Pain Free Performance — Egoscue Certified

Posture Alignment Therapists, Certified by Egoscue University

Joint Pain

How long does it take to create pain relief when practicing The Egoscue Method?

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Most of the clients we see are in pain. These clients come to us for relief with their knee pain, back pain, hip pain, and shoulder pain. Oftentimes, our clients have been to chiropractors, physical therapists, doctors, massage therapists, and acupuncturists that have been unable to create a lasting change with their muscle and joint pain. This can be challenging for our clients because their journey for pain relief has already taken weeks and months before we meet our clients for the first time. 

 

In order to create lasting pain relief, as Postural Alignment Specialists that practice The Egoscue Method, we assess the muscular imbalances in their bodies. This begins through a complete health assessment and history to understand the patterns of movement (or lack of movement) that led to pain. We complete postural photos to see how their joint position aligns against a grid to understand how their joints are loading. This can reveal if an elevated shoulder and hip are leading to the back pain or if a forward head position is causing the shoulder pain. Finally, we complete a series of functional testing and gait analysis to determine what muscles are active or inactive that are resulting in muscular compensation and pain. 

 

When our clients leave their first postural alignment session, they can expect to feel a change in their body. This often results in a decrease in pain. If a client’s body has compensated for years, they might notice feeling “lighter” or “straighter” after doing their Egoscue therapy exercises. This is a sign that their body is becoming more functional and balanced. 

 

The work towards alignment and health takes time and effort. Our muscle memory begins to take effect in 90 days and is often the time our clients begin to notice less pain due to their enhanced alignment. Change is not always linear and might result in peaks and valleys. We encourage clients to remain focused on what is changing. Our cells and tissues are constantly adapting and we will continue to adapt new exercises and stimuli to create a change in the muscle structure. One of the great benefits of our bodies is that they are dynamic and constantly in motion. This is why the method works! Now, let’s get moving!

A look into Knee Pain

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As Egoscue certified postural alignment specialists, our focus is on the position of the client’s load bearing joints. Our shoulders, hips, knees, and ankles bear the weight of our body when standing and moving upright. When we look at our client’s joint position, many of our client’s are surprised by their knee position. 

The load bearing joints of the shoulders, hips, knees, and ankles should align.

Try this:
Stand in front of the mirror
Look at the middle of your thigh bone that is named the femur. Then look at the middle of your knee cap.
Draw an imaginary line from the center of the thigh bone to the middle of the knee cap.
Does the knee turn to the outside of the body or does the knee roll toward the middle of the body?

If the center of your thigh and center of your knee cap are not in line, the rest of your load bearing joints are picking up the work for the uneven load. This uneven load leads to knee pain, arthritis in the knee joint, bursitis, and torn ligaments!

When knees turn out or roll toward the middle of the body, there is significant wear and tear on the knee joint. Imagine going up and down the stairs with the knee cap pointing outward. The friction and demand on the uneven knee joint will lead to knee pain. Over time to avoid the knee pain we begin to sell our house to live on one level or we take the escalator to avoid the movement that leads to pain. This avoidance of triggers will decrease the feeling of the knee pain, but does not address the cause of the knee pain.

Oftentimes the exercise we do to be healthy and support our heart, aggravates our knees and we begin to wonder why. If your knees turn outwards and you cycle or run for 30 minutes, that is 30 minutes that your knee joint is impacted and inflamed. Frequent wear and tear from a misaligned knee exercising on the elliptical, bike, or treadmill will lead to arthritis of the knee and the need for a knee replacement. The exercise is not the enemy, but the position of the knee cap in relation to the thigh bone and pelvis. 

How do we avoid knee replacements, ligament tears, and arthritis? We must consider the muscles that support the thigh bone (femur) and knee cap (patella). Through a postural alignment assessment, we will identify what is off in your body and which muscles need to be activated to bring your body into alignment. By correcting and supporting the position of the lower legs, you will continue to be able to tackle stairs and maintain your heart healthy cardio!

Painful Hip Flexors

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It’s not uncommon for us to hear our clients mention waking up with tight, sore hip flexors. Hip tightness can occur for many reasons. Excessive sitting can cause the muscles to relax and deactivate becoming progressively weaker and shorter, creating pain.

Poor posture habits can create a structural imbalance which will cause an uneven pulling of muscles.  No matter the reason, tightness in the hip flexors will lead to decreased movement in the hip and change the way we walk, stand and sit. Our pelvic position will be out of line because the hip flexors are pulling the pelvis forward. This changes the load of our body and creates instability in our gait. Over time, the uneven load and misalignment leads to inflammation, arthritis and other degenerative changes causing pain.  What to do?

At Pain Free we will evaluate you individually to see what is going on with your body that’s creating the issue.  Part of the prescribed plan will retrain those hip flexors to let go, get back to their intended length and tension to eventually re-establish the entire body’s alignment restoring proper gait.  All of that equals being pain free!

