What makes the Egoscue method work so well compared to other treatments? The Egoscue method is different because it utilizes the basic way our body learns and remembers movement. When you do your Egoscue exercises each morning, you activate muscles in the correct way to align your body.
Motor memory, or muscle memory, allows the cells within our bodies to coordinate our movements, muscles, and brain to create the desired activity. Each time you move, your body remembers it. When movements are done repetitively, your body keeps track and creates the “new normal”. Science shows that it takes 90 days of that new repetitive motion to have the memory remain without prompting. With Egoscue we are introducing proper stimulus to create equal and bilateral activity in the muscles. This retraining process is amazing because it means we have the ability to change and heal ourselves!
In comparison, when a person goes to the chiropractor, they align their bodies through an adjustment of the bones. Without the memory in the muscles, the skeletal alignment will not stay because muscles pull bones. This creates a need for frequent follow-up appointments. With the Egoscue method, our clients are able to retrain the musculature to hold their bones in the correct position. This is why the Egoscue method is a therapy that creates lasting change and is not just temporary symptom relief.
Utilizing Egoscue, our clients are able to create new alignment with noticeable improvement in pain reduction, movement, balance, and quality of life!
Egoscue Method
Joint Replacement and Egoscue
Are you and your physician choosing joint replacement? Let us help you maximize your outcome.
When your joint is bone-on-bone, the pain is worsening and keeps you from your daily activities; joint replacement may be the next best step. I get it, I’d try everything I could to avoid surgery, but sometimes it’s inevitable. So, once you and your physician make this life changing decision, there are some other things to consider as you look forward to getting back to normal. Consider your alignment.
For those of you who are already on board with Egoscue, you know that we are all about pain relief through proper alignment. The key to our work is retraining the muscles to work equally so when the weight of your body goes through your joints it is balanced. If muscles are out of whack and doing too much or too little, bones are pulled out of place, joints are wearing unevenly and therein lies your pain. Once your joints bear weight evenly you gain strength, balance and function. This not only alleviates pain, but protects you in the future. Although I talk about how cartilage regenerates, some joints are so compromised that replacement is the only option. Each body is different; everyone’s history and injuries are different. If you are in pain and cannot function, choosing joint replacement isn’t a failure; it is an amazing tool to get your body and your life back to where it needs to be.
If joint replacement is next, you have prepared for it beautifully! You’re in your best alignment going into surgery – a step ahead of the curve with strength and balance as you also embark on post-surgery rehab. One of our clients recently exclaimed that “My doctors, all the nurses and my rehab therapists were amazed at how strong I was and how fast I recovered from my knee replacement!” “They asked me what I had been doing and I told them it was all my hard work doing Egoscue at Pain Free!” She continues to do her Egoscue e-cises to maintain her alignment and protect her new joint.
If you are planning on joint replacement, we can help you prepare and improve your outcome. And, we are waiting for you on the other side to help keep your entire body functioning – head to toe – including your new joint!
Exercise and Egoscue
We tend to think about our daily exercise as strengthening our muscles or stretching our muscles. We do it every day, we are committed and diligent to maintain our strength and flexibility. If we stopped any part of our routine, we’d lose ground and our body would suffer, right? While there is truth to this, it may not be the appropriate thing to do when you are in pain. As Egoscue therapists we are trained to look at the body using a different approach.
In my physical therapy training, I learned the origin and insertion of all of the muscles and where they connect to the bones. I was taught the particular function and range of motion of each of the individual muscles. In physical therapy, I was trained in specific techniques to treat neck pain, back pain, hip pain, knee pain, shoulder pain – you name it. I also designed personal fitness programs to get people strong. I taught stretch classes to relax tight muscles. I owned a fitness studio in the 1980’s when aerobic classes were the thing to do. I taught classes 7 days a week and had so much fun! I was in great shape but my body was a mess. Why? I never thought about the position of my joints. Even with pain, I would have been hard-pressed to give up my exercise. It was a big part of my life. My new Egoscue clients feel the same way when initially stepping back from their exercise might be necessary. They feel as though they will lose ground with their fitness.
