How postural changes lead to pain

“I’m focused on getting posture right and core as active as possible.” – Ulrike Uta

At this month’s Feeling Fit with FSHD sessions, physiotherapist Ulrike Uta, MSc, MCSP, of the Muscular Dystrophy Support Centre in Coventry, UK, explains how muscle weakness from FSHD can cause people to compensate by overworking other muscles. For example, as abdominal core muscles weaken, the shoulder and neck muscles can get overworked trying to hold up the body. “Tightness around the muscles, aches, pains, cramps, stiffness, heaviness, headaches, shortness of breath, all these issues are secondary to how our body is compensating,” Uta says. In this session, “that’s the bit we want to tackle. Our aim is to make muscles that are overworking to work less hard, and to get the those that are underworking to work as well as they can, all within the frame of FSHD.”

For our second session, Ulrike fielded questions from the audience, with a wealth of advice on how to explore your issues with your physical therapist or trainer.