Try This Morning and Bedtime Routine… Travel Series #5




Let’s talk about traveling again… I’m Allyson, Physical Therapist here at CORE… I wanted to talk to you about establishing some routines in your life. I’m kind of disorganized at home but I’ve established some morning routines and some bedtime routines that help keep the house picked up. I applied that same principle to physical fitness and just staying injury free, especially while you’re traveling. I talked in the last vlog about three essential things to bring on your trip.

Now, lets talk about a morning and evening routine…Part of your morning routine is going to be just breathing and you can do this in sitting or lying down. Take some breaths into the bottom part of your lungs here… (there’s another blog that Brandi did on how to breathe), breathe in and exhale just like you would in Pilates class. With every inhale, exhale think about some part of your body, pay attention to it…

Ask yourself:

  • Do I need to lengthen my spine?
  • Are my ribs flaring?
  • Am I stable?
  • Am I engaging my lower abs and my pelvic floor?

Do five breaths and then check in with your core… reach your arms down, you breathe in, curl up a little bit, hold this… don’t do anything to aggressive on your trip, you don’t want to get hurt. So you can do a little bit of that…

You can also do a roll up and keep those legs down and then stretch over… that’s a simple morning routine, do as many of those as you like.

Then at bedtime, go ahead and pick some kind of release work to do… If your neck and shoulders get tight or are tight, you can do your release work up in your shoulder area. If you’re doing your breathing and it doesn’t feel like you’re getting a full breath or it feels tight or restricted in your diaphragm, hip flexor, you know your release work from being here at CORE… Pick one and do it and then take some more breaths. You can do this in sitting or standing wherever you are, laying down like we did before and then if you’re sitting take your deep breath and just twist your spine a little bit one way, the other way… if there’s a tight side or restricted side go to the easy way and hold it for a few minutes and see if that tight side doesn’t loosen up a little bit…

Last but not least if you can get some kind of resistance work done and I like to do rotator cuff. You just take a band and pull out while squeezing your arms by your sides. This helps keep that scapula down…

So that can be an easy way to loosen up, move a little and enjoy your vacation more… it’s the whole point!

Do you need help establishing an exercise program for home or the road?

Are you having pain that is limiting your ability to travel?

Or, are you traveling regardless of pain, just pushing through?

If you answered yes, We Can Help!

Call 512.215.4227 to tell us your story…

As a physical therapist in the Houston and Austin areas since 1995, Allyson has developed a gentle approach to whole body healing. At Core she has been able to spend more time personally with each client addressing the entire body and providing recovered clients with pilates training to keep them progressing.

“The one body has many parts, but the many parts make up one whole body.” Allyson uses this belief in three areas: First, in her approach to addressing areas of restriction throughout the body as a whole. Second, learning from co-workers, clients and other therapists taking pieces of wisdom and incorporating them into a whole treatment. Last, incorporating the pilates practice into discharge from physical therapy to continue parts of your recovery into a pursuit of health for your whole life. All parts making up one process of returning your body to health.

Her background in Total Motion Release techniques as well as Craniosacral Therapy, Strain/ Counterstrain and PIlates make for a holistic and gentle approach with quick results. The focus of her therapy is to empower the client with tools to heal themselves.

Allyson earned her B.S. in kinesiology at The University of Texas in 1992 and her M.S. in physical therapy from Texas Woman’s University in Houston in 1995. She has worked in pediatrics for 9 years also with great success treating pediatric orthopedic issues and infant torticollis with no crying!
Allyson Marshall