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(old but good!)
| OVERVIEW | And until we start moving around on all fours again, our
back problems will continue. And when we think of primates swinging from trees,
and the fact that chiropractors are increasingly recommending simple
hanging and back-stretching exercises, even for children, it becomes clear that
we have adopted a lifestyle for which we have not completely evolved! One chiropractic author has an appendix entitled "Hanging for Children", and describes an apparatus rudimentarily similar to the HoloBarre! The HoloBarre provides literally DOZENS and DOZENS of ways to hang, stretch, and relax, and to coax and cajole recalcitrant joints and vertebrae back into position, or alignment. And it is you will be able to find DOZENS MORE for your own particular tastes. |
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| Other remedies | This does not discount other remedies for back problems: massage, manipulation, electro-massage, walking on the spine, chiropractic adjustment, and other techniques. However, these all have one thing in common: They require a second (oftentimes expensive) person. | |
Regular Hanging |
Regular hanging is an isometric, preventative method for
maintaining health, although there are some acute conditions in some people that
can be rectified by a simple hand-hang. Generally, though, acute conditions
require the more rigorous inverted hang (next section).
For people with the necessary hand strength, placing the bar as high as practical, grabbing the bar (any grip if the bar is non-rotating, opposed grip if it is rotating) and raising the legs by bending back at the knee. While hanging, taking very deep breaths in and out tends to release the muscles at the lower back, and you can feel the lower back almost "pulling apart". If possible, swinging, twisting, and knee raises to wonders in "loosening things up". This exercise is generally HIGHLY recommended by chiropractors. |
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Inverted Hanging |
Inverted hanging is not easy, regadless of how you
approach it. For those of us who haven't tried it recently, trust me when I say
that your memories of yourself swinging by your knees on a Jungle Gym with free
abandon are just that: Memories! Even slim, trim adults have trouble doing
this. Largely because the strength-to-weight ratio of all small people (and insects and animals) is enormously greater than this ratio is for larger adults. Thus, jumping, tree and fence climbing (remember that?), and the like are all much more difficult for adults. The proof is thatmost of us naturally stop doing these past our teens! |
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What inverted hanging (or any hanging, for that matter) does. |
Chiropractors, as well as orthopedic devices, etc. go
through a fair amount of trouble (reflected in their bills) to "re-align"
the hips and lower and upper vertbrae. If you take any long skinny stick, or
even one of those clear plastic 12 inch rulers, and compress the two ends, you
will undoubtedly see it bow, perhaps even break. If you can imagine the stick
or ruler as segmented, you could easily imagine the segments rupturing, slipping
out of place, or any number of things. You can also imagine them popping right
back into place if , instead of compressing the stick, you were to stretch it.
This is exactly what is happening with your hips, back, and joints. The majority of weight lifting exercises causes drastically increased compression. According to standard texts on biomechanics, mere walking induces compressive loads on the hips (and presumably on the nearby lower back) of FOUIR TO SEVEN TIMES THE BODY WEIGHT! Running, generates up to FIFTEEN TIMES the body weight at various locations in the body. Think about this: This means that for a 200 pound man, parts of his pby are experiencing 3,000 pounds of force!! One statistic purports that 43% of all participants in high-impact aerobics (which do not seem to be as high impact as out-and-out running on asphalt) suffer from injuries, and 73% of the instructors of these classes suffer from injuries! Thus, it seems reasonable that almost all medical therapy and rehab for these problems solves them by applying tension (stretching) as opposed to compression. And you can do this often-times BETTER than what an expensive practitioner can do for you, with a simple adjustable bar and perhaps an attachment or two. By hanging by your hands, you cause your lower body to pull down on the vertebrae; the upper vertebrae experience more pull than the lower, but the neck vertebrae are not stretched at all. And, it does not matter, in principle, whether you hang by your hands, armpits, or are supported by your elbows, or are doing "dips": The force distribution along the spine is the same. However, your ability to relax in these positions may have some differing effects. When you hang upside down, the force profile is a little different, where now the lower back is stretched more than the upper back, and now the neck vertebrae are slightly stretched. And, it does not matter how you are hung: feet, boots, knees, etc. As long as you are completely upsidedown, the force profile will be the same, in principle. For my own acute problems, I have found that passive inversion hanging, either on a table or with an electric winch, to be most effective. However, as stated earlier, hanging upsidedown is not easy, and I am always loathe to do it! However, when I am finally driven to do it, I always enjoy it! Go figure. But, regular hand hanging, or the myriad of gentle stretches and positions soon to be pictured, should eliminate 99% of the need for true inverted hanging. But, if you do need the inversion, there is nothing like it, and if you have had a history of your back seriously "falling out", it might not be a bad idea to prepare yourself with an attachment or two, and learn how to use them beforehand. Unfortunately, it is the least comfortable inverted hangs that are most cost effective (free, essentially), while inversion tables and winches are pretty costly, but still cheap compared to medical bills. Using the gravity boots and hooking them to the HoloBarre is the middle compromise, but this too requires some athleticism, and as mentioned earlier, causes sudden increase in ICP. |
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| The HoloBarre and your Back | The HoloBarre requires just you, the bar, and gravity, and
perhaps an attachment, depending on the method you finally choose. But 99% of
users who have no acute problems, will not need any attachments at all. It is one thing for a system to get you physically fit. It is quite another for a system to cure an agonizing condition. Anyone who has had their back "fall out" knows what is in store for them for days and weeks on end. Imagine being spared that in a 5-minute session on the HoloBarre! In any number of ways you choose to use it! There are two general classes of hanging: regular hanging, using the hands, and inverted hanging using the legs or feet, with inclined hanging being in between (using the hands or feet/legs). Hanging upside down is not an easy thing to do, regardless of the equipment. Even regular hanging requires certain hand strength, although the HoloBarre provides ways that this can be done regardless of handstrength. And rarely is inverted hanging an inexpensive endeavor. We will talk about each of the ways the HoloBarre can accomplish inverted hanging, from the bare bones version, which for some might very well be the best, to the more sophisticated (read: expensive!) methods. |
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