Once again, a PT session leads to this very blog post! I’m tellin’ you, the people at my physical therapy facility give me great material. 😁
So, I had an interesting conversation with a fellow rehabber at PT!! AND it actually had nothing to do with me – – which is quite unusual! I swear, working hard in PT truly baffles people and those people let you know it! Honestly, I’m not entirely clear as to why that is. Perhaps I need to do some research and see why some beings have this phobia about full effort and sweating at physical therapy……
I’ll check it out and get back to you!! 🦍 😁
Okay, back to the conversation at hand! It was with an older gentleman that I had seen at PT for the past three months or so. He was there after his shoulder surgery for a torn rotator cuff. And he was always very nice!! Him and I would chitchat sparingly while we did our own separate workouts.
So, last week, he came up to me and told me that he was one-week away from being cleared from PT!!! He was very dedicated to his rehab, showing up twice a week for the past 3+ months, and his progress showed! And even though he loved to wear jeans and very restrictive clothing to PT – – you know how that hinders progress!! 🤓 – – he was still greatly deserving of saying Buh-bye to PT!!! And of course, I told him that and wished him a huge “Congratulations!!!”
He then started telling me what he thought about his PT experience: how it was good but really long and how he felt like he could have been finished a few weeks ago but he was told that he needed to stay a little longer. AND THEN, he said something that gave me great pause…..
He said, “PT gave me movements to do that I’ll never do again once I leave here!”
Now, this may seem like no big deal. Like, once you’re done with your shoulder exercises, you never have to do them again because you’re “healed.” But that’s not the way the body works!
This is 100% true!!! And I can almost guarantee that this gentleman wasn’t using the full range of motion of his shoulder which led to his rotator cuff tear in the first place. Especially because the exercises given at PT are to work the full ROM (range of motion) of the shoulder!! So, if that movement wasn’t what he was used to….ding, ding, ding!!! We have our answer. 🛎
Here’s the deal in an example: If I stopped raising my right arm overhead – like only brushing my hair with my left hand and only using my left arm to get a dish from the top shelf and so on, my body would adapt to that limited range of motion.
My body would adapt SO WELL, that the brain would recognize that it was no longer important for me to raise my right arm overhead and it would slowly start to lose that function. In brief, this means that the muscles of my right shoulder would stiffen from underuse and from lack of overhead movement at the shoulder joint.
And I might develop some neck pain from this imbalance – – just because I’m making my left side do so much more than my right – – but still, losing that overhead function may not make THAT big of a difference for me….
UNTIL I walk to my car on an icy winter’s night, slip on the slick pavement, and reach my right arm up towards the car to catch myself. RIP!!! Rotator cuff tear. Just like that. Why? Because I lost the overhead function in my right arm which means all of the muscles in the shoulder are no longer doing their job optimally. And therefore those shutdown muscles attempting to catch my body weight as I slipped? That equals disaster. Not because of the ice, not because I’m old, not because I was a klutz, but because I had limited range of motion at my shoulder joint. It simply could not handle what I asked it to do when I slipped on the ice – – because I stopped asking it to move in that “overhead” motion, way before the slip.
Long story short, because this gentleman at PT will once again deny his shoulder some range of motion and/or some activation, he just might be setting himself up for another shoulder issue down the road. And it made me very sad for him!
Because I couldn’t tell him what I was thinking!! He was so happy to be almost finished with the “excessive” movement at PT. And it certainly was not my place to burst his bubble!
I DID see this gentleman again, this morning at PT, and he told me that today was his final day!! So, I wished him well and told him to take care of himself. And we both told each other, “no more injuries!!” To which I certainly hope that both him and I follow those significant orders!!!!!!!
And that is my story of the day for you, thanks to this kind man at PT! And though it had to do with this gentleman’s apparent lack of shoulder mobility, this limited movement can happen at ANY joint in the body and even at the spine!! Because a lack of movement in one area of the body can have devastating effects on that body part. And on the whole of the body, too.
The most important thing to note is that our bodies NEED movement. Big, small, all directions, full range of motion – – like kids who move like crazy in every which-way!!
And the reason some people start to “feel old” and have bodies that hurt or that constantly have an issue, it’s not because they’re old!! Rather, it is because as we get older we stop moving as much and this motion starvation (and limited ROM!) kicks us in the booty!!
Always remember these words of wisdom:
Please treat your mechanical-genius bodies well and move fully, move with kindness, and move with awareness. Because life is movement! And the more movement there is, the more flexibility and fluidity can follow, allowing us to feel better and to feel more alive.
AND YOU DESERVE THAT!!! ❣️❣️❣️❣️❣️