Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there!!

Mom's really are the core of our existence, aren't they?

My mom is one of the strongest, most amazing people I know. Not only was she diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis the year after I was born, but she defied all the doctors and had 2 more children after me. I myself was delivered by emergency C-section. My siblings were both planned C-sections. (In those days once you had one C-section any other births had to be the same way.) When I was 13 she had to have a hysterectomy and had a 4^th incision through that first scar. (We have loads of cancer in our family…thank God she did not and does not and this was just normal procedure for a Peri-menopausal woman in 1980)

Way back when in 1967 the C-Section scars were vertical and cut straight down the middle of the abdominal wall. As you can imagine, this would wreak havoc on the strongest of core musculature.

Mom has only had real trouble walking and standing upright in the last 10 years. She never in my life complained of pain…until recently. In the last month she has been complaining of low back pain. After going through a comprehensive evaluation, we performed manual muscle testing and found her Multifidus and her Gluteus Maximus dysfunctional.  

The Multifidus runs along the back of your body and helps to extend, rotate and side bend your trunk. The Gluteus Maximus extends, laterally rotates and abducts the hip. In order to stand fully erect, your abdominal muscles, your back extensor muscles and your hip muscles all need to be working at their best.

Given her history, and current complain of pain, I wanted to test that C-Section scar. We found one part of the scar working hard for another part. 

I did Myo-fascial Release to the overworking area and then activated the under-working area of the scar. When I retested her Multifidus and Gluteus Maximus they were working just fine, her back pain was less and she was able to stand more upright. She will need to do some ongoing work with some home exercises, but for the moment she was feeling and moving better. 

                                                          

Never underestimate your history of scars and how they can affect your mobility and pain even if the scar occurred a long time ago.

Most of all, if you’re a child of a Mom who had a C-Section, give her some extra love for the strength she has to keep moving and hold you up throughout her life.

Connecting the dots

Pain with movement is what you've got.

Relief from pain and return to the good life is what you sought.

At Move Better PT we work together to connect the dots.

How awesome your movement life is, when you release those knots!

I have had a bunch of clients recently with neck and hip pain. They are usually referred to me for either one or the other, but rarely do they realize that the sites are connected.  When I hear their history I immediately wanted to connect the dots for them.

In the fitness and movement world, we are accustomed to connecting one body part to another. We understand facial chains and gait patterns. It is no surprise to us that the front of one hip may effect the back of the opposite shoulder or neck. For most people I work with, they are surprised how this connection comes about. After we talk about general body movement they usually have a more clear understanding for why they have pain and difficulty with basic mobility.

In the picture below you can visually see how the left shoulder is connected to the right hip.

Do you have multiple sites of pain? Ask your movement professional to connect the dots for you like we do at Move Better. You'll be amazed when you start to un-kink those knots.

Goals

I have been working toward the Strong First Certification (SFG) for a long time. Due to limited shoulder mobility, my progress has been slow. So slow that I actually put the SFG out of my thoughts. This year for the first time in a long time, I decided that I wasn't going to set yearly goals for myself. I was frustrated about my training, and I figured why add the pressure. Turns out, that was a poor decision on my end. Without have direct, objective goals I have completely lost my focus on any training and have felt the difference. My clothes don't fit. I'm sluggish. Even my eating habits have followed suit.

Today I read a good reminder by Dan Sullivan and Catherine Nomura in their book The Laws of Lifetime Growth Always Make Your Future Bigger Than Your Past. They state that it really doesn't matter whether you achieve the goal, but that we set goals to give us something to grow toward.

After my reading I wrote out some goals to achieve by my birthday. I figure turning 50 is the biggest reason to set some goals after all. I will be able to run 5.0 miles, ride 50 miles, and swim .5 miles. Not all at once. I'm motivated and still realistic. I made my workout happen today even though I was running from job to job. I can make these happen even when I am busy.

The SFG is still my goal. I'll keep plugging away at my skills. Strength training is important to do all that endurance work after all.  I'll keep working on my shoulder mobility. In the process, I will challenge myself and will continue to grow.

If you are struggling with motivation to start moving and hopefully moving better, consider setting some goals. They don't have to be huge. Just something to keep you going forward.