Here is what I now understand from my training and certification utilizing the Egoscue Method for the last 13 years. Our habits and old injuries can change the position of our joints. When joints no longer line up correctly, an uneven force goes through them when they bear the weight of your body. This new uneven pattern wears down the cartilage and changes the balance of the muscles. Some muscles are doing more work than they are designed to do, causing them to get stronger and other muscles are doing less work than designed, causing them to weaken. The overall loading of the joints is now very compromised. Let me give you an example:
John Doe works at his desk all day with his back rounded and shoulders slumped over his computer. Years of this posture becomes habit and his muscles now rest in this position. Some of his muscles have shortened over time making it difficult for him to stand straight and pull his shoulders back. It feels normal to have rounded shoulders. John Doe really does not think about it. He has no pain. John Doe goes to the gym and does weight training. His shoulders and his upper back are rounded as he performs bicep curls. Yes, he is strengthening his bicep muscles but, he is also reinforcing the uneven loading of his spine and shoulders.
Fast forward a couple of years and John Doe now has lower back pain. The rounding in his upper back and shoulders changed his center of gravity. This causes the muscles of his lower back to work harder to compensate for the changed center of gravity. The body’s response is that the lower back muscles are tight, creating pressure on the nerves. Strengthening and stretching the muscles of the low back will NOT change the position of the rounded upper back and shoulders. John Doe’s back pain is caused by the position of this upper back and shoulders.
John Doe looks everywhere for relief – physical therapy, chiropractic, acupuncture. Everyone is trying very hard to help but focusing on his back. He still hurts. He finally ends up at Pain Free. In order to help him using the Egoscue Method, we focus on his body as a unit, his alignment. We might recommend temporarily changing how he works his biceps until his upper back and shoulders are in a better position. Does this mean he can never do bicep curls again with weights? Absolutely not! It just means that he may need to back off his old exercise routine a bit until his body responds to the new exercise designed to correct the upper back and shoulder position.
You can understand now that everything in the body is connected. Working on the body part that hurts will not change the way the body moves. The Egoscue Method has taught me how to look at the body as a whole, no longer thinking about strengthening or stretching muscles but alignment. When John Doe stands in front of me in pain, my focus is determining misalignment, what is necessary to correct it and getting him back to his life pain free. Maybe his focus is to be out of pain so that he can get back to his bicep curls. We both win.
What is Different About Egoscue?
People ask us all the time “how is Egoscue different?” At Pain Free Performance, we want to get down to the root of your pain. Egoscue therapy looks at the entire body and determines what joints are out of alignment and therefore, are not mobilizing correctly. When this happens, other muscles will try to create the movement for the weaker muscles. This is what pulls the joint out of the right position.
Egoscue looks at each area of the body and determines which muscles are too tight or overworking. Through gait analysis and functional testing, Egoscue therapy can determine how your body is moving. Then the fun part begins. Our Egoscue University trained therapists will work with you to determine how to release the overworked muscles and how to wake up the muscles that are weaker and not supporting the joints. In other therapies, like traditional physical therapy, therapists work to strengthen the weakened joint, but overlook the compensations from different parts of the body. Egoscue therapists understand that your spine rotates because your right foot is turned out. Egoscue therapists at Pain Free Performance take it a step further and notice the over developed muscles on the right side of your spine. Their Egoscue training promotes further testing to release those muscles before they re-balance the rest of the body.
Want to get back to the life you had before pain? Live the life where you could move naturally and not in order to avoid the pain? Try Egoscue therapy at Pain Free Performance and let’s uncover the root of your pain.
Things I Wish I Explained Better….
I often have a conversation with a client that causes me to think – “Wow, I didn’t do a very good job of covering all the information I wanted to!” There is a lot of information we share with clients and it’s a lot to absorb, especially in the beginning. We also have such a smart group of people who come to Pain Free Performance, we sometimes assume people know things that they don’t.
Here is a smattering of random questions and topics that come up often and might be helpful as you continue your Egoscue journey toward a pain free body! Clients often ask or say….
Can I resume weightlifting?
At first, NO. We don’t want to strengthen any misalignments. When your body is ready, we will give you some pointers on how to start with weights again. You will be surprised at the “work-out” you will get from your Egoscue!
Can I go to Yoga class? Pilates? Tai Chi? Can I jog?
We are all about getting you back to your fullest most pain free life – whatever you love to do! The easy answer is yes, of course. Talk with your Egoscue therapist regarding your particular issues and your favorite class or activity to make the most of it!
I twisted my ankle (bruised my elbow, tweaked my back) so I’m just going to cancel my appointment.
No, just the opposite! That’s the perfect time for you to come in – this is what we do – treat people in pain! So, keep your appointment and have your therapist assess the injury and create a program that will enable you to heal faster and keep your newly aligned body on track!
I may not be doing my E-cises correctly and it made my leg hurt so I just stopped doing the program.
Contact us immediately if you feel that your program is causing any pain. We want to know, ask you a few questions and tweak the program if necessary.
