Experts Blogs

Amateur or professional athletes who play tennis or baseball often need the help of physical therapists because of shoulder injuries. Often the shoulder injury is characterized by pain and weakness in the shoulder girdle, difficulty lifting the arm out to the side, and difficulty sleeping on that shoulder.   Continuing to use the arm may present more pain and cause the patient to react by starting to hunch his/her shoulders forward as if in a fetal position. This can aggravate the pain and a bad cycle can begin if the shoulder isn't properly treated by a physical therapist. Injections by orthopedists...

Let's face it.  Americans are fat, fat, fat. According to current statistics, a whopping 60% are overweight and, of the 40% left, only about 6% fall into the lean category. (Those nice folks who can see their abs.) So, whether your goal is to show off your six-pack or just shed a few nagging pounds, it makes sense to take a hard look at what sets this small group of lean-and-strong apart from the rest. How do they manage to accomplish what 94% of Americans find nearly impossible? The answer might surprise you. Walk This Way  In an effort to...

Okay…today is THE DAY – it’s a brand new year, a fresh start, a place to begin again. And while it’s likely you have some semblance of a plan to slip back into those skinny jeans in 2012, I’ll venture to guess that it’s not your waistline, but your PLAN, that needs a major overhauling. In 12 years of coaching and training thousands of men and women, I can tell you that most weight loss endeavors (especially the New Year's kind) fail, not from a lack of self-discipline, but rather a lack of “pre-paving. “ Consider how easy it is, when...

If you've been trying to flatten your stomach, it's likely that you've done more than one Google search using the 3 most popular key words in the fitness industry: lose belly fat. It's also likely that you did NOT make it through the 440+ pages (and over 2,030,000 links) that followed. My #1 goal today is to save you all of that reading and research by giving you the absolute and definitive recipe for flatter abs, leaner thighs, and a smaller waistline. In other words, you?ve just hit the belly fat jack pot! I should warn you, though?it may not...

We've all heard the familiar mantra "calories in - calories out" right? For years it has been the tried and true chant of the weight loss industry. While there is plenty of hard scientific evidence to back this theory, anyone who has tried to lose weight just by cutting calories knows, there is a lot more to the story than just eating less food.  So, the real question is, "What is the missing link?"  I can tell you with all certainty that, no matter what your goal might be, whether you are interested in losing fat, gaining muscle, getting healthy, reversing the aging process,...

This great question came in from one of my clients yesterday. It's a pretty common one, so I hope you find it useful! Q: As I am removing the layer of fat padding, I am seeing more loose skin and wrinkled skin on my arms and legs when I bend them. I am hoping that this goes away...It's not like I have lost 75 pounds and have large amts of skin...but the looseness is odd looking. Makes me feel "old." A: My first suggestion is to give your body some time to produce more collagen. It does this naturally in...

"Can you tell me how I should look for a new job when I've  been told that I have to leave my job because of my bad health?"  

I'd say that's a tough one, wouldn't you?  Esther is angry, feels totally alone and is really scared.  Seems understandable to me.

Abdominal strengthening You’ve associated it with lying on your back and doing the dreaded crunches! When I have seen people do this in the gym, often they strain their necks once their abdominal is fatigued and their form goes out the window. If their hands are behind their head, they are pulling their necks forward, rather than contracting their abdomens. If you have back problems, lying on your back doing crunches might not be the safest way to build up those core muscles.  Core strengthening is essential to good posture, strength in any kind of arm or leg swing while participating in...

Simple mindfulness exercise for staying calm & centered. Greetings readers! Work can be hard. We’re all susceptible to stress and anxiety, but there are ways to counteract these things. Mindfulness is a mental state of awareness of all that is around us and inside of us. It is a state of calmness, where the body’s autonomic nervous system is activated. With repeated practice you can activate your own mindfulness at any time. Throughout the day and before you go to sleep take in a series of breaths. Instead of allowing your mind to wander over the day’s concerns and letting stress...

“Are you being too uptight?” I have to ask this question of myself sometimes in order to loosen myself up. What happens is that life can beat us up and it can stress us out Then, it creates a cycle of being stressed which leads to feeling like you need to be uptight in order to survive, which only leads to more stress, and so it goes around and around. I get stuck in that cycle from time to time even though I fully believe in and want flow in my life. Flow is beautiful. It is a peaceful feeling that...