3 Necessities for Aging Well. Part 3: Healthy Spine
And, the #3 necessity for aging well is (drumroll)… a healthy spine!
Of course a healthy spine is important. But what does it really mean to have a healthy spine?
First, let’s think about what a spine does:
Allows us to stand upright
Supports the rest of our bones and body when moving (flexibility)
Allows us to bend forward, look up to the sky, turn around to see who’s behind us, lean over to whisper to your friend
Protects the spinal cord where all our nerves run before they branch out into the various parts of your body. If the spine is compressed in areas, the nerves can get that way too. And then pain happens.
Absorbs load and stress (like gravity) from the top to the bottom so our vertebrae don’t crack.
What is a healthy spine?
One that can move in all the directions it’s designed for – flexion, extension, and rotation-- and support that movement.
As we age, the parts of our spine with less mobility -- particularly the thoracic spine (rib cage) -- tend to get more locked down. And, the parts with more mobility – the neck and lumbar -- tend to get less stable.
Our spinal discs also degenerate as we age, which can lead to more compression in the spine causing nerve issues, mobility issues and postural issues.
How to keep the spine healthy?
Work the spine in all the ways it’s designed to move — flexion, extension and rotation. (Disclaimer - you know your body. if you have osteoporosis or other spine issues, some of these moves might not be right for you).
While we want all parts of the spine to be mobile and stable, we particularly want to maintain mobility in the thoracic spine and stability in the cervical and lumbar.
Here are three easy moves to encourage mobility in the thoracic spine:
Place a roller or a rolled up towel right behind your shoulder blades.
Feel which back ribs are touching the towel.
Flexion – slowly roll the spine down, pushing those back ribs into the towel. Round back up. Don’t lose the connection to the towel
Extension – keeping those same back ribs pressing into the towel, lift the collarbones up toward the corner where the wall and ceiling meet. Bring your gaze to that same spot.
Rotation – keeping your hips facing forward, rotate your ribs to the right by pressing the right back ribs into the towel and lifting the left ribs away. Rotate to the other side.
None of these movements going to be big. The thoracic spine doesn’t have a large range of motion, but it’s important to work what it does have.
As you do these focus on what parts you’re actually trying to move. Because the spine works with so many other parts of the body, it’s easy to think you’re moving one part of it when another part is doing the work.
For example:
We often think we’re getting more rotation in our rib cage by rotating our neck
We often think we’re getting more extension in our upper back by pinching our lower back
We often think we’re getting flexion in the thoracic by rounding forward in the lower back
How to keep the mobile parts stable?
For the lumbar spine, strengthen the core(see #2 top necessity for aging well).
For the cervical spine, try keep it from being curved forward like when you’re looking down at your phone, or overly extended for too long, like when you’re pushing your chin forward to see your computer screen.
Bring your phone up to your eyes and place your screen at a distance and height that doesn’t make you have to strain your neck in a certain direction to see it.
Healthy hips, strong core, healthy spine. Give them love and they’ll love you back.
Try it and let us know what you think. We’d love to hear from you.