Steps to Balance

 baby steps

A quarter or an hour in my daily fitness routine is consumed by simply taking short steps, with the objective of distributing my weight evenly and finding my sense of poise.  I am training myself to walk again.

discovering balance

After dropping more than 50kg/100lb I found I was having a hard time feeling sure on my feet; leaning too far forward or rolling to the side.  At 150kg/350lb my body over compensated for the extra load and when I no longer had the girth, it continued to manage my movement in ways that were causing me to have very little stability consequently I felt very frail and unsure in my stride.  This awkward movement created a great deal of stress on my hips, knees and ankles.  Weak stomach muscles also contributed to the problem of being out of balance.   I was down in weight and looking somewhat fit but I had very little stability, felt weak and walked like I had glass in my shoes or as others commented a stick up my bum.

poised

During the process of regaining my poise I discovered another area of concern; my hips.  My hips had become stiff and lost much of their rotating ability.  I exposed this while I was training in Muay Thai, even though my knees were damaged I believed I had strong legs and would be able to kick the bags with great velocity however to my great disappointment I was unable to get any sort of snap on my kick.

The objective to a solid kick is to have the leg swing in the same way a bat would fan towards an object.  The velocity of the swing comes from a combination of a toe pivot and the rotation of the hips.  I was unable to coordinate the movement, tweaked my knee in the process and realized my hips were damn near frozen.  Off to the gym again I went to work on my hip mobility and equilibrium.

smooth motion

Posture is a first step; shoulders back, stomach in, spine aligned and weight distributed evenly.  One of the smartest things I did along the way without knowing it at the time was to use the rowing machine.  The rowing machine works the back and the abs.  When my back became strong it gave a great deal of relief to my legs.  My core abdomen muscles began to strengthen and I found myself standing straight and walking with solid heal to toe foot placement rather than toe to heal as before.

None of these results happened over night, and I was neither able nor willing to spend 60 minutes on the rower, tread mill, stationary bike, or eclectic machines.  I started at 5 minutes, progressed to 10 then 15 moved to 20 began combining and eventually got to 30/45/ and 60 minutes a clip.  Today if I wish I can do 4hrs at one session but quite frankly I find that much cardio very boring however 120 minutes can fly by and is an acceptable routine that pays great dividends.

So here is a plan to improve balance that I believe is good for all ages:

·         Use a straight back chair and make a conscious effort to sit in it with shoulders back, stomach in and spine snug against the chair.

·         Stand without using any assistance

·         Sit without using any assistance

·         Walk heal to toe in a straight line without wobbling

·         Kneel to one knee and stand without assistance

·         Take a long stride until you lose balance; shorten the stride until you feel a solid base without strain on the knees.

·         With the calibrated stride walk around the room; forwards, backwards, and sideways left to right, right to left.

These are simple steps that can be done in almost any environment a few minutes every day and will produce measurable results in a relatively short period of time.

Go have some fun,

G