Egoscue - An Explainer on Posture Therapy to Heal Body Pain

Hi, everyone! This is Lara Hammock from the Marble Jar channel and in today’s video, I’ll tell you about my latest obsession with posture, body pain, and the exercise solutions recommended by Egoscue therapy. 

Recently I have become obsessed with good posture. I did an earlier video on how to fix computer posture. What I have discovered since doing that video is that it is virtually impossible to entirely fix your upper body posture (slumped shoulders and forward head) without first fixing your spine.  Most of the thoughts in this video come directly from the book Pain Free by Pete Egoscue.  Egoscue is a Vietnam veteran who came home from war with a Purple Heart and chronic nerve pain from battle injuries.  He discovered the limits of modern medicine in dealing with chronic pain and set out to find a way to live without pain.  In his book, he presents his revolutionary philosophy that ties together posture, body alignment, and pain management. Let me just take you through the basic concepts of his philosophy.

Posture

Egoscue therapy is similar to chiropractic in that they have both identified the same problem: body asymmetry and posture mis-alignment. Like chiropractors, Egoscue therapists believe that if your hips and spine are out of alignment, your body will maladjust and overcompensate, which will create a cascade of physical problems. So, knee problems can be rooted in hip alignment issues. Neck pain can be traced back to issues with the spine.

There are really two things that Egoscue therapists look for: hip and shoulder alignment and curve of the spine. In order to determine whether your body is out of alignment, all you need is a photograph. If you draw a horizontal line and one hip is slightly higher than the other, chances are you will be having some adaptive pain in your extremities. The other issue they look for is the spine curvature. Naturally, the human spine is an S curve. There is a natural curve out in the lower back or lumbar region and another one in the neck region. My spine, like many other people’s, has gone from looking like an S to looking like a C. I have begun to lose the lumbar curve and also the curve in my neck, which was causing a whole host of issues. I tried to get the curve back in my neck first, but i realized that it is almost impossible to do without also working on the curve in my lower back. If you curve out your lower back by rocking your hips back, your shoulders and neck will automatically go back into a more naturally ideal stance.  Perfect posture looks like this -- when you are standing with your heels against the wall, your rear end, upper back, shoulders, and head should all be touching the wall.  If you start studying people, you will be amazed at how poor almost everyone’s posture is!  Anyone with slumped shoulders, head forward, or feet pointing out like duck feet has posture issues.  It feels like a national epidemic!  We are all going to be in a lot of pain as we age — unless we quite literally, straighten out!

Solution

So this is where the fields of chiropractic and Egoscue therapy diverge. Chiropractors will tell you that the solution to your alignment problems is to receive back adjustments. Some people swear by this and have regular sessions with a chiropractor.  The Egoscue solution is more time-consuming and requires more effort, but it makes more sense to me intuitively. And that is, you have to stretch and strengthen the muscles that hold your bones and body in place through a series of daily exercises.  After all, they reason, your bones may be out of alignment, but your muscles are are keeping those bones in place.  Even after you have had an adjustment, your muscles will ultimately pull your bones back out of alignment unless they have stretched, strengthened and habituated to being in the correct posture. 

Exercises, or E-cises

If you live in a large metro area, you might have an Egoscue Clinic in your area. You can go and get evaluated, although I will warn you — it is not cheap.  They will give you a plan to follow with exercises suited to your specific issues. OR, you can take the cheaper option and just buy the book!  I’ll put an amazon link in the notes section below (https://www.amazon.com/Pain-Free-Revolutionary-Stopping-Chronic/dp/0553379887/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1525116435&sr=8-1&keywords=pain+free+by+pete+egoscue).  The book gives a couple of overview chapters and then goes chapter by chapter covering each body area where you might have pain — like neck and head or knees or back. Then it gives you specific exercises to do to stop the pain in these areas by straightening your body out. What is weird, but makes sense given the overall premise, is that if you are trying to fix neck pain, the exercises are all about aligning your back or hips -- there are none that work specifically on your neck.  One other incredibly important point that Egoscue makes is that . . . 

Motion Heals

Egoscue believes that our bodies are meant to move.  When we get injured, rarely is the solution to stop moving altogether.  We just need to make sure our bodies are properly aligned or else that movement will start to hurt.  If everything is properly lined up, movement actually heals.  My dad and I both have arthritis in our knees.  We used to disagree about how to handle this. I just continue to run on my knees knowing that eventually I’ll probably have to them replaced.  My dad went way in the other direction and did everything he could to stop using his knees. He went so far as to get an elevator installed in his house, so that he wouldn't have to take the stairs!  Well, then he found Egoscue therapy and he does his daily exercises religiously.  He now has military straight posture, and he can run up the stairs again.  He also walks 45 minutes a day now with no pain.  Unbelievable. The exercises have not totally eliminated the pain for me yet, but I do have far more mobility now.  I used to only be able to bend my right knee so far.  For example, when sitting in Indian style, my right knee couldn't bend entirely and my leg would stick out in front.  Now, I don't have quite the same range of motion as in my left knee, but it is definitely better than it was.  The last main point Egoscue makes is the old adage

Use it or Lose it

Humans used to have really different lives.  We worked our fields or hunted and gathered for our food. We felled trees and built our own shelters.  We hung clothes to dry and sheared sheep for wool. Think about the range of motions that we did on a regular basis — just to survive!  Reaching, bending, pulling, lifting, and twisting.  Now, all of that physical work is largely outsourced or automated. Instead of this lively range of motion, most of us confine our movement to what Egoscue says is a 3'x4' box that we carry around in front of us.  All of our movement is basically confined within this box.  The problem is -- as we know -- use it or lose it.  By NOT bending, twisting, lifting, and leaping, we are losing our muscular ability to do so.  Those muscles are atrophying.  And then, because they are weak, we are borrowing from other secondary muscles to accomplish tasks, which throws everything out of whack.  This is one of the best things about yoga -- it requires our body to move in ways that our lives no longer demand.  For this reason, Egoscue advocates taking every opportunity to do whacky physical stuff.  Roll on the ground, leap in the air, wave your arms wildly, crawl under things.  This may seem like inappropriate behavior for a grown adult, but as long as we limit our movements, we will ultimately pay the price for it with pain.  So release your inner toddler!  And even with everyday movement -- get out of your chair, find an excuse to stand or walk.  Never ask anyone to get anything for you -- take the excuse to get more movement in.  Because unless you use it, you'll lose it.  And movement ultimately heal us.

So, here's the thing.  I don't have chronic pain.  I have some muscular weakness in my lower back that I've pulled a couple time, slightly arthritic knees, and some shoulder and neck pain.  Nothing big.  But I plan on using this body for another 30 or 40 years and it's not getting any younger or healthier.  I figure making this kind of investment in aligning my body properly will pay dividends down the road in keeping me mobile, pain-free, and healthy.  Let me know what you think!  Comments are always appreciated and thanks for watching!