How to Create A Network of Physical Therapists for Personal Trainers

You're listening to the PT Proffitt podcast, episode number 10. Today I'm talking with physical therapist Paige McNurthy and we're talking about bridging the gap between physical therapists and personal trainers. So stay tuned. Hi, I'm Beverly Simpson, former fitness manager turned online personal training business owner. And this podcast is where smart fitness professionals, including trainers and clinicians, discover how to increase client performance, performance in movement, package and position their products and services, and get out of their own way so that they can increase their revenue to live a life that they love without sleazy sales. Welcome to the PT Profit Podcast. What's up, coach? I'm Beverly Simpson, owner of B. Simpson Fitness, the founder of the PT Profit formula and host of the PT Profit podcast. In today's video, this is going to be a replay of an interview that we did, episode number 10 on the podcast where I had special guest physical therapist Paige McNarthy, and we talked all about bridging the gap between physical therapists and personal trainers. So if you're a physical therapist or a personal trainer and you care about building out that network so that you can help your clients, which ultimately is going to lead to client success in terms of results, which will then just deepen that know like and trust and keep your clients coming back to you and renewing and growing and learning with you, then you're definitely going to want to stay tuned. So without further ado, let's roll that interview. Hi, Paige. Thanks so much for joining us today. How are you?

Hi. I'm good. I'm a little nervous, but I'm good.

No, it's okay. To be honest, I get nervous too. Every time I hit record, I'm always like, oh, here we go. But you know what? Nervous and excite, they're the same hormone response.

Yeah, yeah, I'm good.

Let's just go ahead and dive right in. Can you share with me with us a little bit about who you are and who you help?

My name is Paige McNerney. I am the owner and solo operator of Alignment and Physical Therapy, which is an outpatient orthopedic practice in Seattle, Washington. I have been a therapist in the Seattle area for 20 plus years. I started my career here in exercise physiology and sports medicine and then went to the University of Washington for my master's degree in physical therapy. Now I've been practicing for over 20 years as a therapist and my outreach has varied tremendously in 20 years. I've always been outpatient orthopedic based. I started off in Kind of a private practice where I worked with a lot of middle school, high school and college age athletes, more sports medicine based. Then I spent 10 years in occupational medicine which was very similar to outpatient orthopedic, but different in regards to I served a clientele that was probably 85% male in the trade industry down in the maritime area district of Seattle. And so I did that for 10 years and then in October of 2019 I broke out on my own and opened my own practice.

Yeah, okay, great.

In postural restoration, breathing mechanics, positioning, movement retraining specifically. And I've been doing that specific kind of line of work for about the last six years.

So yeah, I'd love for you to share with us a little bit about how you got there, what brought you to that type of work, the kind.

Of movement breathing based work. So I have a single son and after I had my son in 2008, I had kind of pelvic and hip pain for years, on and off. And I was doing everything I knew to do, like fitness wise, exercising, weightlifting. And it was actually ironically a Zumba class which I giggle about now, where I really drove that pain home. And so I battled that for several years, you know, orthopedic assessments, two orthopedic surgeons saying that I needed bilateral hip surgery. I was going to be non weight bearing for several months, wasn't going to be able to pick up my 3 year old son at the time. And I was like, that's not an option for me. And so a colleague of mine said, I really feel like you should check out foster restoration. And so I took my first PRI course for my own symptoms and pain management. And I can't tell you, Beverly, how many classes I had taken. Hundreds. Right. Because this was 14 years into my career as a PT. I had done manual therapy through NIOMP through several levels. I had done all sorts of Gary Gray movement and functional movement retraining courses. And I was utilizing this stuff on my patients, I was utilizing it on myself. And it helped some, right? Like it was kind of hit or miss. Some people worked better with some things, some people worked better with others. And then I took this postural restoration course and it was like, I look back on it now because I never knew how much it was literally going to change every aspect of my life from my professional career to my personal family, which is kind of a whole other story, but very dear to my heart and close to my son. But it was literally life changing for me. It was life changing for me personally for my pain it was like every light bulb went off for the first time.

That's amazing.

