Written by I hate hearing people talk about how they can’t do certain exercises any more due to a pain or past injury. I am guilty for this myself. I have had lower back issues for well over a year and have caught myself saying the things I hate to hear other people say. It sucks because exercise is supposed to keep our bodies in shape and able to handle some of the curve balls life tends to throw. So why are so many people hurt!? If your doing everything right then you shouldn’t be hurt at all right!?
What if it’s not the exercise that’s hurting or a specific injury that has messed you up. Stop blaming it on age and lets look at a few things that you CAN CHANGE to make your life better.
This is going to be a multi part blog post. I could write on this stuff for days but wanted to break it up and give little chunks of goodness one day at a time. Here are the first two misunderstood and over looked factors when it comes to pain and “injuries”.
What I want to give you is not a solution to your pain or to instruct you on form but instead an insight into an evaluation technique that you see a lot of chiropractors and physical therapist use to evaluate their patient.
I mean this is PH.D information for free! That’s pretty cool…well maybe not PH.D but it’s pretty legit stuff!!
Check for muscle imbalances: This is a common theme you see in a lot of the big gyms around town. The guys who look like their upper body is being folded in half down the center of their body….kinda like a taco. These dudes have overdeveloped chests and weak backs. That’s pretty basic elementary info though.
What about someones gait or shoulder height when comparing the left and right. Things like uneven hips, poor gait, and slouched shoulders can cause pain that isn’t even localized to that area. Your body is one big kinetic chain which means if your gait (how you walk) is jacked up it could be throwing your hips out of whack, which could be throwing off your back causing shoulder pain which could be the reason why the right side of your neck is tight and why you keep getting headaches. I know that’s a lot of information all at once but take a sec and read back over it…it’s the truth.
Start thinking outside of the box when it comes to things that hurt. So your neck hurts huh? Look in the mirror and see how your shoulders lay. Are they even? Take your fingers and find your “hip bone” do they look like they are two different hights? All these red flags are key players in any evaluation.
Posture is the problem: This is a play off of the first one but I wanted to break it up. Your daily decisions affect your posture. Sure you can gain muscle imbalances which lead to poor posture but the posture issues I am talking about are self inflicted.
You sit at a desk all day; ten bucks says your hips are super tight, your shoulders are a little rounded and if you use a computer either your right or left shoulder aches which occasionally makes it’s way into your neck. These are issues caused by A) your job B) the decisions you make at your job. In order to start correcting these issues you need to start paying attention to what your doing. Don’t rest your arm on your desk while using the mouse. It’s not the use of the mouse that’s messing you up it’s the over use and constantly keeping that shoulder in that position for hours on end.
When we are put in a position where we are sitting or standing for long periods of time your body wants to do it in the most efficient way possible. This is not necessarily a good thing. You get lazy you start to drop your shoulders, hunch your back, release your core muscle, favor one leg over the other etc. (to name a few). These are the things that are making you hurt. The leg that you favor is more than likely going to be more impacted and tighter than the other causing imbalances and pain.
Computer chairs suck unless you spend at least $450 on it.
Stop using the back rest of your chair.
Start sitting straight up and relying on your core muscles to keep you upright. It will suck at first and could potentially make your sore. That’s because your back rest acts as your core muscles for the 6-8 hours that your at work.
So why are you telling us about this stuff!?
Because this is the stuff that could potentially allow you to press, pull and squat comfortably with out any pain.
to your strength and mobility,
William