I do my e-cises when I get home in the afternoon ……
Do your program in the morning! I know, I know sometimes it’s just not possible but here’s the thing…if you do your E-cises in the morning, you are setting yourself up to have your most aligned body possible to carry out all of the living you have to do during the day! This means better function, less pain and less possible injury. Talk with your therapist about how to adjust your program to fit your schedule.
Don’t cherry-pick from your program – do all of the E-cises in the order only!
The order of your Egoscue program is key. The e-cises are prescribed to either wake up certain muscles that are not doing their job or quiet muscles that are overdoing which creates that pesky misalignment, poor function and pain! Depending on your specific issues, there is an important chain of events that must occur by doing the e-cises in order to get you to the best outcome….which is a pain free body!
Do I have to do everything on both sides?
Occasionally, I have a client who ran out of time, or thought because her pain was on the right side that she’d just do the e-cises on the right side. Not with Egoscue. We are trying to get the two halves of the body to work together as intended. What you do to one side, you must do to the other. It is important for regaining muscle balance, symmetry and healing to do the complete program on both sides. If you’re often running late, talk to us and we can tweak your program to fit those days that are just too busy!
Do I have to do Egoscue the rest of my life?
Yes, but a very doable, shorter version of your program. It will be as easy as brushing your teeth or bathing…a necessary and desirable habit to maintain your pain free functional body! When you’re ready, your Egoscue therapist will instruct you on how to continue with abbreviated and rotating programs that will keep you aligned and living life to the fullest!
Speaking of function….
One of the most important things I want our clients to understand is that our job is to improve the way your body functions. Pain relief is the amazing benefit of having a functional body. Pain is the symptom, not the cause. When the joints in the body are in the proper position and the muscles are balanced – the pain goes away!
THE EGOSCUE HABIT
We talk a lot about “habits” – good and bad, new and old, conscious and even unconscious. We have a myriad of them that propel us through our days and nights. Some habits we’d like to break, some we’d like to initiate. I was recently gifted the book “The Power of Habit” written by Charles Duhigg. My mind went immediately to you, my Egoscue clients. How can we utilize this powerful thing (habit) to help us get exactly what we want? Especially when we want an aligned and pain free body!
Well, if you’re reading this blog, you’re interested in Egoscue. You want to be vital and active and do everything you love to do. Your back pain, leg pain, shoulder pain, sciatica, or neck pain has gotten in the way. Perhaps you have an Egoscue program. Is your Egoscue program a habit or are you consciously struggling every day to map out a new plan to accomplish it but not always able to?
The most commonly asked question when clients are in the midst of aligning their body, feeling good and once again able to do their favorite activity is “will I have to do this for the rest of my life”? The answer is always “yes”! Maintenance, you know. Like brushing your teeth or bathing. You get great results from those habits and you understand the consequences if you stop doing them so you do them every day and in the process you have created a habit.
Duhigg says that there is a habit loop – there is something that prompts you to “do” something (time of day, day of week, frame of mind, alarm on our phone for example); then there is the thing you do – the habit – (have a cup of coffee, brush your teeth, take the dog for a walk, shower, do your Egoscue) and then the reward –caffeine stimulant, fresh teeth, happy dog, clean skin, painless body. See where I’m going with this?
He also says we should pay close attention to our reward because often the habit we attach to it is just a part of it – there might be more to the why of it than we are aware of. For example, back to our list above…
Coffee – gosh, actually I love the sensation of holding the warm cup as I plan my day
Brush my teeth – definitely fear driven – I hate the thought of a painful dental visit
Walk the dog – It is what it is – nothing like the unconditional love of a happy dog!
Shower – my husband thinks I smell amazing and always compliments me
Egoscue – I expect to continue to be active, do everything I want to do (and even some I haven’t done yet) and do it all pain free as I age and I’m getting up there!
Are you following me? What I want to impart to you, is that at Pain Free we are in it for the long haul. This is life. Literally, all of the above is life – you have your own list. From here forward let’s get back to experiencing all of it as fluidly and pain free as possible. My favorite Pete Egoscue quote is: “A pain free, active lifestyle is not only possible, but it is the way you should expect to feel and live, no matter your age, no matter your previous experience”. I believe this and YOU can believe it. I will set myself up to live it. It is my reward. It can be yours too.
Let me help you find the way to make your Egoscue program a habit so that it will work for you! Let’s define your prompts and tune into your rewards of doing your program for your life. Remember that age is not a factor of function, misalignment is the culprit. The Egoscue Habit makes the lifelong pain free function that you desire possible!
Aging and Egoscue
What’s trending at Pain Free Performance? Aging….