Right? Like, meaning you see movements, you see rotational patterns, you see pain patterns, you see biomechanical dysfunction in people. And a lot of times they're very similar. Right. And all of a sudden, I was in this course that was, like, explaining to me why I was seeing the things that I was saying. I mean, that was it. I mean, I can't explain it. It was like an epiphany for me as a professional. So, yeah. And that's where I've gone ever since.

So it's almost as if you were meant to have this pain so that you could find this and change other people's lives.

I am a firm believer in everything happens for a reason. When I think about all the gifts I've been given in my life, it always had to do with the time and place, the people I met. Everything that I feel like that has positively influenced me in my life has been based on those situations. I can go back for years from my first job in Seattle and where it led me and who I met there and where that led me and how I got into this and how I got this position and where I went from there. And so, yeah, I mean, it's funny to think that you have to go through that kind of circumstance to get there, but there was a reason, right? So I agree. I'm always not that pain anymore, so. Right. That's a good thing.

Now, you were a PT for 14 years, you said, before you started going down this PRI path. Right. So what was. What led you to being a physical therapist?

Oh, my gosh, I wish I had some kind of brilliant answer for that. People ask me that all the time. I'm serious. No idea. I was a terrible athlete. Right. I've confessed this before. I loved athletics. I loved athletics, and I did everything right. Like, I did volleyball, I did basketball, I did track. And I think that they only made a C team. Ab. A B. A team. B team. I think they only made a C team for me. Right? Like, I was a C team on volleyball. I was a C team on basketball. I ran the 800 in track. And I always say, there was a girl. I went to school with Susie Churchill. I have no idea where Susie Churchill is, but Susie Churchill and I used to trade off who would take last place. And I am forever grateful for her because I didn't have to take last place every time. Right. Like, that was the gift. And so when I got into, you know, like, high school sports and stuff like that. It was obvious that that was not going to be my skill set, but I still loved it. A lot of my friends were really good athletes. And so I joke about the fact that then I went into cheerleading. I went into cheerleading so I could watch all football games so I could watch all basketball games. And then I was a track and cross country manager because my best friend was an extraordinary runner and I never wanted to miss her runs. And so it's funny. So I kind of loved that aspect. Outpatient orthopedic was always my thing. Like I spent time in skilled nursing when I was a new grad trying to make extra money right on the weekends and finally I was just like don't ask me my contract. I was like don't ask me to do that again. It just wasn't for me. Right. That field wasn't for me. I spent time in hospitals and it wasn't for me. But I don't have any like brilliant information as to why I went into it other than the fact that I loved helping people. I loved sports, I love touching people. I'm very physical. So this whole COVID 19 thing is killing me. And so I just knew, I mean from 18 I went into the University of Kansas with a pre, you know, with a pre physical therapy degree. At the time the University of Kansas was a master's program for that. So I did my undergrad in. I double majored in exercise physiology and sports medicine and then I came out here to UW and got my master's degree in PTE and that was it. I've loved it ever since.

Listen, you're in the right place because I laugh all the time because if my 6th grade PE teacher could see me now, he would not believe it. I don't. Like I was the kid in the back that walked the mile every Thursday or always had some reason why it run the mile. I was always trying to get out of Pete pe always that I became a trainer. He would not believe it. I think I would have to work him out to prove it would be like there is no way that this, the most non athletic person on the planet became a trainer. But like you, I just became. I got really passionate about watching people transform their life and go from always feeling like they were miserable and feeling like they couldn't move and feeling like it wasn't that fitness wasn't for them. And then all of a sudden watching them transform their life, that was addictive. Like to me I just had to be part of that.

Yes. And I Don't think. I think 80% of the skill of being any kind of customer service, right. When you're in a service industry to help people is about your ability to relate to those people, right? Empathize with those people. Everybody can read a textbook and learn and learn and learn, right? But having people skills is a skill that is very difficult to learn. And when you're good at it, you're good at it. So I don't know. That's what I feel like I'm good at. And then I can take up pieces and learn the rest along the way.

