Video Courtesy of www.muscleandmotion.com
Amazing how well this shows how we get into trouble with our whole body when we slouch.
The results from slouching are not simply just going to go away. Happening to our kids, elderly and many office workers, or truck drivers and it’s an ongoing on a daily basis. Slowly over time, we reap the results.
The video shows how we stretch out the back muscles to where they no longer support the spine, and disc pressure bulge out to the extent that they run into our spinal cord, nerves, or tender tendons. Slouching is easy, feels comfy, but this tucking under when we sit really complicates everything. We have to learn to address it, its never too late. Problem is, we can’t force ourselves to sit upright or do this 18/7 for-ever. We get a real disaster when we’re faced with the fact that the car seat and the couch, or the office chair seat just don’t feel good to use. That is a sign, it means to do something!
A Fix is tilting the pelvis forward and letting the gravity pull tilt the pelvis forward, its almost too simple, but so unnatural for many. So SITTS makes it simple and gives us the solution that is perfect for this problem. A wedged posture cushion. Using SITTS, we sit into the sitz bones, which you can’t see, but can feel. We find gravity’s perfect balance, and the pelvis can support our spine the way nature intended it to resemble a child’s’ back of 3 years of age. It offers a dynamic stability within the flexible soft cushion.
Saving your bones from wear and tear, and teaches us to feel the proper use of our spine, to enjoy in all stages of life, redistributing weight forward is not an easy task, and I have even tried to encourage folks while sitting on the cushion. They want to tuck the tail under, so its new to them. I teach that you rock the pelvis forward and feel the weight center you over the pubic bone. Slowly showing a person where their low back curves it takes time, but when they get it, it is like a light turns on. Aaaahhh ha moment.
But first, there is work to do!
We need some stretching to get things into a safer perspective, we have to stretch out the hamstrings because they got way too tight during the years of slouching. Next stretch out the hip flexor’s as they really shortened over time, they are those muscles that connected to the spine in the front of the vertebraes’ as we curved or hunched over our hips, they are the ones that we shortened all those years.
Next, stretch out the rotators (piriformis) muscles by crossing cowboy style your leg and bring it close you with the straightest back and hold for 30 secs x 3. These muscles have been way too busy holding the pelvis from the pull of the hamstrings on the hip bones. Be gentle, tight muscles are mad.
Now you have minimized the pain, that is good but the bulging disc needs to be nurtured to move back under the vertebra’s where they use to be located. Since our muscles and sitting habits are reorganized with stretches and proper sitting habits, we can feel this nurtured spinal health. SITTS helps you find relief, why not use a combination of proper sitting combined with therapeutic methods. Also using a cushion we can find that its easier to attain alignment because we learned by activating our senses to appreciate how it feels, using SITTS Posture cushions, new comfort in our abilities and we are able to face the world of events like before. I like that!
It took a lifetime to get here, so it will take a while to feel alignment or it’s instantaneous. It all depends on the person’s commitment. SITTS helps and can help motivate you to your new way of sitting and good spinal health.
Deborah Lee PTA, Feldenkrais Practitioner
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