5 Tips To Avoid Aches And Pain During or After Gardening
Spring is around the corner and many people love gardening. The smell of the soil and flowers are very refreshing for many people and gardening is more like therapy for them. But how many people can not enjoy gardening due to joint pain or back pain? I talk with many of my patients about their gardening hobbies and how they like to do gardening. Most of the time I hear that I love gardening but I can not do it now as I’m getting older or as my back and neck pain is getting worse with gardening. People give up their hobbies because they are afraid of getting hurt or making pain worse.
Can you relate with following statements :
I am getting old for gardening
My back feels so stiff and it’s hard to get up after gardening
I feel still and aches all day after gardening
My knees are hurting when I try to do gardening
I feel exhausted after gardening
If you have any of these issues, you should read further and follow up on our tips for gardening.
1 Avoid bending over from the back; During gardening, we forget about our posture and lean forward from the back. When we lean forward, we overuse our back muscles and that can lead to spasms and also more stiffness at the end of the day. How many times you have experienced that you lean forward and it takes time to straighten up back when you stand up.
Tips: use a stool to sit down and work on your gardening skills or bend more knees and hips during gardening.
2 Get active before gardening: That’s more of a warm-up, just like before any regular workout you need to warm up, you need to warm your body before gardening. Gardening requires a lot of physical work, getting your blood circulating before gardening helps to reduce the risk of injury.
Tips: simple marching in place, speed walking for short distances, or touching toes from a standing position helps to improve your circulation and warm your bod
3 Use the right tools: Avoid lifting heavy plants or soil, rather use a wheelbarrow or garden cart to transfer heavy objects.
Tips: Use the right tools for the right work, for example, round point shovels are better for digging vs square head shovels.
4 Maintain posture: Depending on your gardening needs, your posture will be different. During any position, be mindful of posture and how your body is moving. Being mindful of your posture alone can help you a lot to prevent injury.
Tips: Use a knee pad when kneeling, if possible, kneel on one leg and maintain a straight back. Avoid heavy lifting but keep small pots and plants close to your body while lifting.
5 Take a break and hydrate: Know your limit and try to take a break in between. Especially in winter, your body is not used to all the hard work that is required during gardening, and in spring when the first time you need to make sure you start easy and take plenty of breaks. Make sure to hydrate regularly, during gardening you naturally start sweating more and that can cause dehydration. Some of the signs of dehydration include but are not limited to extreme thirst, headache, and dry mouth.
Tips: Keep water bottles available and set timers for water breaks.
How can Physical Therapists help?
A physical therapist can assess your posture and also address your problem areas. Physical therapists can perform manual therapy and pain management to reduce your pain and create exercise programs to strengthen muscles to improve your movement and posture. Physical therapy can really go into detail about your cause of pain and how they can provide muscle re-education to improve movement without pain. People blame everything on age when it comes to pain. Many of the pain can be treated and a physical therapist can help you to achieve that without any pain meds. We also offer free consultations so we can assess your posture and guide you in the right direction. In Texas, we can also see patients without any order for 10 business days.
So work on all these tips and get back to your gardening skills pain-free.