What I'm really super excited about your work, specifically, and for this podcast, really, is that I feel like for all my years that I've spent as a trainer, that there tends to be a huge gap in terms of networking and relationship development between physical therapists or physiotherapists and personal trainers. And I know for me, and from my perspective, I know a lot of that comes from this feeling as a trainer that, you know, a lot of trainers try to, you know, work out a scope of practice and they don't want to recommend a physical therapist because one of two reasons. Number one, they feel like they find so many pts, because I know this was true for me, that will say, oh, no, you can't be in fitness, you can't do strength training. You just have to roll on the ground and do these hip bridges. Or number two, you feel like that if they are recommending a physical therapist, it means something about them. It means that they can't help their client, which just isn't true. And I have seen in your work that you did this beautiful job of really bridging the gap between physical therapy and fitness. So I'd love for you to speak a little bit about a clinician side and what the experience has been for you. And maybe, you know, what are some of the things that happen on the PT side?

I think first I'm going to state that the only reason that I can be successful at that is thanks to trainers. So let's start it with that because I think, and I'm going to get backlash for saying this maybe, right. But pts as a profession are kind of egotistical. We kind of tend to. I don't know if it's just kind of from. Every profession has their fights, right? To be recognized as professionals, right? And respected professionals. And in pt there was a big drive for a long time about having direct access, right? Being able to, as movement specialists, to be able to evaluate and treat someone without Necessarily having it come from a doctor's referral for me. One, my background was in exercise physiology and sports medicine, right? And so I was fortunate enough when I was coming out of my practice, two things. One, I utilized those skills in a physical therapy setting for three years prior to going back to grad school, right? So I worked with physical therapists who trusted me, right? Once they were done with the rehab, whatever that form of rehab was, to then come out to me and have me guide them through the movement and recovery that was going to drive their success, right? To continue to hold on to whatever the therapist had done. And because of that, when I did become a pt, right then I went and pursued and got my CSCS certification, right? Trying to better understand the dynamic and the crossover world between the rehab world and then getting back into strength and conditioning for people. And so I did that as a new PT with another pt, probably really poorly at the time when I look back on it. But we all learn and grow. Then I went into occupational medicine and occupational medicine was just like outpatient orthopedics for rehab. But all of a sudden I was working with these, what you would consider industrial athletes in my opinion, right? These guys were throwing around 250 pound line, 24 hours a day, 16 hour shifts, working in the fisheries in Alaska, working in industrial rehab. And I was in this position where I was learning how to do all this movement and breathing retraining. And then I had this clientele of people that needed to be able to open 250 pound ship doors and throw crab pots over. And all of a sudden I could not, I couldn't bring it together. I was like, I need help, right? And who better knows how to do this than a trainer? Trainers don't have, they don't do manual therapy and like little joint mobs and stuff like that, right? People come to trainers to get strong and get out of pain and learn how to move better, right? I was now 15 years into my practice and that CSCS thing that I did like 15 years ago, I was like, I don't remember how to do any of this stuff, right? Like, I understand physiology and physics and the anatomy of the body and I knew how to do this positioning and breathing and understanding this stuff, but I, I didn't know how to incorporate that into movement so that I could teach people how to get back into their lives and manage and control those compressions and decompressions to their advantage, right? With big things, big movements, whether it be moving a shift or, or squatting 250 pounds, right, or doing a deadlift or whatever people wanted to do. And so, you know, that's part of the thing with pts, is that you don't have to take. I don't know. How do I want to say this? Opening up my education to other things outside of the PT world was literally the best decision I have ever made in the last five years, right? Looking at trainers who know how to take people, they can't touch them, right? Most of the time, there's a certain scope of line of practice, just like all of us have. And I started kind of researching networks of people, and now I'm surrounded by this tribe of people, right, That I don't know what I would do without them. Like, I have learned a vast amount of information.

Now. Would you say that that's one of the things where a lot of physical therapists or physiotherapists missed the mark? Like the fact that you got a CSCS right at the beginning of your career. Like, is that something that a lot of physical therapists do as well?

