know what osteopathy can do for them.
One Saturday, my son (10) told me that a teammate was unable to give his all during an athletics competition due to stabbing pains around the diaphragm. “Couldn’t you treat him sometime?” he asked. Six months earlier, I had already seen this boy sporting with both knees taped. That made me curious. Complaints rarely arise without reason. Now it was the stabbing pains during a long-distance run; before that, it was patellofemoral pain. This is precisely why it is important not only to treat the complaint but also to address the underlying problem.
His father hesitated at first. Was the problem serious enough? Perhaps he had eaten the wrong thing or school-related stress was playing a role. In my view, these are factors that can certainly have an influence, but they are rarely the actual cause. During the examination, my attention was drawn to tension around the central nervous system, specifically in the connective tissue around the brainstem (medulla oblongata) in the upper neck region. From there, an influence can arise on breathing, tension, and physical capacity during exertion.
That tension appeared likely to be traced back to several significant falls at a young age. At the age of 3, he had fallen backward out of a climbing frame and landed hard on the back of his head. At age 5, another hard blow to the back of his head followed after he fell backward from a high chair onto a hard tiled floor, briefly losing consciousness.
After the treatment, his body reacted strongly: first hyperactive, then extremely fatigued. For me, that is often a sign that the body is actually setting something in motion. Three weeks later, I received a wonderful message: a personal record in the 1500 meters. 15 seconds faster. Run with ease. Without any stabbing pains or discomfort. Coincidence? Perhaps. But frankly, I do not believe in that.
What I find interesting about this case is that my choices during a treatment are not based solely on the patient’s story, but primarily on what the body reveals during the examination. If I were to rely only on the complaint and the medical history, then treating the diaphragm would be the obvious choice. After all, that is where the symptoms were. Furthermore, he had recently experienced a significant fall on his stomach where he literally lost his breath. Yet, during the examination, the body first pointed me in a different direction. And that is precisely where the essence of osteopathy lies for me: not only listening to the patient’s story, but above all to what the body itself indicates.
Performance is often sought in harder training. But sometimes the real gain lies in the details. And that is exactly where osteopathy can make the difference.
