Are you one of those people that keep breaking down and getting injured? Whether it’s from exercise, leisure activities or even work, you must be doing something wrong for this to keep happening. If this is the case, maybe it’s time to re-evaluate what your doing. This is a conversation I have with my clients time and time again. Okay, there will be some people with a physical issue that puts their body under pressure (leg length discrepancy, etc.) but most of the time, certainly with those that are active, it’s down to their planning and programming. So if this… read more →
I was browsing through some other local therapist websites recently, just to check on what they were offering and the range of charges. On one site in particular, the therapist said he didn’t believe in people having maintenance sessions (it was Osteopathy). I found this quite surprising but after thinking about it for a while, the only reason I could think of was that financially, it was better for the therapist to see someone multiple times for an injury rather than once every so often for maintenance. This is where I disagree. Let’s look at some other examples in our… read more →
Lots of clients, especially those with low back pain or those that run, ask why the Glutes are so prone to switching off or going weak. They are one of the first things I test with most clients. We call this Glute Amnesia or Lazy Ass Syndrome! So lets look at a few reasons this muscle group causes so many issues. The Gluteus muscle group comprise of the Maximus, the Medius and Minimus. They make up what we would call the buttocks, posterior and lateral pelvic muscles. I always regard this group as the most important group of muscles apart… read more →
Following up on the recent post about an example of a running injury, I like to describe the injury mechanics like this… Think of it as a Brain Thing. When everything is going well, your Brain sends electrical current to all the muscles around the body. When you over use a muscle for whatever reason it shuts down as a protection mechanism. Another muscle or group of muscles then take over in order to perform movements. Your body works in movement patterns not with individual muscles so your brain doesn’t really care what muscles do what, just how to get… read more →
Here’s an example of a compensatory injury. I’ll use a running example as I do see a (hell of a) lot of runners but don’t get bogged down with the sport, just the mechanics of injury. You are getting out for a run 2-3 times per week at a nice, steady pace. Maybe each run is between 4-7 miles and over the weeks and months, you feel fitter and training is getting so much easier. You then decide to inject some harder training into your regime. You make some of your runs longer. Then some of those runs are done… read more →
Going to continue this little series about the main 2 types of injury as knowing about these will make things much clearer for you. As I explain to the majority of clients, there are two main causes/types of injury. The first is a direct impact or trauma – you drop something on your foot, something or someone hits you as in a tackle during sport or being hit by a car. When this happens, you generally know that where you were impacted or where the trauma occured, is the problem. The secone cause/type is a compensation injury. This is generally… read more →
The longer you leave an injury or niggle, the longer it is likely to take to resolve. Most of us are likely to give an issue some time to resolve on it’s own with rest or maybe some stretching, cold or heat treatment and the like, but if an issue lingers for more than 4 or 5 days, it is most likely that you will develop some sort of compensation. Why? Think about it. You develop some discomfort in your calf and over a few days, it becomes worse. You start to limp a little in order to protect it… read more →
Following on from the recent posts focusing on breathing, here’s a case study from a while back. A while ago, I got a call from a family member on a Sunday morning. They were in excruciating pain in their mid back. They had falling off a stool trying to open a high window and when they stepped back/down, the cat was under their foot and so lost balance and CRASH! Fell backwards and hit back – can’t remember now if it was against the wall or the floor. Anyway, they had trouble breathing but worse was the pain. They were… read more →
In the previous few posts, I talked about the various problems faulty breathing patterns can cause. As you can imagine, a lot of people struggle to believe not breathing correctly can cause such pain elsewhere until that pain resolves with treatment and homework. Recently, I had a few clients that I was convinced had breathing/core issues causing other issues. From testing, we found inhibited (‘weak’) muscles that resolved after working on breathing patterns. But, when those clients returned the following week, they reported little or no improvement, even after following the homework religiously. Some had improvement but not what I… read more →
Many apologies. My last post where I talked about the amount of clients I see with Core/Breathing issues, I said I would write some more about that topic. But due to a short break and being much busier than usual over the past few months, I got way laid. As I mentioned in the last post, clients come in with all sorts of pain or issues. Some it is knee pain, hip pain, low back pain, neck/shoulder pain. But why? Let’s take a look at some of those. Say you come in to see me with one or both knees in… read more →