No, no. And I think it, for me, in all honesty, I would like to say it was because I just had this innate desire, but I was literally working in a sports medicine clinic, and that PT made it a requirement. He said to me, you know, if you want to learn, right, as far as, like, training principles, this is one of the best things you can do. So, again, that's one of those gifts, right, that you meet people who do things for you and push your boundaries and make you experience these things that make you a better clinician, trainer, rehab professional or whatever. So, yeah, I think, you know, I've had conversations where. And let me tell you what, when I was in those CSCS classes, do you know what I mean, I was terrified to speak out, right, Because I was in this group of people. The majority of them were trainers. And here was this, like, nerdy old PT who didn't, you know what I mean? Who was a new grad who didn't have a clue what was going on. And then I have these conversations with these trainers now that depend on, right? Like, I reach out and say, hey, I've got this client. What are some things I can do to help them transition back into some of the things they want to do outside of the rehab world? And they tell me stories like that, where they sat in the same class as I did and didn't want to say anything because they were too embarrassed to be in a world of pts. And I just think it's crazy, right? Like, egos don't help anybody, right? Like, our ultimate goal is to help whoever that client is successfully return to whatever it is they need to do and whoever the hell can make that happen. That's the most important thing. So until that boundary gets broken, right? And people let go of those egos and realize that we're all out for the same goal, right? And we can all help each other.

And for the trainer side as well, I think that the trainers also have, you know, we have egos too, that we need to check and recognize that we're all just going after the same, after the same goal. And I think too, you know, to be fair to the clinicians out there, and I might get backlash for saying this, but not all trainers are created equal in terms of their level of care and passion for human body biomechanics. Like, not everyone, you know, some people just aren't certified. They're just born with an awesome six pack and were athletes in high school and then think, hey, I can train someone. Not recognize realizing that there's a whole science of training that matters.

And to that point, it's the same with pts, right? Or anybody in a service industry of health, right? And that's kind of. You can go off on a whole other tangent of like cookie cutter programs and like our shoulder, internal and external rotation with tubing really going to be the best thing to do for a rotator cub problem. Probably not, right? But I guarantee you in way more settings than not, that's what happens, right? So I think that that's a huge problem just as an industry and some of that too. Again, like, there's all sorts of caveats and legs to this octopus that you could go out on about. For me, another big part of it is, as a physical therapist, a lot of my treatment right now is driven by insurance, right. And insurance limitations. And this is where trainers also come in, a big help for me, right? And everything I learned from them. Because what if someone only has six physical therapy visits and they have an ACL repair, What are you going to do? So in those six visits, or maybe six weeks at the longest, right, I can try to get them to a certain point and then I can either educate them on what I think they need to do next, or I need a network of people where I can say, okay, now, right? You can either continue to work with me for a period of time, right? Or you can go and here's a trainer that's going to be able to take you to the next level, right? And that's been hugely beneficial for me because benefits for people are so limited these days that sometimes that network of referral out to people is huge for me, so that people can then get back into a rehab gym setting.

Well, and I'll say this, too, for a lot of trainers, you know, as coming from the trainer side, having that network is so important, especially for me when I was working with a lot of moms. And our healthcare system fails us in so many ways, and one being the fact that there are these cookie. You know, you were talking about cookie cutter programs. But we also have these standardized rehab benchmarks. Like, six weeks after. Six weeks after birth, you're gonna be good to go and just do it every day. I mean, I'll never forget. Now, granted, my doctor, you know, she's operating from the best of her ability. My doctor came in, and before she even did an internal exam, she's like, you can go back running, swimming, jumping, whatever it is that you were doing, no problem. And I'm like, you haven't even examined me, and you're clearing me for that because it's some arbitrary, you know, standard. I think what happens to a lot of trainers is we become the first line of defense because people think, oh, especially for moms, they think, oh, I'm fine. I've hit this mark. My doctor said I was fine, and then don't even know that. Maybe they should go to a pelvic floor physical therapist don't even know that this, you know, ha, ha. I'm three years postpartum and I'm still peeing in my pants. But that's normal, right? Scary mommy jokes about that and recognize that these are signs. And I think trainers, there is a responsibility that we get to be. It's a gift that we get to be that first line of defense. And so when we can start recognizing and hear things like that are red flags like that, like, you know, I'm leaking, or I have low back pain that just won't go away no matter how many dead bugs I've done. That's a sign like, okay, I need to have this network. I need to reach out to my friend that I can refer them to, right? And it's important to have.

