Health and Wellness Tips from a Physical Therapist
Life gets busy, and it’s easy to put your own wellbeing on the back burner. But taking care of yourself is crucial for maintaining your health and long-term mobility.
I am Lauren Masi, a Doctor of Physical Therapy and Board Certified Orthopedic Clinical Specialist. I’m also the owner and clinical services director of Bay Area Physical Therapy and Lafayette Physical Therapy. Today I’m going to give you some simple health and wellness tips.
Tip #1: Do a Weekly Body Check-In
In today’s world, we definitely get caught up in work, taking care of the kids, handling elderly parents, whatever it might be in your life. We often don’t take the time to check in with ourselves and see how we are feeling.
I encourage you to move your body around, at least once a week, if not more frequently. Turn your head as far as it goes in either direction, move your shoulders, rotate your back, and start to notice how it feels. Does something hurt or feel tight? Can you turn more one way than you can turn the other, or lift one shoulder higher than the other?
Pay attention to these things and, if you do notice something different, see if you can resolve it yourself. Try a little bit of stretching or some light exercise, and see if the problem you noticed goes away. If it does, great. If it doesn’t, it may be something you need to get checked out by a physical therapist before it turns into a bigger loss of mobility or function.
Tip #2: Get More Active Throughout the Week
A lot of us might have jobs that require us to sit at a desk or stay in the same position for a long period of time. This can lead to muscle imbalances. Some muscles are going to get tight, some muscles are going to get weak. Then, when you start to get active again, this might lead to problems and pain, poor biomechanics or poor sport mechanics, if you have those asymmetries.
Also, most of us probably don’t get enough cardio in our life. For good heart health, the recommendation is that we are getting about 20 minutes of cardio—ideally that would be daily, but at least four to five times a week.
When you’re doing cardio, try to get your heart rate up to 80% of your max heart rate. A quick and easy way to calculate that is to take 220 minus your age, multiply that by 0.8, and the resulting number is where you want your heart rate to be during cardio exercises to maximize your cardiovascular health.
Tip #3: Take Time to Alleviate Stress
We all are very, very stressed out in life. We all have our independent stresses. But whether you’re stuck at a desk or dealing with family issues, even something as simple as taking a walk outside, breathing some fresh air, and getting some sunshine can help you destress. We also have heard a lot of vitamin D deficiency has come about in the last couple of years. That’s a good reason to get out in the sun with your sunscreen and try to get some vitamin D in your life.
If walking and being outside is not your thing, there are different ways to alleviate stress. You can find out what that is for you. It could be doing yoga, meditating, or even just lying down in a dark quiet room where you close the door and your kids can’t run in and bother you. Whatever it is, take some time for yourself because stress does affect our ability to heal and function well.
Tip #4 Pay Attention to the Changes in Your Body
This final tip overlaps a little bit with tip number one, but you should pay attention to the changes in your body. You do the full body check-in, and once you do notice changes, you try to handle them on your own.
But if they’re not improving with home remedies in about a week, please seek out some medical attention. The sooner we find any problems with your mobility, strength, and function, the sooner we can handle them to help you get back on track as quickly as possible.
And if you’re at that point and you feel like you could use some help from a physical therapist, please reach out to us at (925) 284-3840 for a complimentary consultation today.