Surgery-Specific Exercise Routines: Part 2

This week, we continue our surgery-specific exercises with two more techniques. As we go over these exercises, you'll notice that they accomplish two things.

1. They slowly stretch the soft tissue. This is so important for recovering from AND preparing for surgery. Particularly recovery. If you pull your soft tissue too hard after surgery, you can end up doing a lot of harm. So the gentle static techniques and movements are designed to create more flexibility and improved circulation gradually, not all at once.
    
2. They incorporate the whole trunk when done correctly. This is also key, particularly for surgery preparation. After surgery, certain areas of your body (muscles, ligaments, and other soft tissues) will not be as strong. In order to compensate for that, other areas of your body will do more work. So if you have surgery on your chest, your shoulders, abs, and arms will need to do more work while your chest is weak. Only preparing the exact area you are getting surgery on is not really preparing at all. Your whole upper-body needs to prepare for the experience and recovery process.

With that being said, let's check out this week's two exercises:

Push the Tablets is a great exercise for stretching the shoulders, upper-back, chest, and neck muscles. All the time you are breathing and stretching the small rib muscles, as well as rotating through the trunk which nourishes the organs and improves flexibility in the spine.

Another important part of preparing for surgery is getting maximum oxygen intake in the days leading up to the operation, and the days following. The Alphabet Stretches (M & T) are a great way to do this. These are the first two of four total stretches. We'll do the next two next week.

See you next week! Happy Stretching!

Surgery-Specific Exercise Routines: Part 1

Welcome back mind-body students! Over the next few weeks I'll be revisiting the various videos I have done for surgery preparation and recovery, and collecting them into one central post. This week, we look back at my "Four Stretches for Surgery" and the "Xena the Warrior" movements.

The basis for these exercises is this: healthy, open soft tissue heals faster and more completely than stiff, clenched soft tissue does. When your soft tissue is cut so that surgeons can access your internal organs, bones, muscles, etc., it is being damaged. Obviously, invasive surgery like this is necessary for many reasons, but it is important to remember that you must also recover from the surgery techniques, not just the problem the surgery was meant to address.

The Four Stretches for Surgery are used to lengthen the muscles and soft tissue around the shoulder joints, and can be assisted with a belt or rope to maintain the stretch when you can't grasp your hands together. Do deep breathing into the areas of your lungs that are opened up by each stretch. 

Then, the Xena the Warrior movements. Dynamic, moving stretches are also crucial for preparing for surgery (and recovering, too). Moving while you stretch and meditate pushes blood and nutrients into the cells of your body. Many people sit in a hunched-forward position, so their chest muscles and upper back muscles are stiff and unhealthy. These techniques address those very issues and can improve upper-body surgery recovery time.

And that's it for this week! Two more videos coming your way next week!

Happy Stretching!

Tai Chi to Solve Tension in Your Shoulders

In the East, pain in the head is not only addressed through the neck and skull, but also the shoulders, chest, and upper back. It is understood that there are thick, complex, and intertwined layers of soft tissue from the solar plexus area all the way up to the face.

The shoulders are a focal point for all of these muscles, tendons, and soft tissues. Getting rid of tension in the shoulders can relieve a lot of pain spread around the body, and also drastically improve your physical performance and day-to-day life.

Throughout the day, we often allow our head to hang, which compresses the neck. We also have a tendency to allow our shoulders to "float" up and forward, meaning the tension in our shoulder, upper back, chest, and neck muscles is gradually increasing as the day goes by. Many people sleep with one or both shoulders tucked up tightly under their jaw, compressing these muscles even more.

How to Fix Tight Shoulders

First and foremost, learning to sleep on your back is of key importance. Get a comfy pillow that isn't too fluffy for your head, and use another pillow or two to slightly elevate the legs behind the knees. Your goal is to have your spine aligned and under no tension. If you get cold when you sleep and like to curl into a fetal position, add warm blankets to your bed so you will be less likely to get cold in the first place.

To actively release tension from your shoulders, you can do a few exercises. First, grab a broom stick and hold it in front of you as though you were doing a chin-up with it (palms facing away from you). You can lower and raise your arms like you were actually doing chin ups to get used to the feeling. Once your hands are a comfortable distance apart, bring the stick down to shoulder height and pull it toward your body until it is about an inch away from the your chest, parallel to your collar bones, just like you have completed a chin-up.

When you are in this position, your shoulders are in their neutral alignment. Totally relax them shoulders down if you are holding them up. Let them sink and allow the stick to slide down without it moving forward or your elbows unbending. Get used to this feeling and your shoulders being aligned. When you do the other exercises, you will want to experience this same feeling of alignment.

You can do this stretch (I call it the emergency neck posture) in your office, putting your head on your folded arms against your desk. The goal is to sink down into the space made between the desk and your shoulders. This is an excellent way to release tension in the back of the neck and between the back of your shoulders (the trapezius muscle). 

Next, do one of my go-to stretches, Iron on the Wall. This stretch is one of the best ways to help your shoulders sink back down to their neutral position and stop them from "floating" up during the day. Because you do it against the wall, your head is pushes back into proper alignment above your spine too. As with all of these stretches, BREATHE deeply in and out. Image the tension melting like ice into water.

Lastly, do this dynamic movement called Stretch the Bows. If you remember to keep your shoulders from floating up, this movement can help you release tension in your chest and back, preventing the shoulders from rolling forward or backward. Keep the head suspended straight up, and practice the feeling of having the head sit directly above the body, instead of pushed forward like many people do. 

And that's it! Happy Stretching!

