Stand Tall, Stay Healthy
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| Anne Kelly |
| 11/13/2009 |
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| Our mothers tell us to do a lot of things when we`re going up, among them, to sit up straight. And it turns out, Mom was right. Because posture doesn`t just affect your appearance, it can affect your health too. Less than two months ago a bulged disc in Wanda Dewing`s back left her partially disabled. It caused so much pain she could barely tie her shoes. Today she says she feels 90 percent better. She`s a new person, thanks to a new posture. One she developed through a posture restoration program that focuses on how the entire body influences itself. "If you come in and you have shoulder pain, we`re certainly going to look at your shoulder, but we`re going to look at your neck, your ribcage, how you breathe, how you swing, yours arms," says physical therapist Jeanne DeKrey. Because, says DeKrey, the muscoskeletal structure is intertwined and if one part of it is off due to a persons poor posture, another part can be affected. Poor hip posture can affect the back, which can bother the diaphragm, which then affects the ribs. The ribs play a major role in how our shoulders are aligned. It`s all connected. "It`s like having a knit sweater and if you snag one corner of it, it kind of deforms the whole fabric of the garment, similar to how our bodies work," DeKrey says. Posture restoration works to fix `snags` in the muscoskeletal system by strengthening muscles that aren`t working hard enough, and by weakening muscles that are working too hard. Aside from exercises, patients are also fit for proper shoes, and made aware of daily habits they have that affect their posture. Dewing didn`t swing her arms when she walked. She does now, she also does her posture exercises on her own every day. "Little things have had a dramatic effect on my well being," she says. Because it`s those little things, if knocked out of place, that can have a major impact on a person`s health. DeKrey says the therapy can have a big effect on a person, but it`s no magic wand. They have to be committed to doing their exercises at home, and in changing their postural habits. |
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