And I think if you. You know, there are people out there, right? I learned that there are people out there that I can look to for help that I can be vulnerable with and be like, listen, this is where I'm at, and I need help, right? Like, what's the next person? And I think when those people allow me to become vulnerable. Then they're also. I hope that the same respect happens back. Right. Like it is out there. It's just you have to seek it out. And the way you seek it out is opening up that educational piece, right? Like stepping, for me, stepping outside of just physical therapy, continuing education, right. And one of the benefits. And. And this is an error on my part, right. Not that I couldn't have used my own money to do that, right. But it really was like the last six years, even though my own practice has very new right. That I. And again, I associate this to people I was with. The fortunate things that I feel like the people I've met and the people that I've come across where I could take my continuing education and use it to whatever I wanted, right. Like, just because this wasn't going to get me CEUs, it was approved by the American Physical Therapy association, right. That it wasn't going to be beneficial to me. I have taken hours upon hours of training. Probably the last 40 hours of training I've done has been from trainers. And I have learned so much about my own body, about my clients. I'm really open with my clients about this. Like, these are people that have educated me in my private practice. Now my client base really is people who are fitness enthusiasts, fitness professionals that, you know, are doing everything they do. This is a part of the world. They could be from like weekend warriors, right? And just, you know, kind of everyday exercise people who are just trying general health. And I also have a lot of fitness professionals, you know, instructors, you know, and whatever, barre three instructors or spin cycle instructors who have just kind of gotten caught in this pain cycle that they can't quite get out of. And so they come to me for that and I help them with that. And then this whole, what I call my new tribe of people that I am so grateful for. And I can literally get emotional about it sometimes because that vulnerability to me was an acceptance, unconditional acceptance in this network of people that I have now met has been life change for me. And then I can take it and give it to these people who. That's what they want. My common client is someone who already has fitness as a part of their everyday life and has just kind of got some symptoms or pain or struggles they can't get past.

So you really prompted this conversation where, you know, you're talking about fitness enthusiasts or people who are, you know, essentially athletes that they are avid. Maybe they're not in some specific sport, but they are avid. People who work there are Avid worker outers, for a lack of a better word. Yeah, like, to work out. And I think what happens is that there's this whole component of the athlete brain is that we are designed to kind of push through pain and just that it's supposed to be hard and that it's supposed to hurt. And that somehow if we just admit that there might be some kind of pain or something that might not seem normal, that it means something about our skill or our ability or our level of discipline or our level of ability to push through. And so I think that oftentimes we don't acknowledge or really work through the fact that we ourselves campaign.

Yes, that was the hardest part for me, even with my own transition into the posture restoration kind of track and breathing track, is that I just kept going more and more and more and more and more thinking that I just wasn't strong enough post baby, right? Like, I just had to keep pushing and just keep pushing. And I just had this conversation with a client yesterday on my table in my clinic, and she was just like, I need to feel it strong. And I was like, girl, you feel everything strong. You need to dial it down, right? Like, you need to let your body rest and recover. So I think. And she is right, a spin cycle instructor, literally a Bar 3 instructor. She owns her own business. You know, there is this innate drive. And so, yeah, I mean, that's the interesting part too, about working with that client base is actually teaching them to actually regress and allow their body to rest and recover, to actually make them a stronger individual when they go do their professional and personal stuff that they love to do right now.

There is something that you said in your story, and also just from knowing you and knowing that the type of people that you work with is that sometimes there are these people that, you know, athletes or fitness enthusiasts, that they have gone to pts before and they have tried everything, and yet they're still not in pain. So they just kind of think, and this is true sometimes for moms too. Gen pop, you know, general population have gone to these people and they have tried everything, and then all of a sudden and nothing works. So they just think, okay, I guess this is just something I have to live with. So what would you say to that athlete? Or what would you say to maybe. What would you say to that PT who's working with that client, who can't get anything, who can't get that client out of pain? What would you. Where would you go? What would you recommend? What were some of the things that you do for your?

