A three part article on Carpal Tunnel that covers: What is Carpal Tunnel, How Tai Chi Provides Relief, and How to Develop a Squid-Like Hand.

Part I: What is Carpal Tunnel

All repetitive stress arises when one or two anatomical spots take the full brunt, strain, and pressure of whatever action you incessantly repeat to get a job done. The carpal tunnel is the space between the wrist bones and the ligament that holds the bones together. The median nerve is located there. The carpal tunnel space is naturally rigid, so if the soft tissues in the area swell, they compress the median nerve, resulting in hand pain and weakness. Repetitive movement of the wrists, such as prolonged typing or use of a computer mouse, can cause such swelling and lead to carpal tunnel syndrome.

Computer Users Take a Pounding

Using computers requires you bend your wrists and move your fingers to strike keys and move a mouse, often at similar bad angles, millions and millions of time. Striking a computer key starts a tiny force wave that emanates from the point of origin, either in the fingers or wrist. This flowing wave will naturally move though and exit whatever is in its path, until it hits a bad angle where the wave is stopped and the impact lodges in a tiny specific, localized area. Usually the first stop is some point in the wrist for the fingers, or in the forearm or elbow for the wrist. At this point, the tiny force from your fingers transmits directly to that part of the arm, hitting like a lightweight hammer until every keystroke is painful.

Pain Spreads from Fingers Upwards

If the force wave gets stuck in a joint, tendon or ligament, rather than passing through it, it lodges there progressively causing damage. That is, for as long as the spring in the soft tissues can handle it. When the soft tissues can’t take any more, the force wave seeks each next new weak angle, one at a time, damaging them progressively in the same way. This process worsens the previous weak point as the force wave continues on the way to the next vulnerable spot. Over time this gentle but constant pounding strains and damages your wrist. After the wrist becomes habituated to hitting bad angles, a series of progressive strains and recurring pains happens within in the forearm, and then travels to the elbow, to the shoulders and shoulder blades, the next muscles, and then to the neck, vertebrae, etc.

Cumulative Effects of Strain

These small pressures and strains on discrete pinpoint parts of the hand and wrist, etc. cause cumulative effects, just like single drops of water over time can dent and eventually wear holes through solid rock. After your muscles tire, the ligaments and tendons take over until they progressively lose their spring and become fatigued. This destabilizes your wrist’s fascia. This in turn unravels the full function of relevant soft tissues and bones that connect to the next adjoining piece of soft tissue in your palm. This binds and constricts the connective soft tissues and bones and they begin cumulatively to tighten. The blood vessels then become overloaded, tissues inflame and swell, nerve roots and carpal tunnel sheaths get irritated—resulting in dysfunction, the loss of finger and arm strength, and significant pain.

For more information: Tai Chi: Health for Life by Bruce Frantzis