Fascia: The Missing Link in Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes, Hypermobility, and Chronic Pain
Why pain, instability, fatigue, and “tightness” in EDS and hypermobility may have less to do with isolated joints - and more to do with the body’s interconnected connective tissue system.
Welcome back to The Bendy Bulletin! One of the most painful phrases many patients with Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes (EDS) and hypermobility spectrum disorders hear is that their hypermobility is “benign.”
Benign hypermobility should not leave someone living with chronic pain, recurrent injuries, exhaustion, instability, and a body that feels impossible to trust.
And yet, many people are still told their imaging is “normal,” their labs are “fine,” or that nothing significant explains why they hurt so much.
Part of the problem may be that we have historically focused too narrowly on joints and muscles, while overlooking one of the body’s most important connective tissue systems: fascia.
Over the past several years, fascia research has expanded dramatically, and it is changing how many clinicians and researchers think about pain, movement, proprioception, and connective tissue disorders. In conversations on the Bendy Bodies Podcast with fascia educator Jill Miller and physiatrist/researcher Dr. Tina Wang, we explored how fascia may help explain many of the symptoms hypermobile patients experience every day, especially symptoms that do not fit neatly into traditional orthopedic models.
Today, I want to help connect some of those dots.
What Is Fascia?
