Let’s start with what you might be feeling.
A sharp, stabbing pain down the back of your leg.
Tingling in your fingers or toes.
A dull, deep ache that just won’t shift.
Burning between your shoulder blades.
Or a strange numbness that creeps into your arms, hands, feet — sometimes even into your face or head.
People often call this a “trapped nerve.” But what’s really going on?
What Is a Trapped Nerve, Really?
“Trapped nerve” is a broad, non-medical term that simply means a nerve is being irritated, compressed, or inflamed — usually somewhere along its path between the spine and the body part it’s trying to serve.
The job of a nerve is to carry messages from the brain to the body, and back again. When something presses on or irritates the nerve — whether it’s a disc, bone, joint, tight muscle, inflammation, or postural collapse — those messages get scrambled. And that’s when symptoms start.
You might experience:
• Radiating or shooting pain
• Pins and needles or “electric shock” sensations
• Numbness, weakness, or a heavy, dead feeling
• Burning, deep aches, or hypersensitivity
Where the symptoms show up depends on which nerve is affected and where it’s being irritated. And this is where people get confused…
The pain is rarely the source.
Just because you feel the pain in your hand, arm, leg, or foot doesn’t mean that’s where the problem is. Most often, the issue begins at the spine — even if your back doesn’t hurt.
What Actually Causes the Nerve to Get “Trapped”?
There’s almost always a deeper, structural issue underneath.
Common causes include:
• Disc bulges or herniations compressing spinal nerves
• Misaligned vertebrae closing down the nerve openings (called foramen)
• Postural collapse shifting the spine out of its natural position
• Tight, overworked muscles bracing to compensate for instability
• Previous injuries (even ones you’ve “recovered” from) leaving hidden imbalances
• Repetitive strain or poor posture loading the spine unevenly
In other words:
The nerve is the victim. Not the villain.
It’s being irritated because something else in the body isn’t right — and that “something” has usually been building for a long time.
Can Chiropractic Help?
Yes — when the problem is structural, chiropractic care can help significantly.
But it depends on the type of chiropractic.
We don’t “crack the nerve” or “put it back in.” Instead, chiropractic techniques like the one we use here at The Backstory (Advanced Biostructural Correction™ (ABC)) are designed to identify and correct the misalignments your body can’t fix on its own — the ones that are likely creating the nerve irritation in the first place.
The result?
• Less pressure on the nerve
• Better posture and spinal alignment
• A nervous system that can communicate freely again
• Symptoms that start to ease — not because they were masked, but because the body was corrected
What About Disc Herniations?
People are often surprised to hear: we don’t treat the disc directly.
What we do is correct the structure around it — helping the spine decompress naturally. When that happens, the pressure on the disc reduces, inflammation calms down, and the nerve gets a chance to recover.
And yes — we’ve seen many patients avoid surgery this way.
So How Does It Actually Work?
The nerves that control your muscles, organs, limbs, and sensations all pass through or near the spine. If the spine is misaligned, tilted, compressed, or under strain, it can interfere with those nerves — often subtly, at first. Over time, that subtle dysfunction builds up into symptoms.
We focus on removing that interference.
By restoring proper spinal alignment and taking stress off the nervous system, the body can begin to heal — not just feel better for a day or two.
Final Thought
If you’ve been told you have a trapped nerve… or you’re just dealing with strange, persistent symptoms and haven’t found answers — don’t just chase the pain. Find the cause.
Nerves don’t get trapped for no reason.
And when you correct what’s underneath the problem, that’s when real change begins.
