Tuesday, July 3, 2007

to stretch or not to stretch?

i did a bunch of stretching before my surgeries (as instructed by a pt) as well as afterwards.

for the last 2 months i have not been stretching, and it has made a difference. an irritated nerve can be more irritated by stretching it. it would make sense to me, that a deep lunge/psoas stretch would more than likely irritate those nerves that are located in the fascia of the psoas. note the nerves that are often irritated in the sports hernia: ilionguinal, iliohypogastric, and genitofemoral nerves.

i wish a doctor would post here and provide insight on the irritation of these nerves. from what i understand, in many cases of ap there is a tearing of the obliques. the ilioinguinal and iliohypogastric nerves pass bewteen the layers of obliques. i can only assume that is why reaching overhead and twisting is painful to so many that suffer from this injury.

so, i think that stretching was bad for me. that is, until the nerves really began to calm down through a period of NOT STRETCHING. by the time i had my surgeries, i was no longer in shape, in fact, i had lost about 27 pounds due to lack of mobility and desire to eat due to pain, and sickness from the antibiotics i was carelessly put on.
as my nerves are slowly becoming less irritated, my mobility has begun to really come back. i can bend over without pain most of the time.

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