Try this and see if you are able to notice a release:

Stand with your back against the wall. When your hips are touching the wall, your thighs and kneecaps will begin to release. If your thighs want to engage, stay in this position for 2-5 minutes until your thighs release and the backs of your legs begin to work.

Set In Our Ways

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The modern era has provided us with many benefits. Enhanced technology has changed our health care, our connections with one another, and increased our access to opportunities we would not have had without it. We see the changes with our children and their relationships with their peers. As technology changes our lives, we adapt socially and our bodies physically adapt.

Most of us have had periods in our life that require us to commute long distances or work in front of a screen. In order to live our lives, we frequently sit. Sitting or holding any position for an extended period of time changes our muscles, our joints and our cardiovascular system. These changes can decrease blood flow throughout our body and make our muscles atrophy. When we sit or hold any position for too long, some muscles shorten and other muscles stretch. Our body begins to adapt to the improper muscle length change which pulls our joints out of alignment. That’s when the pain begins.

At Pain Free, we use the Egoscue method that considers the whole body and the relationship of all muscles and joints to each other. We understand that a patient’s health history and movement history has created adaptations and changes in their musculoskeletal system. These changes have affected their body’s mobility, blood flow, and led to pain. This could be back pain, knee pain, hip pain, foot pain, or any part of the body that has had to adapt to hours of holding a position. With time, we are able to realign the body and nourish muscles that support the body. When muscles work the way they were designed to, we are pain free!

Back Pain

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Last week a wonderful woman came to see me who has been struggling with extreme lower back pain for years. She has stenosis in her spine and has endured several injuries throughout her life. The pain in her back had gotten so bad that she couldn’t even walk without the back pain intensifying.

After evaluating her back pain, in order to see the response of the prescribed Egoscue program in her body, I asked her to walk after completing each stretch or position (E-cises). Watching her gait allowed me to see exactly how her body was responding and as importantly allowed her to feel the changes in her body.  Within ten minutes she had completed four Egoscue E-cises that encouraged the spine, shoulders, and pelvis to be in a better position. As she began to walk, she was overwhelmed with emotion. She couldn’t believe that her lower back didn’t hurt anymore!  This was the first time in years she did not have back pain.

Analyzing her gait, I could see that her shoulders were not as forward, she had increased range of motion in her hips, and she appeared lighter on her feet. As an Egoscue therapist, it is so exciting to see instant changes! While it doesn’t always happen this dramatically, when the E-cises are introduced the body changes.  Back pain is relieved.

In order to keep progressing toward a pain free body, these E-cises must become a way of life. You have to challenge the body as it evolves with new stimuli. You have to be dedicated. Doing the E-cises daily, even for as little as ten minutes, will benefit your body! Your back pain can be relieved.

For some people, the relief of back pain, shoulder pain, hip pain or knee pain might not happen in the first ten minutes, but over time the changes do add up and the pain retreats. The time and energy you’ve invested while doing your Egoscue program will decrease your pain and allow your body to function in the way that you desire! Walking, running, hiking, standing and sleeping without pain are within your reach! This result is emotional for our clients and for us.  Finally being pain free is life changing.  It’s what we do at Pain Free – we are here to help you realize the possibility of life without pain once and for all.

 

Cart before the Horse

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The Cart before the Horse….

The other day I got a call from a client who was in such excruciating back pain that she couldn’t make her appointment. She travels from quite a distance and she said she could not get comfortable enough to sit in the car that long. I spoke with her on the phone and gave her some e-cises to do. She called back about an hour later and her pain was significantly better.

When I asked her what she’d been doing before her pain began, I got an earful! She had been shaking out rugs, digging in the garden, mowing, cleaning her house for an upcoming event including a lot of up and down the stairs. When we talked about her Egoscue menu, she said she’d been doing well with it. I learned later that she had not done her Eogscue program before she started her busy and very physical day. Aha, therein lies the problem.

She should have done her Egoscue program BEFORE beginning her activities. Let me tell you why….

The sole purpose of performing an Egoscue program is to change the alignment of the body, creating a pain free body. When muscles aren’t working properly, after an injury or surgery for example, they become imbalanced. They either work too hard and become overly tight or don’t work at all and become loose. Muscles are responsible for keeping our bones in place so both scenarios cause the muscles to pull the bones out of alignment. This creates wear and tear on the joints and pain. Doing the individualized Egoscue program you are prescribed gets those muscles back to doing what they’re supposed to do, which puts the bones back where they belong. If my client had done her Egoscue prior to working so hard, her body would have been prepared – less wear and tear on the joints, less pain.

So, the very best way to enjoy your Egoscue and your new found alignment is to DO YOUR EGOSCUE MENU BEFORE YOU BEGIN YOUR ACTIVITIES! It is our goal to get you back to doing what you love and what you need to do! The body needs to be aligned before you start pushing it. It is the best way to avoid pain, avoid injury and begin to strengthen your alignment –not strengthen your dysfunction. Does that make sense?

So, put the horse (Egoscue) before the cart (your life’s activities) and make your Egoscue menu part of your early morning routine! Your body will thank you.