Workplace-Friendly Exercises
Are you having back or neck pain at work?
Are you embarrassed to make a scene repping out some exercises even if it’ll help your aches and pain?
Let’s skip the embarrassment.
Work isn’t the most ideal environment for getting on the floor to do some much-needed exercises or stretches to prevent common aches and pains. However, if you are in pain, it is vital to follow an home-exercise program given by your healthcare provider. Why? Because you’re not getting treated by your chiropractor 24 hours a day 7 days a week! In-office treatment is extremely important, but what you do on your own outside of the office to fix the problem is just as important! It will only speed up the process of getting out of pain and starting to function better than ever.
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Everyone has pain in different areas. Without doing an exam and figuring out where your spine in particular needs some help, it is obviously impossible to know if these particular exercises will be 100% beneficial to YOU. However, they are general stretches that most people will feel benefit from, especially if you sit all day at work! This video will give you a few exercises that are easy to bring to a workplace environment. The best part? They won't make you look TOO crazy! There is an exercise for each of the 3 main parts of your spine: the cervical (neck), thoracic (mid back), and lumbar (low back) regions. I also threw in one that targets a very important muscle around the hips.
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The first exercise: cervical retractions and extensions. They are derived from a technique called McKenzie Method. Keeping the spine neutral without flexing your neck forward, you want to retract the chin (like giving yourself a double chin) using your hands to provide extra pressure. Then you will look up to the ceiling as far as possible. As with the next exercise to follow, putting our spine in the opposite direction of what we do all day (which is mostly flexion) can alleviate a lot of our aches and pains.
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The second exercise: seated thoracic extensions. This exercise in particular is good for a workplace environment because you don’t even need to get out of your chair. Putting your elbows on your desk in front of you and arch your back towards the ground as best you can, holding for at least 10-20 seconds. Hearing a few clicks or pops is totally normal, and it’s just getting motion back into the mid back. This extension motion is a great option for this area of the spine!
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The third exercise: seated piriformis stretch. This targets, you guessed it, the piriformis muscle. The muscle originates on the sacrum (the big bone at the base of your spine) and inserts on the femur. While seated with good posture, cross your leg over your opposite knee and then lean forward. It is extremely important to note that you should keep your spine neutral/straight this entire time. Never compromise rounding your back to lean further forward. Simply stop once you feel the stretch, and hold it for as long as you are comfortable with.
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The fourth exercise: standing door stretch. This targets a muscle called the quadratus lumborum (QL). Find any doorway, and grab on to one side with both hands. Cross your outside leg in front of the inside one for a deeper stretch. The video will show you exactly how to perform all of these exercises to give you some reference!
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It is important to keep moving throughout the day, especially when sitting takes up the majority of our day. Too much of anything is never a good thing (unless it's proper belly breathing and great posture!), and sitting is no different. I hope you find these few exercises helpful and easy to implement into your day!
