Author: melissa

After a good workout, your muscles hurt.  Usually, that means you’re doing it right, but sometimes it can be a sign that something has gone wrong.  The question is, how do you differentiate between general soreness (which is both common and a good thing after a workout) and actual pain?

This article will help make that clear.

In order to improve your body, you have to push its limits.  When you do that, muscle soreness is one of the short-term results.  Fortunately, this mild burning sensation passes within a day or two and can be alleviated via things as simple as resting, stretching before and after your workout, and then more activity.

The more you work your body, the more efficient it gets and the further back your soreness threshold moves.

Unfortunately, if you overdo it, you’ll find yourself experiencing more than simple soreness.  Pain tends to run deeper.  While soreness is confined to your muscles themselves, pain seeps into your joints too.  While soreness will subside with additional activity, such activity will only make pain worse.

Further, soreness tends to be relatively short lived.  In two or three days, even after a strenuous workout, the soreness subsides.  Pain won’t.  It won’t go away until whatever underlying issue is causing the pain has been addressed.

If you give it enough time, those underlying issues will usually (but not always) go away on their own.  Even so, most people lack the time or patience for that.  If you’re experiencing an unpleasant sensation and you’re not sure whether it’s simple soreness or serious pain, and if it hasn’t subsided in a couple days, play it safe.  Pay a visit to your doctor or your chiropractor and get it checked out.  It’s always better to err on the side of caution.

There are several myths and misconceptions about exercising and knee pain. Some people say you should avoid any type of exercise at all if your knees are hurting. Others recommend a “walk it off” approach, suggesting you work through the pain.  Which of the two approaches is correct, though?

The answer is:  It’s complicated.

If you’ve just suffered a knee injury and it is swollen and inflamed, give it a bit of time (48 to 72 hours) before you attempt to exercise it.  During that time, apply heat and ice in an alternating pattern.  After that, however, your knee will be healed sufficiently to stand gentle, low-impact and low-intensity exercise.

You should always listen to your body, however.  If the pain becomes too much, definitely don’t try to work through it.  You may wind up making it worse.

You should also avoid any form of exercise that sees you putting a heavy weight load on your knees.  Weight lifting with a knee injury, for instance, is a recipe for disaster.  Anything that requires jumping is likewise a bad idea for anyone with a knee injury. The sudden stop at the end will put tremendous pressure on your knees, which can make an existing injury worse. This is called high-impact exercise.

On the other hand, there are a number of low-intensity exercises that don’t put excess weight on your knees and those are all fine.  Squatting, for instance (without weights) is a fantastic way to gently exercise your knees and stretch the connecting ligaments, which will actually facilitate faster healing.

Another misconception is the notion that if you have arthritic knees, you shouldn’t exercise them.  This is actually bad advice. If you neglect exercising your arthritic knees, they’ll actually get worse faster than they would if you do regular, low impact exercises. This is even if the act of doing so causes a moderate amount of pain.

The bottom line is, exercising with a sore knee is possible. That’s provided that you don’t do it immediately after an injury, you are mindful of what your body is telling you, and aware of the types of exercises you do.

 

If you experience back pain when you bend or stretch, you’re certainly not alone.  The question though, is what’s causing your back pain in the first place?

The answers are more varied than you might think.  Here are the most common ones:

A Muscle Strain or Sprain

These two are far and away the most common causes of back pain that flares up as a consequence of you stretching, bending or reaching.  It hurts, yes, but it’s temporary.  With the application of alternating ice and heat, paired with low impact exercises that gently stretch those muscles, you can expect pain caused by strains or sprains to gradually improve and fade away over time.

This type of pain can be caused by a variety of issues including nerve compression, lack of blood flow, a general lack of flexibility and excessive physical activity which leads to overuse.  Even dehydration can cause this type of pain.

A Herniated Disc

While not nearly as common as a muscle strain or sprain, herniated discs are still commonplace and describe a condition where the soft padding between two segments of your spine has slipped out of position and begun to bulge out.  When that happens, pretty much any time you move, you’re going to experience sharp, shooting pain.

With proper treatment, including NSAIDs and low-impact exercise, the pain from a herniated disc will begin to subside in six to eight weeks.  Other treatments such as an epidural steroid injection could speed the process even further, although if the pain persists much beyond eight weeks, surgery may be required to correct the issue.

Arthritis

This is more common in people over the age of fifty-five, although it’s certainly possible that arthritis could be the issue in people younger than that.  Unfortunately, there’s no cure for arthritis, although there are several viable treatments that can help you manage the pain.

Our recommendation is this:  Unless you can point to a recent activity that may have caused a strain or sprain, you should see your doctor or chiropractor and give them the opportunity to assess you, so you can begin treating it appropriately.  Don’t suffer needlessly!

Back pain is a common ailment, and most people have simply resigned themselves to it.  Nearly everyone in America will, at one point or another during their lives, experience back pain.  The causes are many and varied, but one often overlooked culprit is the mattress you sleep on every night.

