We spend a lot of time focusing on stretching shoulders and chest, but how often do you consider the sides of your shoulders? Your body is 3D and your fascias don’t care if they are on the top, bottom, front, back or side of you – it’s all interconnected.

Even when the shoulders are healthy, it can be quite intense to go after the rotator cuff with a therapy ball and even more so if there is any injury or overuse going on. But thankfully for you, there is an indirect path to resolving rotator cuff issues via another muscle… the deltoid.

The deltoid is a muscle on the side of the shoulder that gives it its shape. It has three parts to it (an anterior/front, medial/middle, and posterior/back) that help to move the humerus (upper arm bone) into abduction, flexion and extension. The swinging of your arms while you’re walking? Deltoid has a bit to do with that. It also is involved if you reach out to the side to grab something.

The anterior deltoid (the front most part) can often have many painful trigger points and adhesions from hours the hours we spend with our shoulders in front of us, typing on keyboards, driving, eating, reading…the list goes on.

The deltoid/rotator cuff connection is due to the fact that the deltoid sits directly on top of the rotator cuff tendons on the head of the humerus.

If the deltoid is stiff and crispy, that can potentially inhibit motion in the rotator cuff.

Because your body is an interconnected system of systems, feeding slack into one area can spill into neighboring areas. In this case, getting more motion into the deltoid will release tension, enhance fluid flow and improve hydration and doing this for the deltoid can spill over into the rotator cuff.

Check out my video below for my favorite shoulder relief with deltoid massage!

Get the products used in this video HERE