Perfect posture?
The idea of “perfect” posture is hard to define. In terms of anatomical posture, the neck is midline and balanced over the trunk, hips over knees, knees over ankles; all balanced in perfect harmony. But humans are built to move so we aren’t really meant to stay in this posture. We are meant to fluidly move in our out of “perfect” posture. It is often the break down of these movement patterns that create the pain we associate with “bad” posture. So addressing any muscular weakness or poor motor patterns can be crucial to helping with this problem.
Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of people stuck in a forward head or increased thoracic kyphotic posture at rest and during movement leading to pain. On way to think of this is that we are always fighting gravity. Think of gravity as a vector meant to hit the top of your head. This force is then dispersed through the spine to the pelvis to the hips down to the knees, ankles and finally the feet. With increased thoracic kyphosis (think stooped older person), where that vector hits is now changed creating increased load on the spine and back muscles to keep us upright. This increased load will lead to pain and stiffness.
With a forward head posture, the body compensates by tipping the head back in order to keep our eyes looking forward. If it didn’t do this we would perpetually be looking down. This creates a lot of pressure where the head and cervical spine connect leading to pain and headaches.
As far as the shoulders, we are all at risk for our shoulders rounding forward; which is often found in conjugation with forward head & increased thoracic kyphosis. This leads to a shortening of the pectoral muscles, weakening of the scapular muscles and decreased range of motion of the shoulder joint. This triad of issues can lead to physiological problems of the joint such as rotator cuff impingement, frozen shoulder, and bursitis.
The following are some of my favorite home treatment & preventive measures which utilize the foam roller. (We have great videos for these on the Home STRETCH page).
Place the foam roller parallel along your spine supporting the head and sacrum. In this position you can practice diagrammatic breathing (relaxation), marching (core strengthening) or snow angels (shoulder stretching).
Place the foam roller perpendicular to your spine with your hands behind your head for support. Roll the foam roller up and down your spine, concentrating on areas that are particularly tight. Once you find an area that is tight you can work on it by doing small extensions over the foam roller.
