Massage for Neuralgia & Nerve Pain in Seattle

Neuralgia is pain that follows the path of a nerve. It can feel like burning, shooting, electric shock, or stabbing, and it tends to come in waves or persist as a constant low-grade fire. Unlike muscle soreness, which you can usually locate and press on, nerve pain often feels like it’s traveling. It might start at the base of your skull and shoot up over your head. It might run along a rib from back to front. It might light up your arm or leg in a line that doesn’t match any single muscle. That traveling quality is the hallmark of neuralgia: the pain follows the nerve, not the muscle.

Common types of neuralgia

Several types of neuralgia are common. Occipital neuralgia affects the greater and lesser occipital nerves at the back of the head, producing sharp pain that radiates from the base of the skull up and over the scalp. It’s frequently misidentified as tension headache or migraine. Trigeminal neuralgia involves the trigeminal nerve in the face and causes intense, electric-shock pain in the jaw, cheek, or forehead. Intercostal neuralgia runs along the nerves between the ribs, creating a band of burning or stabbing pain that wraps around the chest wall. Peripheral neuralgia in the arms and legs can follow any nerve pathway and produce burning, numbness, tingling, or shooting pain. Each type has its own triggers and patterns, but the underlying mechanism is similar: the nerve itself is irritated, inflamed, or being compressed by surrounding tissue.

Neuralgia and nerve compression

There’s an important distinction between nerve compression and neuralgia, though they often overlap. Compression conditions like carpal tunnel syndrome involve sustained mechanical pressure on a nerve, usually from a muscle, ligament, or bony structure. Neuralgia can involve compression but also includes nerve irritation from inflammation, fascial adhesions, scar tissue, or sensitization of the nerve itself. A nerve doesn’t have to be pinched to hurt. It can become irritated where it passes through tight fascia, where scar tissue from an old injury tethers it, or where chronic muscle tension creates enough friction to inflame the nerve sheath. Understanding this distinction matters because treatment that focuses only on releasing compression may miss the fascial and inflammatory components that are keeping the nerve irritated.

How we approach treatment

At Maxwell Massage, Lauren Herring treats neuralgia with neuromuscular therapy, identifying and releasing the specific muscles and trigger points that are compressing or irritating nerves. Her detailed knowledge of nerve pathways allows her to trace symptoms back to the site of irritation and work precisely on the structures involved. Treatment follows the nerve’s route rather than only the place you feel the symptoms, testing for restrictions at each point where it passes through a tight space and using gentle, sustained pressure to free it without flaring it up. For many patients, addressing both the muscular and the fascial contributions produces better results than either alone.

When to seek medical care

If you’re dealing with neuralgia, a few things to know. Facial neuralgia, especially trigeminal neuralgia, needs a medical workup before massage treatment. Sudden onset of nerve pain, particularly if it’s accompanied by progressive weakness, numbness that’s spreading, or changes in bladder or bowel function, warrants a visit to your doctor first. These symptoms can indicate conditions that need medical intervention. For neuralgia that’s been evaluated and cleared by your doctor, or for chronic nerve pain patterns that you’ve been managing for a while, manual therapy can make a real difference. The goal is to calm the irritated nerve by releasing the tissue around it, reduce the tension patterns that contribute to the irritation, and give the nerve space to heal. Progress can be gradual with chronic neuralgia, but most patients notice a reduction in the intensity and frequency of their pain within the first few sessions.