Posture Awareness

Hey everyone, it's Dr. Dave. Hopefully you're all doing well, taking care of each other, enjoying yourselves, and creating those great experiences in your life. One of the questions that people ask me sometimes because we do a lot of work with posture is, "What exercises can I do to kind of fix the posture, especially with this hump in the upper back?" And my first answer isn't necessarily explain the exercises, but to let them know that Depending on how long and what's going on and why would it appear that that posture has changed or there is a hump there, exercise may not be enough to try and correct that hump. But whether it is or it isn't, the exercises are still good for you, but there may be another cause or source and some other things playing into why the body is taking on those posture changes. So that might be key to address first. And again, that's always with function. Function first. Now we want to support that, of course, with good fitness. So the top suggestion isn't necessarily just an exercise, but it's awareness. That if someone comes to the clinic and we give them exercises and we do some treatment and we unlock and release and we work on retraining this, that if they leave the clinic and they're not doing their exercises, but the rest of the day they're feeding into that by not being aware, then all of it is an uphill battle and it's going to be very difficult to influence and encourage your body to sit and move differently. So the number one step dealing with that posture change is your awareness. Sitting tall, standing tall, catching yourself. One of the neat things that we tell people often is just to find a wall or a flat surface where you can put your heels, your bum, your shoulder blades, and your head against the wall. Looking straight ahead, you just translate that head back 2 or 3 seconds, and then you step away and go about your business. But multiple times throughout the day, very briefly, Just remind that position. And by creating that awareness and some reminders like that, you can help work on ensuring not only maybe some encouragement for that posture to get better, but definitely not playing to allowing it to get worse. Sometimes slowing and stopping is the best process of improving and recovering some of that posture. Um, another good thing to do is all kinds of upper back exercises. So if you have access to resistance bands or if you go to the gym, some of the common exercises that will work are like a seated row or a pullback with a resistance band, either one or both, to really work on those shoulders and bringing those shoulder blades back. And then any kinds of pull-downs, straight down, some kind of pull-downs in front, you can even do like reverse flies, anything that works those superficial back muscles will help with that posture. But be cautious. That's going to help with the upper part of the back and in the shoulders, but sometimes the neck still gets left out. So the specific neck exercises can be done either with molds using gravity and/or with a resistance band, but because we're dealing with the neck and in each individual case the cause or source of those posture changes might be different, it's a good idea to get that advice specifically from chiropractor, personal trainer perhaps, and maybe some other kind of allied health professional who has some knowledge or experience in that respect. Okay? So those are the key things. Some awareness, catching yourself during the day, reminding, and then hooking up with a healthcare provider to make sure that any exercises that are given, other than the ones that you might be doing in the gym anyway that could help with posture, are specific to you and are going to get you the results that you're looking for. All right? So I hope that was helpful. If you have any questions, you can always reach out to us through our website. Come like us on Facebook, follow us. We put out some good posts now and then. We'd love to see you there. Drop by the clinic anytime. You're always welcome. The door is open to help you create those great experiences in your life. All right, till next time, take care.