How Pilates Can Get You Back To Full Strength After An Injury

Exercising after An Injury

Oh no!  You twisted your ankle, broke your arm, tore your rotator cuff or did something else injurious to your precious body!!  Well, that’s it you think, “I am out of commission for a while”. Whether you are a stay at home mom or dad of a toddler, a professional athlete or a busy executive you’ve got a problem and parts of your life may come to a screeching halt  (to be dramatic) or at least be changed. Now you face the business of how to fix it.

FIRST THINGS FIRST: see your doctor

Going to the doctor is usually the first step in the path to recovery.  There is a good chance it will be necessary to stop or alter your usual exercise or activity regimen until you are healed.  You may be faced with surgery, physical therapy or both. Ok, you say, well let’s get on with it because frankly there is no other choice and I’ve got places to go, people to see and things to do.  

 

FAST FORWARD: returning to exercise After you’re healed

Injury is healed!  Yay! Moving right along to physical therapy.  After many rigorous sessions of stretching and strengthening and diligently continuing prescribed exercises at home you get the thumbs up from the Doc to finally return to your regularly scheduled program of activity and exercise.  That ankle, knee, foot, wrist, shoulder, etc. feels better than new and you are ecstatic!

WHAT THE HECK!?! Recovery takes time

Back to the gym you merrily go only to discover that although you now have a newly rehabbed seemingly bionic body part, the rest of your body has gone to pot!  Well, this is not surprising. Don’t despair. There is a solution – Pilates.

CAUTION: 

You may be prone to injuring yourself again if you try to jump back in with excessive exercise zeal. 

So, take it easy and take it to the Pilates studio where a classically trained instructor can safely get you back on track.  

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENED to your body while you were healing

While you were on leave from the gym your muscles went to sleep, so to speak, and during hibernation lost some tone.  And although, the injured part of your body was awakened and strengthened during therapy the rest of your body remained lethargic.  So what we have here is a body that is misaligned and out of balance. 

IT’S HIP TO BE SQUARE, even if you’re starting from square one

Time to awaken and re-energize those lazy parts and get the whole body back in sync. 

Assessing the physique of the client is the first step. I observe the way he/she walks into the studio, how she/he stands, sits, and moves.  I note my client’s “square” (also sometimes referred to as “the box” or “the frame”). This is the space created by the shoulders and the hips  (the torso). In a perfect world the body is beautifully aligned horizontally from shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip and vertically from hip to shoulder.  Well, the world is not perfect and neither are all the bodies in it. Most people have a weaker (slouchier) side and it may be even more apparent in a person who has been inactive while recovering from an injury.   

GETTING SQUARED AWAY

Armed with the information I gathered from my assessment I get to work “squaring away”.  Intuitively, one may think that the focus of the workout should be directed at the weaker side.  But, au contraire, with Pilates we treat the whole body. 

Moving from one Pilates exercise to the next while concentrating on “keeping the torso square” the weaker side will naturally work harder than the stronger side in order to maintain the required alignment.  Eventually both sides will become more evenly and equally strong – “squared away”.   

THE CORE: the center of your body and core of your strength

The core is what I am really talking about.  This is the powerhouse, my friend.  This is the place from which the energy of all your movements originates.   All of those muscles in your square/torso are critical for support and stability of the spine. The strength of these muscles correlate to good overall health, proper alignment and future injury prevention. 

A REAL LIFE SCENARIO: an AHA moment for a pilates student

So… I had an elderly client (in her 80’s) who trained with me regularly for many years.  At one point she had to have abdominal surgery so was not able to workout for a time. When she was healed and returned to my studio she told me that she experienced something puzzling and asked me to help her understand.

She discovered that immediately after surgery she was not able to open her car door or turn door handles!  “Why would that be,” she asked “since my arms and shoulders were not affected by the operation?”

Well, folks, the answer is simply that the power originates from the core.  She was not able to access her abdominal muscles so therefore had less strength going to her arms.  

STRETCHing for strengthening

A very important part of the workout, which is incorporated within all the exercises, is stretching.  Stretching in coordination with strengthening is a critical component of the overall Pilates approach.

words of WISDOM

“You can say what Pilates is in these words:  Stretch with strength and control. And the control part is the most important because it makes you use your mind.”

Romana Kryzanowska, Pilates elder

READY SET GO!

Well, my friend, as you embark on your journey to recovery, I wish you well and good health through Pilates.  As we say at Romana’s Pilates, “Love All Around”