I think that one of the big things that from PT side, I'm just going to speak from the PT side that can be missed is truly listening, right? Why are these people, what have they done before? What do they have going on in their lives that could be from basic health history questions, sleep questions, birth questions, regular past medical history questions, but also just listening and watching their body language. What are they doing in the chair? Are they fidgeting around and obviously uncomfortable and anxious about the entire situation? Are they slouched down in the chair? And then I think, oh gosh, if they're slouched down in the chair like that, so bad they can't negate pressure whatsoever. So no wonder their poor systems are not getting better. Why are the reasons, what is their global problem? Because maybe they just got a cookie cutter problem and that was part of it, right? But most of the time I really believe that, you know, you have this brain, body movement, right? And that brain can affect a massive amount of what can happen with recovery for people. And so that goes back to that connection, meaning when you can connect with somebody, right? When they truly feel like you're listening to them, understanding what's happening. Some of these areas we address. Sometimes when I, when I'm seeing someone for, for an hour long treatment, we spend the first 45 minutes discussing what else is happening, right. And how that affects things. So I think in a world where you particularly with pts that are seeing mainly insurance based companies, right, it's time, it's money and they tend to just rush things along and it can be a huge missing component. These people, there might be a whole array of things going on. Maybe they don't like to be touched and that's difficult, right? Maybe they have other issues going on with their family or their relationship or work or as we know, right? COVID 19 has been a huge thing for people, right? Their worlds have changed drastically. Whether they've lost jobs or they're working from home, or they're working from home and trying to have their kids with them. You know, there's all sorts of aspects that go into pain and recovery and if those elements are ignored, then for me, I think that's why people come see me. Right? This woman that I just told you about yesterday, she had been with a PT for 13 visits already before she saw me, just unsuccessfully. It would work for a period of time. And then her pain kept coming back. There was a lot of other elements that we had to discuss as far as pain and recovery and how to manage it. There's just a massive amount of stuff that plays in. And if you don't take the time to learn that about clients, I think your success rate is going to be less.

That's such a good point. And, you know, I'm curious, and I'm going to ask this question knowing that the answer is probably, it depends. But just for argument's sake, are there typical, you know, pain benchmarks that you're really looking at in terms of standardization of when a pain. When a client should at least feel improvement in their pain? Like how you know, because we all know there's a difference between pain and discomfort and that there is going to be some types of, you know, feelings of discomfort as you're healing. But when are you really looking at a patient and thinking, okay, this is not working.

That is a good question. And it does vary a lot, right? And there's all sorts of variables, meaning pain is subjective, for sure, right? Like, again, that's that whole brain body movement, right? How people perceive pain comes in a variety of different ways. It also depends on the patient's belief in the process, right? Like they have to participate and believe in the process of getting better. And sometimes I think one of the hardest things, when you're working with people and you have people that are in pain or have a desired outcome from you, right? They're seeing you because they have a goal in mind that they want to reach and they're looking at you to help them get there. And when you can't, right? It's a very difficult thing. And sometimes you can't because they have issues that are out of your scope of practice and you need to refer out. Sometimes it's because there is a lack of compliance, right? And really participating in their recovery. And then you have people that are, you know, heavy participants, and sometimes they don't get better. Also, like, I think for me, I mean, there's. There's tests and measures that we do, of course, right? That we look at for, hopefully for success. There is success for me when I. When people tell me that they're doing simple things, like things like I'm resting better, all of a sudden I have this freedom when I'm walking. These are key things, right? Like, I just had somebody say to me yesterday, right? Like, I don't know whether this is really working or not, but the only thing I know is, like, I feel totally different when I'm, like, walking around, like, so much better. Like, I have this freedom of movement, right? That's a win for me when People notice, like, basic things like walking improvement, sleeping improvement, stress management improvement, right. This is huge. So. And those things are all associated with decreased pain, right. The reason they can do those things is because their pain is going. So I don't know that I have exact benchmarks. And unfortunately, with Insurance World, I do have to document benchmarks, right? And those are where the test and measures and like numerical pain scales and all that kind of stuff come into play. But for me personally, as a therapist, those are not the things that I look at. The things that I look at are what people are telling me about their lives, right? Like, this is easier, I feel better. I've noticed that I'm consciously thinking about this, right? And oh my gosh, I took a walk the other day and I noticed that I was totally breathing out of my nose the whole time. I never breathed out of my mouth, right. And how much better it felt, just things like that. So I don't know if I'm doing a good job of answering your question, really straightforward, but it is very subjective, right? And it is very independent and individual on the person. And sometimes there are those cases where I say, you know what, maybe this isn't the best fit. Right? And maybe we have to have those uncomfortable conversations about, you have to believe in this process, you have to believe in yourself that your body can get better. Right. We have been given the genetic lottery, right? Our bodies are amazing. They can do amazing things and we can treat them like crap and they can recover. They're so resilient. And so it's really amazing when you see that resilience and people see that resilience. But can I get that with everybody? Not always.

