I wanted to talk briefly about starting out an exercise program. I had an interesting case come through the clinic on tuesday. The lady has an acute torticollis. She could not move her head at all right or left. She could not look up. The muscles were all in spasms around the neck and shoulder. So what happened? I questioned and asked a bunch of question and she said it just started like that sunday morning. So with my experience I inquired to see what she had done that would have been different on saturday and there it was! She mentioned that she had decided to do a spinning class. It had been a long time since she had done one she said. So questioning more I said ” could you have used your neck muscles to help you pedal” the answer was “yes”. She used other muscles to compensate for the weaknesses to help her in the spinning class. So I am pretty convinced that she injured herself on saturday but the inflammation and the spasms only came about 24 hours later.

This is so common where people who have not exercised in a long time decide to go out and do what they used to do. The issue is that their body is not ready for that. When you have not exercised in a long time you must ease yourself into it slowly otherwise your body will let you know!!! This is a recurrent theme in the clinic when people feel a little bit better, they go all out and do what they used to do. Usually I get a call the next day and we are back to square one!! so remember to slowly start and give a chance to your body to adjust to the change!!

Valerie