Getting out of an exercise slump

I’ve seen this time and time again but have also experienced it personally when you go in and out of an exercise routine. Whether you have been sick, away on holiday or have other countless excuses with finances or the very popular no time.

Despite these, yes it can be hard to get the ball rolling again and get back to exercise but here are my recommendations.

  1. Starting Exercise

It has been a while since you’ve been back to some regular exercise, I strongly recommend chatting to a health professional (aka me, an Exercise Physiologist or one of my many amazing friends at Enhance Physiotherapy) to see if exercise is safe for you.

  1. Goal Setting

Not just thinking about how nice it would be to do XYZ, actually putting pen to paper and writing down some achievable and measurable goals that you want to work towards. For example number of exercise sessions per week. Keep these goals on hand by putting them on your fridge so you can be reminded of why you’re doing this.

  1. Exercise Type

Try and pick the type of exercise that you will enjoy. If you hate going to the gym at 5am don’t do it… You’re more likely to stay consistent with a type of exercise that you enjoy.

  1. Friends!

Not only someone to chat to but someone to give you that motivation and extra push. Its ok to have those hard days when the motivation is low, however exercising with a friend makes it so much more achievable!

  1. Food

Making sure you’re fueling your body to succeed with balanced and healthy meals. If you goal is to lose weight you can’t just starve yourself…  that not fun, nor is it healthy or something that you can maintain for long term. You end up putting more weight on, trust me I do this to earn a living.

I hope these tips are helpful and if you have any burning questions come visit me at any one of our 3 clinics or give me a call. I’m happy to chat and to help you with your exercise journey!

Samantha

Sam is our full time Exercise Physiologist. To book an appointment with Sam call our clinic on 9583 5165.

Plantar Fasciosis

From experience, we have encountered a lot of tough patients.  We would manage their main complaint, however to find out some have long standing foot pain that has no resolved.  No one should be walking around with pain underneath their foot for the rest of their lives!

At our clinic, we have seen an emergence of chronic Plantar Fasciosis.  Commonly known as “Plantar fasciitis”, however majority of the cases are actually not inflammatory conditions in nature.  The plantar fascia is a fibrous connective tissue which originates from the inside heel bone, and expands into five bands which attach forward onto the bottom knuckles of all five toes.  The term “Fasciosis” is coined due to research findings where there is thickening of the plantar fascia, disorganized collagen fibres, collagen cell death, enlargement of blood vessels and poor blood flow.   In other words, the ropes under the foot is starting to fray and lose its structural integrity and tensile strength.  It is also more common in females than males.  Also common in all ages, however commonly in middle age population.

Some risk factors include:

  • Reduced ankle range of motion (lifting foot up)
  • Collapsing of foot arch under load (dynamic flat feet)
  • Elevated BMI
  • Incorrect shoe fit
  • Prolonged high impact weight bearing activities.

Common presentations include:

  • Heel pain first thing in the morning or after resting for prolonged periods
  • Limping and toe walking
  • Dislike hard surfaces and stairs
  • Tender to touch on the inside part of the heel or arch of the foot
  • Heel or foot pain after standing all day, long walks and exercising
  • Recent sudden increase in activity level. For example, going from not normally running, to running 5km

It is a condition that is treatable with proper management.  Some treatments which include ankle and foot mobilizations, stretching, taping to support the arch from collapsing.  Management often includes, a tailored strengthening program, stretches, foot orthoses and graduated load management to get one back to their favourite activity.  However from our clinical experience, Shockwave Therapy coupled with strengthening exercises and supportive foot arch methods has provided some of the best results.

Shockwave therapy in short is an non-invasive and safe treatment machine that provides acoustic waves carrying high energy levels to the injured site to promote regeneration and reparative process of the soft tissue and tendons.  The great medical effect is the result of pain relief and improving mobility.   Improving mobility is important to also assist restoration of tissue repair.

Keep in mind, foot heel pain must be properly diagnosed by your trusted health care profession as it may mimic other injuries such as Achillies tendinopathy, irritated heel or foot fat pad, irritated nerves in foot or ankle, or growing pains such as Sever’s disease is a few to name.  All these different diagnoses are managed differently and applying the same concept such as Shockwave therapy may make the injury worse.