Well, I love that you bring this up. I love that you bring up the power of the mind, body connection. It was something that I always talked about when I was training people, one on one, is that it's a component that most people miss, that most people don't recognize and don't realize the power of what it is that they are thinking and what it is that they are saying about their recovery, about their body, about their performance. That stuff really matters. And most people miss it.

Yep. This is our mothership, right? Everything comes from here. And even as a professional person who works in helping people all the time, my mothership can be so nasty sometimes, right? And so it is a constant. It's a work in progress. But really, when I work on my mothership, everything else about me changes, right? And I believe that, having just spoken to a client the other day was getting Ready, Very stressful situation. She was getting ready to go for two weeks vacation and we spent the hour of therapy talking about how are you going to come back into life and not get back to this point? That's the stuff I want you to reflect on when you're on vacation and you take the time. I don't feel like that's out of my scope of practice. I don't because it's a huge part of recovery and there are lines there for sure. But as a practitioner, anybody who work with the public, I think you have to be able to talk about those tough conversations sometimes and not just focus on this is what we're going to get done while you're in here. And we have to get through all these exercises and stuff like that. There's a lot more components to it, right.

And you're talking in terms of the mothership, being the leader. And one of the things too that I used to always talk about was that 95% of what we're doing on a day to day basis is done on automation.

Right.

Brain needs to have that type of automation. So one of the things that since birth that gets automatically automated is this concept of breathing. And now so anyone who's involved in pri, so now I definitely want to be mindful of your time because I know we could go down a whole nother rabbit hole. This that I'm about to bring up. We started on breathing, but, you know, that's one of the components that I feel like now people are starting to pay attention to and how breathing specifically can help in rehabilitation and also in performance. And yet most people miss it. This is the first year I honestly, I didn't think about breathing until after I had my children and I had already been a trainer for seven years. So I would love for you to just kind of talk a little bit, at least scratch the surface. We're going to the podcast again to like go deeper on this subject, but I'd love for you to at least, you know, scratch the surface on the impact of breathing and how it's changed your practice essentially.

Well, when I took that PRI course and someone started talking about visceral anatomy, pressure management, the fact that our lungs. Right. This sounds so bad and I am going to say it out loud that the lungs are in our chest cavity and not in our belly, right? Because I had taught belly breathing, lymphatic belly breathing, all this stuff for so long, right. And the fact of the kind of. Most people, and I say this with a caveat, most people being Fairly symmetrical on the outside and the asymmetry pattern that we are naturally and innately built with on the inside, and how this drives rotational patterns and points of compression and points of expansion. And, you know, breathing, if you take 21,000 breaths a day on average, right? I mean, it was euphoric for me because I had had students for 10 years, and I had multiple students who said to me, you know, Paige, why are the rotational patterns always the same? Right? Like, why do people almost always look the same? And, you know, my answer was, I don't know. They just do. Like, way to go, CI. But then I took this first VRI course, and that's what happened, right? And so all of a sudden, I was learning why I was seeing the things I was seeing, why I wasn't able to necessarily get everybody better. This whole relationship between sympathetic drive and parasympathetic drive that I personally was dealing with. And so it just opened a massive world for me in regards of how important breathing, simple things, mouth breathing versus nasal breathing. And so I just started learning and researching like crazy.

And.

And I started having success with my clients for the first time. People that could come in and we could do, you know, patients like to have. They like to see things, they like to see results right away. And I understand that. And that's kind of where the buy in comes. And I could show them these different positions and things they were struggling with, and then say, take 10 breaths like this and then retest them and show them. And that was it, right? I've had clients fall asleep with me in my. Because for the first time, their bodies are so sympathetically driven. Just by teaching them to breathe properly and use those diaphragms and their canister naturally, they were able to just rest for the first time. So for me, there's a huge education in just rest and recovery, right? The importance of stresses to your system are really important, right? And that's how your system makes changes, strength changes and physiological and histological changes. But you can't take those stresses and become a stronger person without being able to negate compression and expansion globally, right? And then you can use those compression to your advantage, and you can use those expansions to your advantage in whatever you're wanting, whether it's just better rest or whether you're an Olympic lifter that needs to drag 4 or 500 pounds. It was huge for me on many levels, and I could talk about it forever. And now I'm learning all sorts of other elements, more on the fitness side of how to take everything I know from the PRI side and drive it back into a fitness program for people.

