A few weeks ago, I had to make a long drive through PA. If you’ve ever spent hours behind the wheel, you know how tense your shoulders get, how stiff your back feels, and how your whole body seems to tighten up.
By the time I got home, my neck was locked in a HUGE knot. I could barely turn my head, and moving my left shoulder was miserable. So, I ran through my usual lineup of acupuncture, red light therapy, nerve flossing, gentle stretching and waited for it to settle down.
Instead, a few days later the pain decided to travel straight down my arm and land in my wrist.
And let me tell you Danielle: wrists are no joke. We rarely give them a second thought until they start throbbing or hurting to bend, but they do so much for us. Your wrist is a tight little puzzle of eight tiny bones, sandwiched between your hand and forearm, all held together by a web of muscles, tendons, ligaments, and nerves.
Wrist pain doesn’t always start in your wrist and I'm a perfect example of this. Sometimes when your neck or shoulder gets tight and cranky, it can irritate the nerves that run down your arm. So even though your wrist is the part screaming for attention, the real culprit might be sitting way up in your neck or shoulder.
It was a good (if uncomfortable!) reminder of something we tell people all the time: Movement is medicine.
Now, we'll never tell you to push through sharp pain or ignore a real injury. But shutting down and freezing up completely usually just leaves you feeling stiffer and crankier. Our bodies are built to move. Your muscles, joints, and tendons actually need gentle resistance and motion to heal and stay healthy. We just need to modify sometimes. (For me it was taking breaks in class by rolling out my wrists and fingers, turning my hands out to take pressure off the flexion of my wrist, and lightening the spring tension on shoulder work).
The trick is finding the right dose.
So if something in your body starts acting up, try not to freeze up entirely. Modify it. Move what feels okay. Keep things flowing. We just have to give our bodies the right kind of movement to thrive.
