The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › Injuries, Restrictions, Ailments, Pose Modifications › Illnesses/Ailments › hypermobile joints?
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I’ve been doing bikram on and off for a year. I’m 6 days into a challenge and feeling good. Over the summer, my back was really bothering me and I went to my doc. I got referred to a sports med doc who I saw today. She took one look at me and said I shoudln’t do yoga because I have hyper mobile joints.
Anyone else? Thoughts? My fingers are really bendy and I can bend them almost all the way back to the back of my hands. In wind removing pose, my knee touches my shoulder with very little effort.
My 11 year old son also was told he has hypermobile joints. The Orthopedist recommended he work on strengthening his muscles if he intends to join any sports.
I wouldn’t ignore what the physician told you. Work with coming to a compromise if you can. Stronger muscles do help to support the joints. Maybe combined a gentler form of yoga. You could also get a second medical opinion to see if the physicans concur. Just my $.02.
Hi Cate
Ellyn is right! You may not want to listen to the blanket veto of your doc, but you may want to listen to the message that lies beneath.
And that is in order to support your ‘yoga habit’ you need to support your flexible or hyper mobile joints and do some strength training.
You can achieve this in this static set of poses by deliberately NOT going deep but by working strongly on alignment and the strength aspects of the pose. This may not be immediately obvious to you in a particular pose, but that’s certainly something I can help you with at the forum or in the Hot Yoga MasterClass manual which would detail exactly what to work and how.
For example slight adjustments in Half Moon (that are not immediately obvious) can transform this pose for you from being about how far you arc to the side to a powerful pose. It would be about you balancing what you do with hips, arms and torso and where you place your weight. The tiny details may be your savior here.
It seems you may even benefit from some strength sessions at a gym. Have you ever done that?
I am not sure if a gentler form of yoga would do it for you. It really has to work well with the techniques you use. For example you may find that Power Yoga is a great style for you because of the focus on strength building.
Let us know what you decide to do
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂I have “sloppy ankles” according to my physio and therefore shouldn’t even do some things such as running. But all of the yoga poses I showed him, he was quite OK with as they strengthened the whole joint’s mechanism. He was certainly wary of stretching already “loose” ligaments, but as long as the poses are practised correctly, with a focus on alignment & strength, he was happy!
I have very pronated feet, so I really have to focus on Gabrielle’s “Great Posture From The Ground Up”, including how I treat my feet & ankles in class.
Not really an “answer” as such, but just to reiterate, I think building strength in the right places is a key to addressing your issue!
Good luck
Robert
I’m quite a mess lol. My knees are sore and have been for ages regardless of what exercise I do. Sports med doc told me running would be fine (used to be hard core runner) but it REALLY hurts my knees/ankles so I have to take what she says with a grain of salt. I find even though I’m quite flexible, my muscles compensate and get tight. I’m finding with hot yoga, its seems to be balancing things out a bit.
I just finished day 13 of my challenge. I’ve been concentrating on tightening my quads vs locking my knees because I can lock my joins without tightening my muscles if that makes sense. My upper body really feels a lot stronger from the challenge. I like the strength component of hot yoga. I did power yoga for a while and the room was freezing and it didn’t quite feel right.
I have another appt with the sports med doc early november after the challenge. We shall see what she says then. So far, her suggestions were running and pilates. I’ve toyed with the idea of swimming but swimming has occasionally popped my toes out of joint even gong back to when I was a kid. Swimming and winter are a big old yuck too.
“Swimming and winter are a big old yuck too.”
LOL! … agreed.
It’s great to be concentrating on engaging quads vs just “locking” (a bit like just leaning on a straight leg) – you could also request a decent physio check that this is happening correctly as there are some minor muscles that need to come into play to ensure correct location of the kneecap under full engagement
As I understand it, it is possible to pull the kneecap OUT of alignment if the surrounding muscles are incorrectly engaged and the quads fiercely contracted. I believe that applies to me due to the ankle pronation and hence my leg/knee alignment, and so I’m quite careful to not only give the quads a good ‘ole squeeze, but also take care I’m doing everything symmetrically.
I’m the same as you – if I run (actually even a few paces) my knees get sore. Any more than that and the ankles will too.
Ice-skating; roller-blading; yoga; swimming; long walks up & down hills – all no problem at all.
Keep us updated!
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