Do you have stiff hips that you aren't even aware of?

What happens when your hips don’t move very well – this could just be an issue on one side?

Your body has to make up that movement elsewhere eg your lower back or knees, resulting in pain.

So if you’ve been wondering why your knee or back hurts, check how well your hips move.

Rotation of the hips is the part you’re least likely to think of but is a crucial element.

How well do your hips move?

Do they move the same on both sides? Most of us are asymmetrical. We will have differences. If there is a big difference, then you should work on the side that moves less well.

I’ve gone through various examples of movements in different positions. We are not limited to these positions. We move far more dynamically in real life.

Is your body cheating you?

One thing I will add is, your body is very good at cheating. If you want to cheat your way through movement, it’s easily done. For example, in hip extension if you don’t have the movement in your hip, you will arch your lower back or bend your knee or rotate through your pelvis. You may look like you have the movement, but do you really?

Key things to look out for when testing movement in your hips:

1. Are you adding rotation into a movement - this could be coming from anywhere and is a common compensation?

2. Are you using your back?

Why does everyone seem to get the same exercises when they have hip or lower back pain?

Many of the clients I see who have been to physios for knee or back pain are given exercises such as bridges, clams and fire-hydrants. All great exercises, but why are they all getting the same exercises or variations of these?

Generally, because these people have weak glutes.

Most of us have weak glutes because we spend our lives seated. We aren’t using our glutes, and thus the pelvis is not being supported adequately, however, resolving pain issues isn’t so simple and those exercises are only the first piece of the puzzle.

We need to look at the movement our hips are able to make.

We need mobile hips in order to carry out basic day to day movements such as walking, running, reaching up into a cupboard or bending down to pick up a pen from the floor. Everyone needs good movement and lots of different movement. We are not robots, so our bodies should easily be able to mould into different positions.

Today, we’ll look at how your stiff hip could be causing your knee pain.

If you regularly get knee pain towards the inside of your knee and you lack the ability to extend or internally rotate through your hip, there’s your problem. Every time you walk or run, your hip makes lots of subtle movements to get your leg into the optimal position for the movement. If it isn’t able to move freely, it creates new movements.

What can you do?

Take a look at how your hips move, how you lunge and how controlled your movement is.

Sometimes a few stretches of the restricted area can improve your movement, other times you need more focused retraining of the whole area.

Next Piece of the Puzzle

The bridges, clams and fire hydrant exercises are there to help build endurance into those gluteal muscles, however, the next stage would be to put them together.

Sometimes, people are given exercises that put it all together, but they have no awareness of what they are doing so the important part of the process is completely missed.

Why Working with me is Different

When people work with me, they are taught about awareness and to tap into what they are feeling is working. You need to develop this awareness because we use it in the next stage.

If you have no idea that your lunge is twisted, you will never straighten it. If you are aware it is twisted, you can feel what you are using and change it to what you should be using through the awareness you developed doing your earlier exercises.

Do you struggle with your prescribed exercises And feel you’ve made no progress?

Book yourself a complimentary exploratory call to discuss how you can progress to moving better.

I am Sabrina Qua - Soft Tissue Therapist, Movement Coach and Personal Trainer based in Worcester Park, Greater London, who helps people reduce their muscular aches and pains through an integrative approach, so they can live active, enjoyable lives.

Do your aches or pains feel like a puzzle no one can solve?

Do you have aches all over your body and every time you see a professional they focus solely on one area of pain?

Feel a bit like a puzzle?

Have you considered that all your aches could be connected?

Tightness in one area can pull your body out of alignment.

The pelvis is at the centre of your body, any issues in this area can show up below or above it and if you’re unlucky, both directions.

Tension in your shoulders could cause your upper body to be pulled upwards, creating tension in areas lower down or through your neck and arms.

Everything is connected

When you lift your arm to reach into the back of a cupboard, it’s not just your arm and shoulder that needs to move. A chain reaction affects muscles across your back and into your pelvis and down your opposite leg. This all happens automatically.

Your bones are connected by muscles and other soft tissue, so when you move your arm, the other muscles and connective tissue along the chain need to be moving freely for the movement to occur easily.

When the movement is restricted, somewhere along the chain, this could be close to the joint you’re moving or at the opposite end, this can result in poor movement and eventually pain.

Unexplained knee pain when you lift your arm overhead?

Your inability to reach high with your right arm may be causing the pain you feel in your left hip.

Pain or pulling sensations can occur if there’s an imbalance and more tension than normal anywhere along the chain. Tension and imbalance can lead to poor activation or confused engagement of muscles eg If you aren’t activating and engaging your glutes effectively, when your twist to reach, this could explain the pain in your knee.

Exercises not working?

So if you have a sore shoulder that isn’t improving despite doing your shoulder exercises…. Or a painful knee that regularly becomes puffy and inflamed, it’s time to look at you as a whole rather than the isolated knee or shoulder.

I help people reduce their muscular aches and pains so they can live active, enjoyable lives through the use of soft tissue therapy and exercise.

Many of the clients I help feel like they’ve tried everything and have been suffering for months or years.

Clients often talk about their knee pain and later it transpires they also have a bit of a back niggle and pain down one of their arms. Armed with the full picture, we can look for connections between the areas.

If you regularly have issues in more than one location, let’s see if and how they are linked.

To discuss your findings book your complimentary exploratory call now.

For more success stories visit client stories.

