Boston Bound – My oh Myokinesthetics to the Rescue!
By Leonela Connolly, Running Coach training for the Boston Marathon 2016
It’s been a while since my last Boston Bound post. Several things have happened that could have derailed my training, but I persevered…..with a little help from my friends at TEAM! I’ll start at the beginning with my lower back strain and the MyoKinesthetic treatment that expedited my recovery.
In the interest of full disclosure, my lower back has always been a weak link in my body. Most of that is due to lack of core strength. Thus, the need for core strength training! Anyway, I am pretty sure that I strained my lower back doing weighted squats that 1) had too much weight on the bar for me, and 2) for which I had not properly warmed up. I was trying to do too much, too soon.
This little event caused me to take a full week off from running. During that week, I spent alot of time like this,
Yeah, that’s me on my heating pad!
That heating pad was helpful, but did not expedite my recovery. What really helped was
I am not an expert in MYK, so I can only provide my limited understanding and discuss the results that I saw with its application. MYK is a system that involves muscles (myo) and sensory awareness of muscle, tendon, and joint movement (kinesthetics). This system attempts to change the dysfunctional messages sent from the sore or injured muscles to the brain so that the brain, in turn, can change the postural compensation messages it sends to those related muscles. The idea is that changing dysfunction and compensation messages, posture will balance restoring the proper muscle/tissue function to correct the root cause of your pain.
Fortunately, TEAM has a resident expert in MYK, Sheri Lawler. She is our skillful Massage Therapist, MYK expert and motivated professional who works hard to ensure everyday athletes like me can get back to and stay on track to meet their goals. She was instrumental in getting me back to running!
My initial consultation with Sheri was simple, efficient and painless. She used MYK techniques to check me out in order to determine what needed to be corrected.
Then she got to work!
Here’s the difference. From “I can’t reach my toes” because my lower back was sore and very tight!
To, “WOOHOO I can reach my toes!!”
I could already feel a difference, but the biggest impact was when I went to put my shoe back on and I could do it without having to bring my foot up to a figure 4 position and without pain! I almost cried!
The result was amazing. I felt much better immediately after the first treatment. After two treatments, and being careful about my movements (not lifting any weights and walking), I was back to running, albeit, short distances, but I was out and about!! Even better, I have had no lower back issues since then, through my continued strength training and increased mileage. So, I am very happy and grateful to Sheri for her work! It felt like a miracle!
My BOSTON BOUND journey continues. Stay tuned for more to come.
Let’s do this!!