New Study on Tai Chi and Osteoarthritis of the Knee

Knee osteoarthritis is a painful, chronic disability. Currently, there are very few effective methods for treating the symptoms, and virtually no remedies available for treating the root causes of the condition or improving longterm pain levels and knee function. Previous studies that I have helped develop, and other studies from around the world, suggest that Tai Chi could be an effective way of improving the lives and reducing the symptoms of knee osteoarthritis patients.

Until recently, no trials have directly compared Tai Chi to other therapies for knee osteoarthritis. But, I am excited to announce that I helped develop a study that does exactly that, and it was published in the Annals of Internal Medicine Journal!

The study, titled Comparative Effectiveness of Tai Chi Versus Physical Therapy for Knee Osteoarthritis: A Randomized Trial, examines the effectiveness of Tai Chi versus standard physical therapy as a treatment for knee osteoarthritis in a 52 week, single-blind, randomized trial.

To read the scientific abstract in full, click here.

204 participants (who averaged 60 years old) took part in the study. 70% were women and 30% were men, and all of them suffered from osteoarthritis of the knee. Each participant was put into one of two groups: one group did Tai Chi regularly for the duration of the study, and the other group did physical therapy.

At the end of the trial, both groups showed significant improvement in their symptoms. That’s good news, because it means that both Tai Chi and physical therapy work! However, the participants that did Tai Chi also reported a significant decrease in their feelings of depression, and felt that the physical part of their quality of life had improved dramatically.

Overall, this study did not prove that Tai Chi is better for your knee osteoarthritis than regular physical therapy, but it does provide evidence for the body AND mind benefits of a Tai Chi practice.

After all, why just have less pain when you can also feel happier and have a higher quality of life with the same amount of effort?

Again, if you would like to read the full study abstract, you can find it here.

I also want to give a big thank you (and congratulations) to all of my co-authors who worked hard to make this study happen. One more important study bringing the mind-body world and the world of science together.

Happy Stretching!

Integrative Pain Management, Part 2: Mind and Body

This is a continuation of my Integrative Pain Management series, based on content selected from my chapter of the book Integrative Pain Management: Massage, Movement, and Mindfulness Based Approaches. 

See also: Part 1.

For in-depth routines to deal with upper back pain, lower back pain, and other conditions, check out my video courses on Udemy!

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Pain is not just a physical sensation, it is also a psychological phenomenon. This is particularly true of chronic pain, which can go on long after a physical injury has healed. The interplay between mind and body when it comes to pain is extremely complex, but there is one thing about it that is dead simple: the power of the mind cannot be ignored.

An amazing example of this power is a condition called Phantom Limb Pain. This effect can occur when an injured or paralyzed limb is amputated, but the amputee continues to experience pain as though the limb were still there. Obviously, when a limb is amputated, the nerves that were responsible for sensing pain in that limb are also gone. However, the brain has 'learned' over months or years of real pain, that the limb, even after it is gone, is in pain. it isn't until the unconscious mind can 'unlearn' that the limb is in pain, and instead learn that the limb is gone, that the chronic pain will go away.

This technique of experiencing the pain and then learning to release it via the mind is one of the main reasons that integrated strategies for managing pain have so much potential. Mind-body techniques like Tai Chi target pain in both the body and the mind. A dedicated mind-body pain management routine can simultaneously reduce pain caused by the tissues, as well as pain caused by a learned psychological pattern, or other mental obstacle.

Next week, we'll discuss how Eastern philosophies reconcile the split between mind and body into the flow of energy, or qi, in the body, and how that relates to our experience of pain.

Happy Stretching!

Integrative Pain Management, Part 1: The Problem of Pain

Chronic pain is a common symptom of countless conditions and injuries. Whether it's from fibromyalgia, knee osteoarthritis, cancer, or any other ailment, chronic pain can take you from 60 to 0 in no time flat. When doctors can't treat the underlying causes of chronic pain, "Take two aspirin and call me in the morning" just doesn't cut it.

Over the years, numerous solutions to the problem of chronic pain have developed, such as surgery, Cortisone shots, and Physiotherapy, to name a few. Each of these strategies has their ups and downs with regards to cost, invasiveness, permanence, chance of success, and so on. Many people find that one or more of these treatments is the solution they were looking for. Others, however, try all of them without any luck.

A recent development in the world of pain treatment is the widespread use of prescription painkillers, opioids in particular, which are a type of drug that works on the nervous system directly to inhibit pain. Common prescription opioids for pain relief include oxycodone, hydrocodone, codeine, morphine, and fentanyl, an accidental overdose of which is believed to have caused the death of the late great musical artist Prince. 

The consequences of prescribing addictive substances to patients, even in highly controlled dosages, are only coming to light now. The numbers, however, are already staggering. In 2012, 259 million opioid prescriptions were written in the US, which is enough to give one bottle of pills to every adult in America. In 2014, nearly 2 million Americans were addicted to prescription pain killers, and in the same year, almost 19,000 Americans died from overdosing on them. The rate of such deaths has quadrupled since 1999. (For these stats and more, check out the ASAM's opioid addiction report, as well as the CDC's section on opioid overdose.)

And perhaps the worst part of this national situation is that these people still have chronic pain. The painkillers only work for as long as they are taken, and eventually the body will develop a tolerance for the medications that will make them less effective. The solution that I and many others have collaborated on is Integrative Pain Management. This mind-body approach not only avoids the dangers of prescription medication or surgery, but also seeks to incorporate the entire being (body, breath, mind, energy, and spirit) into the healing process, and fix the underlying causes of the chronic pain so that, through practice and discipline, it can be cured and not just numbed.

Over the next several weeks I will be posting integrative pain management content selected from my chapter in the book Integrative Pain Management: Massage, Movement, and Mindfulness Based Approaches. Share the blogs with your friends, post them on Facebook, and retweet me on Twitter so that we can get this pain-fighting knowledge to the people who need it.

Happy Stretching!