To learn more, join my Facebook group Reduce Pain and Move Better.

Do you have tight hip flexors?

You may have been told you have tight hip flexors, or perhaps you suspect they’re tight because you spend most of your day seated… so how do you know if they are tight and what can you do?

Where are your hip flexors?

Your hip flexors are the muscles at the front of your hip that help your body hinge into a seated position. They also help you raise your knee to your chest, so they can become tight and shortened due to long periods of sitting.

Image: Essential Anatomy5

Why is having tight hip flexors a problem?

Tight or shortened muscles (anywhere in your body) will affect your mobility and posture. Tight hip flexors will stop your glutes (butt muscles) from functioning properly, leading to imbalance and poor movement. Your glutes are one of the most powerful muscles in your body, if they aren’t functioning properly, you will have to gain your power and movement from elsewhere.

Because of your tight hips, you may experience hip pain, knee pain, lower back pain, ankle pain just to name a few.

3 Common Signs Your Hip Flexors Are Tight

1. You have an excessive arch in your lower back that often feels sore or achy. When the hip flexors are tight, they will pull your pelvis forward creating the arch. Try lying on the floor - you will find you have a large gap between your lower back and the floor. Now try to engage your abdominals by drawing in your belly button in towards your spine and tucking your pelvis bone. If you find this a struggle, this could be an indicator that your hip flexors are tight.

2. Lying down on your back with your knees bent, bring one knee into your chest. Any pinching at the front of your hips could indicate tightness of your hip flexors. The tightness leaves less space for movement, hence you feel pinching. You may find one side moves more freely than the other, this is also quite common.

3. One leg appears longer than the other. When the hip flexors are tight, which can occur just on one side, the pelvis is pulled forward, changing the way your femur sits in your hip socket. This results in one leg appearing longer. You may feel knee, ankle or back pain as a result of this as your body tries to manage the imbalance.

There are many ofther signs and tests for tight hip flexors, but you have to remember, they should not be blamed for everything. Muscles work in pairs and there are groups of muscles that support each other. Dysfunction could stem from any of these areas.

What can you do about tight hip flexors?

1. Reduce the amount of time you are sat down. frequent movement allows your muscles to shorten and lengthen, preventing ‘tightness’ from developing..

2. Stretch tight, shortened muscles. There are many different ways to stretch your hip flexors. This is just one of them.

3. Soft Tissue Therapy can really help give you a kick start, allowing you to feel what it’s like to have more open free moving hips., and making it more accessible for you to upkeep.

Are you aware of how tight your body is?

Often people don’t know how a relaxed free moving body feels because they are used to the body they live in. You live day in day out with your restrictions which are normal for you.

As a Soft Tissue Therapist, I can feel areas of tension that you aren’t aware of. It’s only through palpation that you realise just how “tight” you are.

EMMETT technique is just one of the therapies I use and it is extremely efficient and effective at releasing hip flexor tightness.

Relaxed hip flexors will improve your posture and the way your move. Any pains you felt before will also likely change and reduce.

As with all soft tissue therapies though, you do need to follow it up with stretching and strengthening of the relevant muscle groups.

So how do you feel about your hip flexors?

Do they need attention - movement, stretching, soft tissue release?

If stretching and movement isn’t working for you, you will probably benefit from soft tissue therapy. If you have been tight for a long time, your body will have created many different compensation patterns, all of which need to be addressed.

I am Sabrina, Movement Coach, Personal Trainer and Soft Tissue Therapist based in Worcester Park helping people overcome their aches, pains and recurring injuries through the use of soft tissue therapy and good healthy movement.

Want to get fitter but feel stuck because of your aches or pains?

Are you thinking about getting fitter and stronger this year, but you feel stuck because last time you tried to exercise, your knees, shoulders or back hurt?

You worked with a personal trainer or you attended classes, yet you still felt sore and not in a good way?

Not really sure how to progress due to past experiences?

The great news is everyone, including you, can get fitter and stronger, you just need coaching in the exercises that are right for you, right now and someone who is interested in ensuring you are moving well.

I am a specialist Personal Trainer, Movement Coach and Soft Tissue Therapist who specialises in helping people who feel stuck because of their aches, pains or old injuries.

Using a combination of integrated soft tissue therapy, with the right exercises and movement, you can be fitter and stronger. Gone are the days where you say, “I can’t do lunges because of my knees” or “I can’t reach overhead because of my back”.

Clients who choose to train with me do so because they have struggled with painful joints and fear certain movements. Once they have immersed into a programme with me, they discover they are able make the movements and do the exercises that once brought them pain. Because my clients move better, their discomfort becomes a thing of the past.

Not only are they becoming fitter and stronger, they are also developing confidence to work out harder and try new things.

One of my clients said: I felt quite stuck, in a repeating pattern of motivation followed by injury > despondence. Disillusioned by exercise and PTs and feeling like 'I can't' do certain things.

Now I feel overall a bit more balanced! I no longer have the mindset that 'I can't' do certain things. As we've proven lunges are very much possible!

If you feel stuck or disillusioned by exercise, let’s have a chat and see if we can turn things around for you this year. Complimentary exploratory calls allow you the opportunity to discuss the challenges you face and what you’d like to achieve. Together we decide if I am the best person to support you.

I am based in Worcester Park an clients can come to me however I also offer limited home visit appointments in and around Kingston Upon Thames / Epsom. Online sessions are also available.