When I think of the most common conversation that pops up at our clinic these days…it has to be aging. At Pain Free Performance we are made up of a lot of baby boomers, people who are interested in staying active, working hard, retiring well, while enjoying life to the fullest. What I’m hearing (and feeling) is that we don’t like the wrinkles, the diminishing muscle tone, but especially the insinuation that we’re losing physical momentum and there’s nothing we can do about it. Society has always been fascinated with youth…but weren’t we young not long ago?
Then, something stops us in our tracks. We’re still skiing, golfing, swimming, running but afterwards we can barely move. We twist or land hard doing things we’ve always done and ouch – back pain, heel pain, foot pain, neck pain – where did that come from?! I can’t tell you how often I hear “I suddenly feel so old”, “I can’t believe I can’t ____ anymore” (just fill in the blank), or “My doctor says I have arthritis…”.
I encourage you NOT to buy into the theory that because you’re a little older, that activity is a thing of the past. There’s a great quote John Elder, of Egoscue University, used in a recent article “If you didn’t know how old you are, you’d have no idea how old you are…”! Forget the number! The best thing we can do for ourselves is keep moving. Stay active. Listen to our bodies. They are amazing – even as we age! The human body has an innate and amazing ability to heal.
Our bodies, young or old, are designed to run, jump, play, swim, move and rest without pain. The pain is an alarm sounding that something in the musculo-skeletal system is out of whack. Your head should sit squarely on your neck – your ears over shoulders which should line up over your hips, which line up over your knees and on down to your ankles. If you look at yourself from the side in the mirror and this isn’t happening, you’ve got some muscles that are not doing their job properly. This creates uneven wear and tear on the joints and is how all of the tendonitis, stenosis, bulging disks and tennis elbow stuff come into play. It could be a result of an injury (ie; putting more weight on one ankle after breaking the other-for years and years) or habitual poor body mechanics or posture (ie; hunched over your computer, phone, steering wheel or easel). Muscles pull bones – either into or out of alignment…are you getting the picture?
Most often, the missing link to becoming pain free is getting your body aligned so that you can continue to do all of the things you love to do. Everything else – the meds, the massage, the adjustment – are great, but temporary relief. Egoscue – it’s real lasting relief. If you have back pain, plantar fasciitis, rotator cuff syndrome, knee pain, arthritis, or wrist pain – don’t blame age, blame alignment!!
We know how to teach you to retrain your muscles so that they are on track – waking up those muscles that aren’t doing enough and quieting those muscles that have been overworking – perfectly pulling your skeletal system back into the design intended and relieving the pain. Let us show you how.
GARDENING SEASON AGAIN!
Ah yes! It’s time for gardening and yard work. Finally! But after just a couple of hours of gardening, my back hurts. We hear this at Pain Free in the spring, especially as people start getting more active. They get back pain from what seems to be the simplest most innocuous movements.
We forget that the body is a stimulus-response system (everything we do and eve think has a muscular response in the body). If you’ve been sitting around all winter that inactivity created some less mobile areas in the body. You may have been active all winter, going to the gym, lifting weights, hours of aerobics, skiing – active! But moving into the garden we still hear “my back hurts!”. Those winter activities are great and, even better, fun! However, they don’t get our bodies more functional. What I mean by that is joints lined up vertically and horizontally. Moving that bag of topsoil requires different movement strength than your weight machine, stair machine, or elliptical. You need to be functional before you are active to stay pain free.
Take weeding for example, Most of us will sit on the ground and start pulling weeds. That sitting position already puts your back in a rounded, flexed position and once you start pulling weeds you force the back muscles to work in that disadvantaged position with no help from the hips and legs (because you’re sitting on them;). Ouch!
WHAT TO DO?!!
BEFORE: Think of your gardening and yardwork as a strength work-out and prepare for it like that. Do a little warm-up before you go out to get your body functional, lined up vertically and equal right to left. Try these e-cises:
AIRBENCH
CATS AND DOGS
ARM CIRCLES
ELBOW CURLS
DURING: It’s good to change positions. Instead of sitting the whole time, kneel or work from your hands and knees, get up and walk around. Try standing and bend from your hips for a bit. Change positions every 10-20 minutes. Your body likes a variety of movement and positions!
AFTER: When you’re done and feeling all proud of yourself, instead of plopping down on the couch, take that much deserved break in static back – everyone’s favorite exercise and so restorative. If your back pain continues give us a call. At Pain Free Performance, we are Posture Alignment Specialists certified by Egoscue University — we can help you eliminate that back pain and enjoy your garden!
