Reduce pain and tightness with stretching
Are you feeling stiff and tender when you get out of bed in the morning? Maybe working at your job, sitting at a desk in the same position for hours leaves your body feeling tight and restricted?
Well, there is good news for you! We can do several things to help loosen those tight and stiff muscles that we may have and help take some of the pressure off our spinal joints.
Ensuring we have properly strengthened, toned, and stretched muscles can help alleviate body stiffness and tightness and improve movement.
So why is stretching important?
First, we need our bodies to have a certain about of mobility. When our muscles can move more freely, this allows for better motion throughout our joints. Whether it’s the joints in our spine, pelvis, or arms and legs, we have muscles that are attached and responsible for all our actions. If a muscle is stiff and tight, it can incorrectly restrict the movement and pull on a particular joint, leading to pain, tenderness and affecting daily living. By stretching daily, we can create more movement in the muscles and, therefore, the joints, decreasing the effects of tight muscles on the body (pain, stiffness etc.). When we have full movement of our muscles and joints, we are better able to do everyday activities and less likely to hurt ourselves.
This leads us to the second reason why stretching is so important. Stretching has been shown to boost the length of time that an adjustment holds, meaning you get more out of your chiropractic treatment if you stretch between your appointments. As mentioned earlier, a tight muscle can pull a joint, meaning that vertebrae can be misaligned due to having less movement in a muscle. By stretching, we put less pressure on the joints, so they will respond better and hold the correct position longer when adjusted.
Stretching is a good reliever of stress and toxins from the body. Stretching promotes blood flow to the muscles, joints, organs, and brain, which helps move oxygen and reduce the toxins through these areas. It is the perfect way to wind down after a workout or a stressful day as it helps release any tension the body might be holding. The ideal thing about stretching is can be done any time, anywhere.
Lastly, stretching allows for more power through the body. When doing a bicep curl or lifting a leg to walk or an arm to eat, the muscle fibres shorten so the muscle can contract. When we have poor flexibility in a muscle fibre, it means the amount that muscle can contract is smaller due to the muscle fibre being shorter. In contrast, if a muscle fibre is flexible, this means when the muscle contracts, the muscle fibre is longer, so it has a more significant distance to contract, leading to more strength and power during its use. Compare it to throwing a baseball; if we were only to stretch the arm a little when throwing the ball, it wouldn’t get very far. But if we were to stretch our arm back as far as it goes and use the entire length and load of the arm, the baseball would go a lot further with a lot more force and power. Stretching benefits more than just our gym-goers.
It’s important to note that stretching has to be done consistently for results. Stretching once a month is not going to have any effect on our body makeup. Unfortunately, we would all love a quick fix, but we should try and stretch daily to reap all the benefits, it’s only 10-15 minutes out of your day. It is best to do it after a warm-up before stretching to have a good blood flow to the muscles. Stretching should also never cause PAIN. Cease the stretch and talk to your chiropractor if it does.
If you are interested in stretching or have any concerns or questions. We will now be running FREE stretch classes, available on the first Wednesday of every month. The classes will be alternating between the upper body and lower body. Booking is essential due to limited spots being available.
If you would like to book the stretch class at Evolving Chiropractic, please give us a call on 9736 3322 or email us at admin@evolvingchiropractic.com.au