Humanity wouldn’t be much without our joints. That piece of our anatomy that lets us take our ideas and make them into something tangible. Thanks to our anatomy, movement is actually quite fluid and seamless for us. Even as this is typed, I barely have time to think it before my fingers are moving and typing out my ideas and thoughts. Seamless. So wouldn’t it make sense that we take care of the very thing that allows us to be the masters of our environment? Here are a few quick and easy ways that you can protect your joints and make sure you’re moving seamlessly and gracefully into the future.
One, don’t sit still for too long. Our joints like to move, they need to move. Working in an office, seated at a desk all day can wreak havoc on our joints. We all know the feeling, especially after a long movie, where it’s a little difficult to stand up and our joints feel like they’ve got concrete on them. That’s our body’s way of telling us “I do not like this, I need to move.” If your job requires you to sit at a desk all day, set little alarms for the last 5 minutes of the hour so you can stand up, stretch, put your body through some ranges of motion and get the joints lubricated.
Use good lifting technique! If you’re a weightlifter or your job requires you to move heavy objects, make sure you brace your core and lift with your legs, keeping a good neutral spine. Doing this will make sure that you’re using your strongest muscles the way that they were meant to be used and at the proper angles. This is much more beneficial than torquing your spine at weird angles. A hurt spine means a hurt spinal joint, and if your spine is out of sorts, soon the rest of your body will follow. Use weight belts that help you brace if you become fatigued throughout the day. Fatigue will go away, spinal injuries rarely do.
Don’t engage in risky behavior if you don’t have to. Let’s face it none of us are invincible 16-year-old anymore. We can’t take the kind of falls and hits that we could in our youth. Our bodies just don’t recover the same way as they used to. Leave some of the adrenaline chasing antics back in high school where they can heal from these injuries much better than we can. Hits, falls, and trips could end up causing a hurt both physically, and financially if you’re not able to work.
Last but not least, try to exercise. It doesn’t have to be something you hate. Yoga and weightlifting, though vastly different are equally valid forms of exercise. Whichever you choose, whether it be either of these two extremes or something in the middle, exercising your body helps build muscle and increase blood flow throughout the extremities, and helps keep your joints warm and lubricated so they can function optimally.
Which every piece of advice you choose to follow, make sure you’re taking care of your body, by taking care of your joints. Plus, I hear joint replacement surgery is really painful.
For more information on protecting your joints and other pain management, visit Dr. McKee’s website,
Spine Care of San Antonio.
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