Are you injured? Do you have chronic pain in a particular area? Does the pain come and go depending on what activities you do? Does the discomfort keep you from doing what you want to do? If you answered yes to any one or more of these questions, are you ready to fix it? Are you ready to get yourself back to the place you were before you started living with your physical limitation? Well, a combination of good physiotherapy (diagnosis) and Pilates movement therapy (exercise) can help.
Physiotherapy
When you get physiotherapy, the therapist will do an assessment of the area creating pain for you. Unless the pain is due to some specific accident, the pain is usually caused by wrong movement patterns. Once the physio diagnoses the wrong movement pattern and the weaknesses that have caused it, then exercises are used to re-create the right movement pattern for that area of function.
Physiotherapy & Pilates
When your physiotherapist works with your Pilates instructor, the results are fantastic. The physio tells your Pilates teacher which muscles are weak and not turning on, and which ones are overused and in desperate need of relaxation and stretching, and finally, which movements aggravate the pain. Then the Pilates instructor coaches you with the exercises given to you by the physio so that you execute the exercises with proper alignment, as well as, chooses other Pilates movements based on the info from your physio.
Pilates
Pilates exercises are excellent for rehabilitation because Pilates exercises combine a balance of strength and flexibility. Because wrong movement patterns create weak muscles and overworked (usually tight) muscles, exercises that strengthen the weak muscles and relax the overworked muscles will bring about rehabilitation. An exercise that does the opposite, will exasperate the pain and prolong rehabilitation.
All Pilates movements emphasize proper alignment, breathing, proper muscle sequencing, and a balance between strength and flexibility. There are about 500 Pilates exercises to choose from so there will always be an abundance of movements that are right for your body.
The final result is your recovery of health
When our bodies are in pain, our bodies experience more stress than they need and our brains are less free to fully experience joy and confidence. Our bodies and minds experience undue stress when we are out of balance. Proper physiotherapy diagnosis followed by rehabilitative Pilates exercises restore body-mind balance which is expressed as joy, confidence, mobility and freedom.
This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.