Which is awesome because like you just said, not only did it help in your own pain recovery, you're noticing that it's impacted your clients.

Oh, my gosh, huge. It's the first time that, again, not everybody, but, like, it was the first time that I saw consistent changes and people freaked out. And those people could have been those, like, chain smoking. I only drink coffee. I haven't had water in a year. Fishermen who work 16 hours a day who freaked out because just doing this simple breathing exercise made them feel so much better. Right? To fitness professionals or anybody, you know, weekend warriors or whatever, right. Being able to utilize this for rest and recovery, for whatever reason, preparation for preparation for activity and fitness.

That's so good. So thank you. I definitely want to definitely be mindful of your time. So I'm going to leave you with the last question and then of course, share with the listeners where they can find more about you. But the last question I'll give you is, what would you say to a new clinician or maybe physical therapist that doesn't have a fitness network yet? Where would be one of the first places that you would start as a PT to start building these types of relationships?

I built my relationships through research and looking at people online, actually. Right. I think it's really important to have a network locally where you're at, right? And so there's all sorts of resources that you can go look at, whether resources within your field of physical therapy, resources online. If you're looking at doing a specific type of training, oftentimes you can reach out to those institutes too. But for me, the global world is huge now, right. So you don't just have to have access to trainers in your local area, right. People can get great training online now. It's amazing, right? Like, and this is one of the good things. It's always been there. But this is one of the really good things that's come out of the situation that the world's been in globally is it just opened up these massive doors for me too, right? All these people that you can reach out to and discuss and get that network built. I mean, you just have to look outside your small box, right? Like, you have to look outside the window of physical therapy and see what else is out there. Because there is so much information.

That whole concept of checking your ego, right. Once you can accept that, there's more to learn. Once you can get out of that dogmatic thinking like this way is the only way. Just because it's worked for me at least at some capacity. That's when you can start growing and expanding and that you'll grow that network. So I hear that for sure.

And you need to look out of your region, right. Like I think regionally too. My region here is big, like manual therapy, NIAM type stuff. That's kind of what you're pushed in school. You know, I don't know what happens in each region, you know, northeast, southeast, you know, Midwest. But that is definitely what was thrown at me as a new grad. And you know, I did that and I was like just going to kill me for saying that. But it's, you know, it was fine, you know, and I appreciated it and they're super smart people, right? For sure. But it just, I used it for a period of time and I just didn't find it to be the most successful thing or something that I enjoyed. So then I kind of seeked more movement based education after that. But just understanding that looking at a broad group at first, right. Because then maybe you find something that's more interesting to you and then you can kind of hone in. But as a new grad, it's really important. And the good thing about most new grads, honestly is they're just so jonesing for learning that if they kind of look beyond their the norm, the I think it would be very beneficial. It just took me about 15 years to get there. I'm serious.

Yeah, I love it.

Okay. And I feel good about where I'm at now and I feel good about the things that I'm doing and I'm enjoying my career more now than I did 10 or 15 years ago.

So I think that's so important.

Yeah.

So this has been so amazing. Thank you so much for your time. For anyone who's interested in learning more, maybe working with you, where can I send them?

So you. I'm at alignment physical therapy.com online and then I have an Instagram account to Facebook. I don't know. Help me out, Beverly.

So we are definitely going to link up your website. We'll link up your Instagram account and Facebook account so we can find you there.

It's just me, so it's not like I have all these global, global things going so, so well. I'm easy. And email me on my website, you know what I mean? And on my Instagram my email is there. So that's a great way to reach out to me too.

Questions you there on, on the Instagrams oh my gosh.

I had so much fun. Thank you for having me. Thanks so much. I love it. Thank you Beverly.

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