We all have a long new year of 2019 ahead of us, right not start your year on a pain free step.

By:  Ed Ma

References:

  • Lemont H, Ammirati KM, Usen N. Plantar fasciitis: a degenerative process (fasciosis) without inflammation. J Am Podiatr Med Assoc. 2003;93(3):234–7
  • Alexander T. M. van de Water, Caroline M. Speksnijder, Efficacy of taping for the treatment of plantar fasciosis: a systematic review, Journal of the American Podiatric Medical Association, 2010; 1: 41-51. (level of evidence: 1a)
  • Sun J, Gao F, Wang Y, Sun W, Jiang B, Li Z. Extracorporeal shock wave therapy is effective in treating chronic plantar fasciitis: A meta-analysis of RCTs. Medicine (Baltimore). 2017;96(15):e6621.

Is stretching necessary?

Active Stretching

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”1321″ img_size=”large” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]I’m sure traditionally, everybody has been told numerous times to stretch before and after exercises, or in the morning before you get going or at night before you go to bed. And, I do get a lot of patients coming in and saying that, “I know I should do my stretches, and I don’t stretch enough.” But is stretching really necessary? Yes and No.

Growing up, I’ve always been able to bend myself backwards, or in half, rotate my joints to 360°, and anything you name it, I can do it. And no I’m not a gymnast; I just have hyper flexible joints! And right now, just because our world has been taken over so much by emoji’s, I bet every single one of you have already expressed in a million emoji’s to what they’ve just read above! LOL…

With flexibility comes a lot of mobility, so do I need to stretch when I’m that mobile? The answer is no, because I can bend in half and not be able to feel the stretch. I have learnt that for myself when I started going to crossfit. While a lot of people have really tight muscles and reduced range of movements, the mobility drills we do just before we start on our weights and our WODs (workout of the day), would benefit a lot of people, however, I have found that I injure myself easy, as when I stretch or perform those mobility drills, my muscles and joints become too lax to support me and I hurt myself easier by spraining my joints.

Enough of me, and let’s talk about technicality and fancy terms…

So do all of us need to stretch? No. If you were someone that struggles to touch your toes or have difficulty squatting at the gym, then stretching would be necessary for you to achieve that range of movement. However, if you have already got that flexibility, and you struggle to do movements like back squats, deadlifts – putting it in day-to-day life, bending and lifting something, reaching or lunging, then you may need to improve on your mobility!

So what’s the difference between flexibility and mobility?

Flexibility is your joints ability to go through range as far as it is structurally capable – this is your passive range of movement, and to determine that, someone like a physiotherapist is able to do that for you, while you are in a relaxed position and they simply just lift your arm up as far as your joint can go, for example. And, mobility is simply how far you can move that arm actively by yourself.

So while your joints may have the flexibility, it is quite possible to lack mobility. Or if your joints are not flexible, then you may lack both of them. This is when stretching comes into play, and it will definitely give you that extra movement before your exercises or even doing activities of your daily living.

As for me, when I have both flexibility and mobility, stretching and mobility drills don’t quite work for me, as after doing them, I can’t lift heavier weights and have no control, as I have stretched out all my muscles till they are relaxed, so they don’t protect me! Therefore, I use a simple yet precious piece of resistance band to activate my muscles, whether it be doing clamshells, shoulder internal and external rotations, and so on; so that I have that muscle contraction and activation to support my joints to be able to perform my weight lifts and have the control through my movements.

To make it sound less complicated, everybody is very different in terms of their body composition, structure, joints and muscle contractility. While something works really well for a group of people, it may not work at all for another. Whether you’re someone who’s very flexible or very tight and have no mobility, there’s always something that can be catered to you to enhance or improve the quality of your movements without getting injured, may it be at the gym, at work, or even doing chores at home.

So come and see us here at Enhance Physiotherapy, we have abundance of stretches, mobility drills and even muscle activation drills to help you with all your needs!

Simmi xxx

Simmi works full time at our Thornlie Clinic. To book an appointment with Simmi call 6161 8901 or simply book online.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]