Ahhhhhh for your aching back
There’s an official Baby Boomer dance – have you heard about it? Here’s how it goes:
Stand up, keep hunched over … and grab to support your aching back. Walk awhile, bend slightly over … and grab to support your back. Sit down and grimace. Repeat the sequence to the tune of “My Achy, Breaky Back!”
Okay, I know – it’s just not funny, is it? (Especially that song reference; that one just caused *me* pain!) In fact, it’s blasted annoying. Walking hunched over is not only a pain, it’s downright unattractive. Nothing like advertising – hey, I’m ancient! For all the money women (and men) spend on trying to look younger, seems to me this is a dead giveaway. And unlike sagging skin, it also really makes you FEEL older.
Thankfully, you have some good, natural choices to restore yourself to an upright homo sapiens. Two of these are yoga and intense stretching.
A recent study showed that, compared with self care, yoga and stretching class participants were much more likely to rate their back pain as better, much better or completely gone. In addition, they were well satisfied with their overall care for back pain after being in these groups. Each group took a 75-minute weekly class in the area of focus and practiced at home for around 20 minutes at least three times a week.
That’s the official word, and in my limited experience, I am sure this makes a difference in how your back – and body and life – feels. But, in case it helps, let me add my own, very unofficial “research:”
I pretty much never have had back pain. Yes, I’m thankful! It’s just not a weak area for me. (And, yes, I have those, and, yes, I use advice similar to the study above and the area I’ll mention below to take care of those.) But earlier this year, I reached down and … I couldn’t. And it hurt. Badly. I was stunned; I hadn’t done anything that I was aware of for this sort of pain to occur.
Thankfully, it didn’t take long to figure out what had happened. Before I moved, I belonged to a gym and was doing well. When I moved in 2009, I didn’t sign up for a gym membership for awhile, then realized the error of my ways. (I am motivated by a gym; everything and anything will interrupt me if I attempt to work out at home.) But my new gym wasn’t my old gym, and I didn’t realize I was skipping one group of muscles.
What was I overlooking? My poor glutes! I don’t see them; why do I care? I don’t aim for buns of steel at age 56 (or should I, being single and all that good stuff?!). But guess what? My daughter (a clinical massage therapist with a great knack for figuring out what you need to do to restore a functional, happy body) had me try a pulley-type machine to see how my glutes measured up. Ummm, they didn’t! I could barely do the movement without ANY weight on the machine. And I had done a similar move at my prior gym with somewhere around 80-100 pounds on that machine. Yikes!
I added that in, and my back quickly returned to normal. I could bend again easily, yay! I could reach the floor. I wasn’t groaning. Since then, I steadily have been able to increase the weight I can lift with the machine that isolates my glutes. I have kept that movement as part of my routine – and I will always keep it – because I want my back to be its normal, useful, unpainful self. Because I caught it early, it was easy to remedy. Which, as a side note, is why I want you to note those first inklings of something. Ignorance, in this case, is most definitely not bliss.
So, if you have back issues, consider adding stretching, yoga and strength training to your routine to get good, safe, much less costly relief.
Is fun on your to do list?
“People rarely succeed at anything
unless they have fun doing it.”
~ Author Unknown
1 simple change = 8 ways you get healthier
Our world is filled with simple, inexpensive (or free), natural ways to help us stay well. And, yet, we make it all so complicated!
If you’d give a little more time to this one area, here’s how your health could be enhanced:
- You’d be less likely to be obese.
- Your chances of becoming diabetic would drop.
- So would your blood pressure.
- So would your chances of being in a car accident.
- You’d be less likely to fall, as your balance would improve.
- Your heart attack risk would drop by almost half.
- You’d find it easier to make good food choices.
- You’d overall lower your chance of dying.
What’s the mystery ingredient? Sleep. Enough of it – say, more than seven hours – and quality sleep. That’s all. And women, some of the above impacts you the most. I’m not going to differentiate which is which because all of us can benefit from a good night’s rest.
Okay, so stop reading; this was short. Get to bed earlier tonight!
Live your vision
“Your time on this earth is limited;
don’t live someone else’s life, live by your vision.”
~ Steve Jobs
The bear path to wellness
This time of year, bears consume 20,000 calories per day from grasses, fruits, nuts, berries, insects and scavenged carcasses. (Similar to we humans! Okay, yes, I know – knock a zero off that number along with knocking off most of those food choices.)
That’s all in preparation for their winter hibernation. A time in which they allow their bodies to thoroughly renew during the worst weather. They don’t get up, fight sliding around in a metal box on wheels, grab coffee to get through it all …. and repeat daily.
In addition, when bears aren’t hibernating and they get angry, you know it! No stuffing down those feelings for a bear.
Okay, yeah, yeah, I know – you can’t be a bear. You might want to be a bear, but you can’t. Your job won’t wait all winter. You have a family to feed. You have other responsibilities besides hunting for berries and napping and scaring humans.
I get it. So – let’s talk about what you CAN do. That’s the focus. Not what you can’t do. That doesn’t help.
Can you add a few more berries and nuts to your diet this week? Can you allow yourself to sleep an extra half hour tonight? Can you shut down the phone, computer and TV a while before bed so your body is settled down and relaxed? Can you grab one glass of water to wash down your berries and nuts instead of a some combo of sugar/caffeine/alcohol? Can you let one of the things that bug you but really aren’t in your control – bad drivers, crabby whomever, the weather – roll off your back and not stress about it?
PIck one; do it. Don’t complain about it. Just be a bear and man up! (or is that bear up?)
