Repetitive Slouch Syndrome

I work with a lot of clients who suffer with long-term chronic pains, and a disturbing number of them complain of very similar pain patterns... Pain between the shoulder blades that spreads upward towards the neck; numbness and pain in their arms and wrists; low back pains (generally towards one side or the other).

I know these symptoms well, because I have them myself... It's probably just that dreaded disease AGE (pronounced Ay-Gee-Eee), but maybe there is another cause... Maybe their is something that we can actually control...

"Sit up straight!" scolded you mother... and she was right.

Most of us have atrocious posture. Most of us slouch in our chairs, hunch over our keyboards, and crease our necks to look at our computer monitors for hours every day.
We are constantly and persistently molding ourselves into a "whiplashed-fetal" shape that is reminiscent of our origins in our mother's wombs ... but with a neck thrown back as if we've been rear ended in a car wreck.

The problem with our chronic slouching is that our postural muscles (the muscles in our bodies that help us maintain normal sitting and standing posture) were not designed to be held in the whiplashed-fetal shape for prolonged periods of time: When we slouch, the postural muscles of our backs are stretched. When we slouch, the postural muscles of our fronts are shortened. If we slouch long enough the muscles of our backs begin to think that their "normal" length is long, and the muscles of our fronts begin to think that their "normal" length is short. Add to this the strain that we are putting on our necks (the whiplashed part of this posture) and the result is muscles that do not work as well as they should, and (of more immediate concern to those in pain) muscles that tend to hurt (a lot) and muscles that often constrict the nerves that pass through them.

Of course the preceding paragraphs are a radical simplification of what is "really" going on, but I think you get the point. Bad posture (over the long run) molds your body shape, and that can lead to pain.

With Trigger Point Therapy and Myofascial Release techniques I can generally help reduce a client's pain... but for lasting relief my clients have work on their own to improve their posture. They have to unlearn the habits that led to their pain - through Yoga, through Pilates, through Tai Chi - many programs teach good posture (the "best" one is the program that the client will actually adopt and make a part of their life) but the main point of pursuing any of these programs is that my clients learn to sit up straight and stop slouching. In many cases that is "the cure" that will bring them relief over the long run.
(Image Copyrights: Nicholas Monu and Fred Goldstein from iStockPhoto.com)