I've been seeing a Chiropractor for a while now.
It started when I ricked my neck moving the Eglu Go. A few sessions sorted that out, but I had some other stiffness (the top of my neck and up into my skull), so I continued to go to see her to work on that. That got resolved, and I haven't had migraines (from pain there) since.
I then asked her to concentrate on the stiffness across my shoulders, and she found a deep rooted problem in my other shoulder. The problem with these things is that they came on gradually, crept up on me without me noticing. My body adjusted itself to cope, and in doing so created other problems elsewhere.
I'm having acupuncture on my shoulder, which is working really well. because so much of me feels much more flexible, I decided to introduce a daily stretching routine. I used the stretching exercises I learned when I was a (ir)regular visitor to Curves. Managed to find a copy on the Internet to refresh myself, and started.
The upper body ones were fine. The chiropractic treatment I had been receiving had made a big difference.
I did the first 8 exercises, which involve standing, without hesitation. But then it came to doing the ones where I have to sit on the floor. The floor seemed a long way away. And it looked hard. For the first 3 days, I kidded myself that I would do the sitting down exercises Later. In the living room on the rug. When my body had warmed up. In the evening while I was watching TV. Just before I go to bed.
Of course, I didn't do them.
In the end, I made myself do them in the morning. I knew it was unlikely to be good news - all that procrastinating was my body's way of trying to protect itself.
And they were awful. Especially the one where I have to sit down, legs extended, and touch my toes. I couldn't get much past my knee. I pulled one knee up, so I had only one leg extended. This is a bit of a cheat, but it helps to do this in the early days. I still couldn't reach my toes. I was mortified. I had realised I was stiff, but this was DREADFUL.
I haven't been this bad since I first discovered I had a problem with my sacral illiac muscle/joint thing.
So, at my most recent treatment, I asked my Chiropractor to take a look at my lower back particularly. The problem appears to be a little bit higher up than the sacral illiac joint (SIJ) - although I suspect that the SIJ is the cause, and the immobility of the vertebrae above it is just a symptom.
So, I'm making myself do my exercise routine, AND I'm adding back in the exercises I used to help with the SIJ.
It started when I ricked my neck moving the Eglu Go. A few sessions sorted that out, but I had some other stiffness (the top of my neck and up into my skull), so I continued to go to see her to work on that. That got resolved, and I haven't had migraines (from pain there) since.
I then asked her to concentrate on the stiffness across my shoulders, and she found a deep rooted problem in my other shoulder. The problem with these things is that they came on gradually, crept up on me without me noticing. My body adjusted itself to cope, and in doing so created other problems elsewhere.
I'm having acupuncture on my shoulder, which is working really well. because so much of me feels much more flexible, I decided to introduce a daily stretching routine. I used the stretching exercises I learned when I was a (ir)regular visitor to Curves. Managed to find a copy on the Internet to refresh myself, and started.
The upper body ones were fine. The chiropractic treatment I had been receiving had made a big difference.
I did the first 8 exercises, which involve standing, without hesitation. But then it came to doing the ones where I have to sit on the floor. The floor seemed a long way away. And it looked hard. For the first 3 days, I kidded myself that I would do the sitting down exercises Later. In the living room on the rug. When my body had warmed up. In the evening while I was watching TV. Just before I go to bed.
Of course, I didn't do them.
In the end, I made myself do them in the morning. I knew it was unlikely to be good news - all that procrastinating was my body's way of trying to protect itself.
And they were awful. Especially the one where I have to sit down, legs extended, and touch my toes. I couldn't get much past my knee. I pulled one knee up, so I had only one leg extended. This is a bit of a cheat, but it helps to do this in the early days. I still couldn't reach my toes. I was mortified. I had realised I was stiff, but this was DREADFUL.
I haven't been this bad since I first discovered I had a problem with my sacral illiac muscle/joint thing.
So, at my most recent treatment, I asked my Chiropractor to take a look at my lower back particularly. The problem appears to be a little bit higher up than the sacral illiac joint (SIJ) - although I suspect that the SIJ is the cause, and the immobility of the vertebrae above it is just a symptom.
So, I'm making myself do my exercise routine, AND I'm adding back in the exercises I used to help with the SIJ.
I imagine that progress will be gradual and almost unnoticeable, so I thought I'd make some notes here about how far I can stretch. I'm not going to bore you with every exercise, I'm particularly interested in the progress of the sitting stretch.
And writing it here may "force" me to do it.