How do you tell though?  Here are a few tips, tricks and pointers you can use to identify if your mattress is contributing to your back pain and how to minimize its impact:

Simple Mindfulness

We’ll start with the basics.  It benefits you to pay attention to exactly when your back pain seems to flare up.  If you have trouble getting a decent night’s sleep and when you wake up every morning, you feel a twinge of pain getting out of bed, that’s a clear sign that your mattress may be at least part of the problem.

Look For Obvious Signs

If you do wake up each morning in pain, inspect your mattress closely before you make the bed.  Are there places that sag?  Are there lumpy areas?  If so, that’s another clear indicator that your mattress is at least part of the problem.

Fortunately, this is an easy issue to address, or at least prevent.  Every month or so, flip or turn your mattress so that you wear it out evenly.  Over time, the springs and coils will begin to break down in the areas that are supporting your weight.  By changing the orientation of your mattress at regular intervals, you can extend its useful life, and minimize your back pain as you bring firmer areas of your mattress into active use.

Mind Your Weight

Maybe you’ve gained weight since you first purchased your mattress.  While the firmness of the mattress may have been fine when you initially made the purchase, your increase in weight may be causing it to break down more quickly, contributing to your pain problem.

The Age Of The Mattress Matters

In some instances, older is better.  That’s definitely not true where mattresses are concerned, however.  If your mattress is more than five years old, it’s almost certainly contributing to whatever back pain you’re feeling.  In that case, the solution is simple – it’s time for a replacement.

Back pain is no laughing matter, and anything you can do to minimize its severity and impact on your life is a very good thing.  Pay attention to your mattress.  It may be a bigger factor than you first realized.

Even people who don’t do Yoga know that it’s good for them.  What many people don’t know, however, is exactly why it’s so good for you.  In this article, we’ll outline just a few of the many benefits you’ll realize by making Yoga a regular part of your daily routine.

It Increases Your Flexibility

Let’s start with the most obvious.  The various positions you’ll contort yourself into as you begin to practice Yoga will absolutely improve and increase your flexibility.  Many people say they’re not flexible enough to do Yoga, but that’s actually just a myth and an excuse.  If a relative lack of flexibility is an issue, you’ll need to stick to basic positions. Over time, however, you’ll absolutely find yourself moving beyond those.

Helps With Weight Loss

More than a third of Americans are obese, and almost everyone living in this country could stand to drop at least a few pounds.  Yoga can help with that.  Not only will it help you burn calories and tone your muscles, but Yoga is also incredibly relaxing.  Stress, after all, is one of the major contributing factors to weight gain.  Anything that can be done to reduce stress will also have a positive impact on weight loss.

It’s A Confidence Booster

There’s undoubtedly a spiritual component to Yoga, and many people find that connotation to be incredibly empowering, especially when combined with the fact that it invariably helps to improve your mood as it lowers your stress level.

More than that though, as you embrace the meditative aspects of Yoga and begin to focus on the union of mind and body, you’ll find that you invariably become a more confident person.

People find their way to Yoga for all sorts of different reasons.  Whatever your particular reasons are though, rest assured that it will pay you handsome dividends in a variety of ways.

Most people don’t spend too much time thinking about their feet.  We all tend to take them for granted unless there’s a problem and they start to hurt.  It might surprise you to know, then, that your feet are much more important to your overall health than you think!

Your feet are a lot more complex mechanically than you probably realize. They contain 26 bones, 33 different joints, and more than a hundred muscles, ligaments and tendons.  If any one of those malfunctions or gets stressed or strained, your foot is going to start hurting, which could lead to real trouble for you in a variety of ways.

Consider what happens when you start experiencing foot pain.  The natural, instinctive response to that is to start “favoring” that foot by limping.  Unfortunately, when you do that, you throw your balance off, which means that you’re putting undue stress on just about every other part of your body.

If you don’t address whatever underlying issue is causing your foot pain, it’s inevitably going to cause pain in your thighs, hips and probably your back.  Your body is a finely tuned, finely balanced machine even if you’re not in the best of health.  Even if you’re overweight.  The bottom line is, if you’re off-balance and limping for an extended period of time, it’s going to have dire repercussions that you’ll find yourself dealing with for weeks, months, or even longer.

That’s why the moment your feet start hurting, it’s important to get to the bottom of why and address the issue.  Don’t let your aching feet cause additional problems for you.  Pamper your feet.  Take precautions to take good care of them, and they’ll take good care of you.

Just about everyone has suffered a muscle cramp at one point or another.  It’s one of the most common types of injuries or pain you can experience. However, how do they happen, and when you get one, what’s the best way of minimizing its impact?  Fair questions for both.

Here are the answers:

In simplest terms, a muscle cramp is a strong tightening or contraction of the muscle in question.  They tend to have a sudden onset, and can last anywhere from just a few seconds to several minutes.

