Do you have an injury that keeps returning? Have you been told to rest, but the injury is still there as soon as you go back to exercise? Do you feel like taking painkillers while sitting on a waitlist is wasting time you could be training?
Sam and Tas have both experienced this and the frustration is real.
The Injury Cycle
As athletes, and when we say ‘athletes’ we mean anyone who engages in physical activity, not just the elite Olympians, it can become so easy to get trapped in the injury cycle. We’ve been there ourselves and we see it week in, week out in the clinic.
- You experience pain
- You take a rest from your usual activity routine
- You return to exercise
- You reinjure the same area, sometimes realising it hadn’t improved at all
For a lot of you, exercise is a crucial part of your routine for physical and mental health, so resting for long periods isn’t an option. As a result, we see patients who choose one of two options:
- You’ve exercised through the pain, having Googled your symptoms, bought a pair of insoles from Boots and YouTubed how to apply tape and are in worse pain than before.
- You have rested for so long your mental and physical health have deteriorated enough for you to feel really down about how your body feels and the lack of recovery.
Why Does The Injury Cycle Happen?
The most common cause is referred to as having poor load tolerance. This can be due to biomechanical dysfunction, where your body isn’t moving efficiently for the job you’re asking it to perform, either through muscular tension, poor form, or other restriction. It can also be because your body isn’t ready to do as much as you are asking which is called overuse. Either doing too much, for too long or both, often seen in our runners and weightlifters.
Similar to overuse, weakness can be a factor. Either from a lack of conditioning to perform a certain task, for example lifting a weight that is heavier than you can manage repeatedly. Or after a period of rest where your body becomes deconditioned to your previous personal best but you still attempt to perform at the pre-rest standard. It can also be as simple as favouring one side of the body more than the other leading to disparity of strength between your left and right.
Another cause is a lack of progressive rehab plan. For some of you it is because there was no rehab plan (or you ignored what you were given) and you just winged it after injury, hoping it had gone away. For others, it is because you recieved a plan that was incomplete/standardised or skipped progression too quickly. We often see our patients who are over 75, desperate to resume their daily dog walk, being given floor-based exercises they can’t manage.
The 4 Stages of Proper Rehab
- Pain reduction – this is our primary aim when you come in for an appointment. Assessment, diagnosis, hands-on treatment and initial advice for pain management at home.
- Mobility improvement – this is where we address the wider picture and look at what other parts of your movement are contributing to the injury recurrence
- Strengthening – this is where your cooperation with your rehab plan comes in, often hands-on appointments are spread out much further to give you time to follow the plan and you return so we can update your plan and address any niggles with treatment in the clinic
- Return to sport – Supporting you as you return to sport/exercise with a progressive and sport-specific rehab plan, addressing aches and pain when needed or at semi-regular check-ins.
A recent example of this has been our wonderful patient who came in with foot pain while training for the Brighton marathon. She followed our advice on home care, and committed to her rehab plan between appointments to give her enough pain relief and functional improvement to complete the Brighton marathon without sacrificing her goal race time. She is now ready to take on her post-event treatment and rehab plan to fully resolve her pain before her next marathon.
Our sports therapist Tas specialises in rehab programmes designed to stop injuries from returning and get patients back to running, the gym, and sport. You can book with her online here, or call 07506461919.
Wisbey Osteopathy 