I wrote a post on muscle failure. Physical therapists will often strap a 2 pound weight on your ankle and say do 30 kick thingies. I’m guilty of this. For an injured muscle or muscles that have never been exercised ever, this will build some strength. However, if you really want to build strength in a muscle, you have to take it to failure. You have to work the muscle so hard that it stops working, for a few seconds. I remember in PT school a professor who has a GCS – this is a certification that means she is a specialist working with geriatric patients – was working with a 90-year old man and she was actually taking his muscles to failure and she told us the patient said “my muscles feel alive again.” Now, right after a stroke you don’t wanna do this, you need to be really gentle at first. But when you’re chronic like me, the muscles need to fail – a lot. Read this.
Categories: Health, Rehab, Stroke stuff
How long after a stroke can you start doing this?
I’m not sure, I don’t think there is an answer to this. It’s gonna depend on how badly the brain is damaged and how long it takes to reach a point of medical stability. But I don’t know, maybe that’s even wrong, Peter G. Levine would know.
http://recoverfromstroke.blogspot.com/
Excellent blog, Amy. I like this post. Intriguing idea.
Thank you!!!!!!
I took my finger flexors to failure once while canoeing and that night my intrinsic muscles of the hand were sore. Thats the only time I’ve ever gotten the intrinsics to fire.