Old injury rehab and anyone who remembers the 80's
Old injuries can be defined as something that you’ve been carrying for more than a few months (this is called chronic). The longer you carry a chronic injury, the more surrounding muscles come into the equation to try to compensate for the old initial injury. This means over a period of time your body adapts to new pathways of movement, creating further fatigue in different places. And before you know it, you're 40 years of age yet getting out of bed like a 70 year old! (no offence to my 70 year old patients whom I love very much!)
One thing I'm learning as I get older is to properly coordinate the injuries since I turned 40. It's like something clicks (pun intended) where I find my body penalising me for not warming up correctly, or mostly not making time to cool down. Self preservation is key to be able to keep you healthy and pushing forward. For these reasons, it's in your own future interest to make yourself as bullet proof as you can now to keep in great shape later.
Things to keep you in peak bullet proof condition for as long as humanly possible
- Warming down with some mobilisations & stretches are key to keeping me vulnerable from injury. I do them religiously after exercise and it’s often the days I forget where I find myself moving around more like a tin man than a 50 year old athlete!
- Recovery is big one for me. Despite my body urging me to get out of my comfort zone and push myself daily, I’m also aware that training hard with a rest day in between allows my body time to repair and recover.
- If carrying an injury for more than 3 weeks, it’s fair to say that you’re not likely to shrug it off in comparison to younger versions of yourself. It’s therefore in your own self preservation interest to address any old injuries before your body starts compensating around it. Therefore, come see me. Let me show you how i can help.
Age is not an illness! It just makes us a little more vulnerable to injury especially if we keep training as if we're still 20 years of age, made of rubber, bullet proof and immortal! If you visit me, I'm likely to set you up with a mobility program to help best prepare your body for what ever you choose to throw at it! I turned 50 this year and despite wondering how on earth I got this old, I'm still pushing my body as hard as it will allow me!
Listen to your body when it whispers rather than when it’s shouting at you! Age is not an illness, it’s just a symptom of a life time of mileage you’ve put your body through. Lack of recovery is the one of the main reasons why injury clinics up and down the country are busy!
