Blog Week 9 - Reflecting, Stretching, Posture & Acupuncture

This week my blog is a bit emotional. Everywhere I turn I hear of someone's death. Is that what happens when you become an adult? You just hope to be one of the last ones standing?

When death is all around us, we are reminded to live. We only have one life and never know when it may be the last time we see someone. That being said, I want to start with a sincere I love you to everyone who is reading this! Thank you for your support and letting me support you.

Now, lets share some happy thoughts and make the rest of our time on this spinning asteroid as great as possible.

1. Recently I was asked a great question. How important is holding a stretch for a long time? Well, let me tell you, VERY important. You body does not give a crap about 10 - 20 second stretches. This is related to a concept called TIME UNDER TENSION. It is time under tension that makes a difference and actually helps you change your tissues. If you have time make that time under tension 10 minutes (research supports this). But I usually recommend 2 minutes to people since that is more do-able for most. Then you can add PIR or PAILS/RAILS if you know what those are; if not keep following or search for posts by any Functional Range Systems practitioner who will have posts on these. For the research oriented minds: Langevin et al. 2010 to start and follow citing articles :)

A very good analogy to drive this home is the fact that someone needs to wear braces for a really long time to see change in their smile (which indicates the tissues have changed). So it is very logical that your body needs a lot of repeated time under tension for change to happen.

2. I saw a recent study talking about the fact that technology is creating postures and postural habits that ergonomics have to adapted to. Check in with yourself, what kind of position are you in? I am guilty of jutting my head forward like a weird exotic bird haha. That being said, we should do what we can to maintain our backs, necks and basically the rest of us.

This weeks video is for your back :) Since this is not a stretch per say the time under tension is difference, it is mobile, so you want to create you time under tension by doing slow and controlled reputations. Enjoy! and let me know if you try it and what you think :)

3. Medical Acupuncture - get on board especially if you have tried "everything" else with no success. This treatment gets IN the tissues. Despite widespread use in clinical practice by nurses, physio therapists and chiropractors and your favourite nurse/osteopath- ME!- it still remains controversial. The results, however, speak for themselves. As an instructor always used to say- "The results are on the table!"

If that isn't enough, research shows, time and time again, that it is an effective and natural way to help with musculoskeletal, headache and chronic pain. Acupuncture eases excess inflammation through a peripheral opioid mechanisms (think pain relief) and there are many different studies showing this (i.e. Kim et al.). As for the treatment itself, it isn't too bad. A little pinch here and there for BIG time relief.

Tino- this blog is for you! RIP my friend and thanks for the beautiful life.