Surprisingly, science doesn’t offer any firm answers on the exact causes of muscle cramps, although we know of a number of things that can certainly lead to them.  Among them are:

• A potassium, magnesium, iron, or calcium deficiency in your blood
• Dehydration
• Standing on a hard, unyielding surface for an extended period of time
• Exposure to extremes in temperature in either direction, but especially exposure to cold

In addition to those things, perhaps the leading cause of muscle cramps is simple over-use.  Exercising for too long or too intensely can certainly lead to cramping.  Fortunately, there are a few simple things you can do to alleviate the pain.  These include:

• Walking it off – It may sound almost cliche, but if you’re suffering a leg cramp, walking does help to stretch it out.
• Perform a gentle stretching routine – if you’re not in a position where you can walk, then gentle persistent stretching will certainly help, and is a perfectly viable alternative
• Massage – another great option is massage, which you can, in most cases, easily do yourself
• Alternate ice and heat – Ice alone is moderately effective. Heat alone is moderately effective, but for best results, use both in an alternating pattern of about fifteen minutes each.

Of course, if your pain persists, then it could be a symptom of a deeper problem, in which case, you should make an appointment with your chiropractor or physician at your next available opportunity.

 

If you’re like most people, you probably made one or more New Year’s Resolutions.  Among the most common resolutions people tend to make is to lose weight and get in better shape. Unfortunately, most people’s resolutions only last about a week, and in many cases, less than that.

Then the real world intrudes, and you realize that accomplishing those goals takes hard work, dedication and focus.

In short, it’s not fun.  If it’s something you’re serious about though, you should know that you don’t have to obsess over it to see a big difference in your life.  Small changes, made incrementally over time, can result in significant weight loss and a much better level of overall health.

Here are a few basic tips to get you started:

• Eat from a smaller plate. Even if you don’t make significant changes to your diet, this is a great way to start.  It’s a simple psychological trick that works on just about everyone.  You can load your smaller plate to capacity and it still won’t hold as much food as you normally eat on a full-sized plate.  Of course, it goes without saying that you should skip seconds.
• Add more veggies to your diet. Again, you don’t have to go crazy here, but if your daily diet is short on veggies, simply adding some and eating them first will do wonders for your weight and overall level of health.
• Consider developing a new walking habit. This is perhaps the easiest and lowest intensity form of exercise you can do.  Best of all, you already know how and have everything you need to do it.  Start modestly, with a ten or fifteen minute walk, every third day, then work up gradually from there.

These are simple changes that you’ll barely have to adjust your routine for, but if you do them and stick with it for a few months, you’ll be amazed at the results and it will likely prompt you to want to do even more.

 

 

If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it a thousand times.  Watch your posture!  Be mindful of your posture! You keep hearing about it because it’s important.  If you’ve ever suffered a massive headache due to several hours’ worth of improper sitting, you understand and appreciate why posture is so important.

What few people realize, however, is that poor posture can do a lot more than simply giving you an aching neck or back.  Over the long haul, it can literally reshape your spine and do even more than that.  Here are a few of the other ways your posture can negatively impact your health:

Nerve Constriction & Damage

Your body was designed to stand and sit a certain way.  Any time you do something that runs counter to your body’s inherent design, it can cause nerves all over your body to become pinched and constricted.  Pinched nerves can obviously cause pain in the immediate area where the nerve is, but they’re all interconnected in a massive highway inside your body. That means a pinched nerve in your back can cause pain in your arms or legs too.  Worse, these kinds of issues don’t go away on their own.  They’ll only get more severe with time.

Increased Risk Of Heart Disease

Just like poor posture can pinch nerves, it can also constrict blood flow by constricting blood vessels all over your body.  This, in turn, can result in blood clots and a condition called ‘Deep Vein Thrombosis,’ both of which can and will increase your chances of developing heart disease.

Poor Digestion

On top of that, poor posture, especially while seated in a slouching position, can compress the organs in your abdominal region, which includes your digestive tract.  The effect isn’t immediate, but over time, it can negatively impact your metabolism and your ability to digest food properly.

As you can see then, poor posture is bad news for lots of different reasons you may not have considered!

Tis the season to be jolly, and to eat!  A lot.

In fact, many people make New Years Resolutions centered around weight loss specifically because they overindulged on all the goodness offered during the holiday season.

Below, you’ll find a few simple tips to help keep from over-doing it where all the delicious food is concerned.

Advanced Planning Pays Off

If you know that you’re going to a feast later in the day, skip breakfast, or eat a sparse one.  The same thing goes for lunch.  About an hour before you’re scheduled to go to the feast, drink a big glass of water to help fill you up before you get there.

Eat Slowly

Once there, take the time to savor the food, and give yourself about fifteen or twenty minutes before you decide to go back for seconds. One of the reasons we so often wind up feeling overstuffed is that it takes our bodies about twenty minutes to realize we’re full.  If you don’t wait, you’ll wind up eating a second helping and then be miserably full by the time your body catches up.

Use A Smaller Plate!

This works especially well if you’re the one hosting the feast, as you can simply choose to serve yourself on a smaller plate.  Even if not, use the bread plate instead of the dinner plate. It’s a simple psychological trick that will leave you feeling satisfied without overdoing it.  Your brain sees the plate brimming with delicious food, and is happy with that, despite that the plate is smaller. If you combine this with the “twenty-minute rule” mentioned above, you’ll rarely walk away from the table feeling miserably full.

These three tips, taken together, will practically guarantee that you’ll enjoy the holiday feasting without overindulging, and that’s a very good thing indeed!