PAIN IS A WARNING. Get your hand off the stove. Go to the ER and get that bloody gash sewed up. This is acute pain, you can see there is something wrong and it tells you you’d better do something pronto.
But what about joint pain in hips and knees that creeps up, goes away, and then creeps up and stays. What to do?
Harvard Health Publishing connected to Harvard Medical School provides on line articles under the heading of HEALTHbeat. It often provides fodder for my blogs as it does this month.
The article titled Exercising with Knee or Hip Pain suggests that if you have knee or hip pain that it may be time to “up your exercise game!” And that it is an effective treatment for knee and hip problems.
It goes on….
”Strong muscles around a damaged knee or hip can help support a joint by taking over some of its responsibilities. For example, your hips will have an easier time supporting your body weight if your quadriceps, gluteals, hamstrings, and abdominal muscles are strong.”
“Strong quadriceps and hamstrings can take over much of the shock-absorbing role usually played by the meniscus or cartilage in the knee. The proper balance of strength in the muscles can hold the joint in the most functional and least painful position. With any knee or hip problem, the first muscles to lose strength are the largest antigravity muscles—the quadriceps and gluteals—so an exercise plan for any injury is likely to focus on these.”
“Muscles work in pairs: one contracts while the opposing one relaxes. For example, when you straighten your knee, your quadriceps on the front of your thigh contracts, and the hamstrings on the back relax. Imbalances in the function of paired muscles can cause joint problems and invite injury.”
“If your hamstrings are tight, your quadriceps can’t contract fully and may weaken, so exercise the quadriceps and hamstrings (the opposing muscles) equally. Flexibility exercises (to stretch and relax specific muscles) are an important part of an exercise plan to improve joint function.”
And all of this is true. What seems to be missing is this: damaged muscles that have been overused or abused in some way through accidents, sports or occupations, for instance, tend to tighten, spasm and become less flexible. Tight muscles shorten and pull on the joints where they are attached causing pain.
A shortened muscle, which is less flexible and has a shorter range of motion, is weaker. It is kind of like the difference between a short and long back swing in tennis. The longer swing has more power. It is very difficult to stretch a muscle out of its tightness or spasm. Figure that your hamstrings are like a rope. When in spasm they have tiny knots along the way. Would you pull the ends of the rope to get the knots out? Of course you wouldn’t. You would untie the knots first. The rope would immediately be longer.
How do you get rid of the knots in your hamstrings?
Use Bonnie Prudden Myotherapy®.
Go here to learn more, save yourself time and money,
and erase the pain from your hips, knees and life.
Bonnie Prudden – Trigger Points – Myotherapy – Bonnie Prudden Myotherapy
We teach this to 1st graders so surely you can learn.
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If you have questions or need help, email me at enid@bonnieprudden.com. For more information about Bonnie Prudden®, Bonnie Prudden Myotherapy®, workshops, books, self-help tools, DVDs, educational videos, and blogs, visit www.bonnieprudden.com. Or call 520-299-8064 if you have questions or need help. Enid Whittaker, Managing Director, Bonnie Prudden Myotherapy®
