Treadmill - need teacher opinion on this statement

Hello Dear Surviving, I am so happy that you posted this question. Thank you. I have been considering getting one for the exact reason that you have one....especially because New England winters can stop the walking for weeks at a time. I am wondering about the difference between the manual (where walking is powered by your stride) and the electric (?) ones? Which one is this article referring to, since it would make a big difference in how we use our muscles. I am thinking the manual one would actually mimic the walk outside since the stride is powered by us and the speed is powered by us. I can see how an automatic one might use very different muscles and maybe behave the way this article refers. Which kind do you have? I look forward to Christine's thoughts and others. All the best to you!

Ah yes...the biomechanical scientist strikes again, no doubt ;) Let’s use our common sense, which proves time and again to outsmart the egg heads who somehow seem not quite connected to their bodies.

No question that you use a different set of muscles on the treadmill. Ironically, they are the same ones you use when ice or roller skating (betcha the author of that quote never donned a pair of blades!) This is why your shin muscles work harder (and get sore!) with either the treadmill or skating. It takes the work of the foot arch to toe-off (or “push back”) in normal gait, an action that is dampened on the treadmill and obliterated with skate blades or rollers. Does this mean skating is a no-no too? Hogwash. If skating or treadmilling were your primary modes of travel you would develop bomber shins and weak buns. I say, enjoy your treadmill, but stay in WW posture and balance with barefoot, up-on-toes exercises.

I don’t believe I’ve ever been on a treadmill (plenty of escalators, tho :-) so I can’t really offer buying suggestions.

Christine

Dear Nightingale

If I got it correctly Christine and our quoted writer are agreed that to walk the treadmill or to skate means not using our gluteal muscles or the heel to toe movement in the same way as we do when we walk naturally; there is not the follow through that we have when going for a walk, rather we are tipped forward.

Christine says that does not mean we should not skate or walk in this way, as long as we do so in posture and make sure if we do much of it to balance this out with going up on our toes. Unfortunately, the context to surviving ‘s quote is not shown. I deduce from it that the writer advises against this form of exercise as your major exercise regime if you have certain weaknesses which are listed.

I do have pelvic weakness and I also have a hip weakness and I have found that walking on a treadmill does put unusual stress upon my knees, my small toes and my hips than if I walk, just as walking over sand hills will cause yet a different set of stresses. Naturally, I am wary of this for my hip’s sake.

I looked at both a mechanical and an electrical treadmill and the mechanical one was smaller, but I found little difference between it and the electric models which however were bulkier and taking up far more room than I found desirable if I wanted it indoors during winter. “The stride and speed are powered by us” in the manual model, but the process I found to be the same, the treadmill or conveyor belt propels the walker forward similarly I think to the propulsion of walking down hill even though the treadmill is sloped upwards, in either model.

I finally opted for a smallish exercise bike. Seated on a bike in posture I found to be helpful in pushing my prolapse forwards, it took up little room and was far less punishing on my hip.

Obviously you have some research ahead of you.

Cheers Fab

Thank you Dear Fab for all of your input, I really appreciate it! Best wishes to you.

Thanks from me, too, Fab, for your input. The author of Surviving's quote states, "Try taking your act on the road (as in, not on the treadmill) and practice the 'ice skating' feel of a pushing-back gait pattern."

I was making the point that skating is a picking up of the foot/leg and moving, or gliding, it forward. A treadmill forces us to pick up the back foot and move it forward as well. Treadmilling is more like skating than walking. There is no or little "push-back" with either.

I have a pair of roller blades and my hope is to be able to skate with my five-year old granddaughter. She is not quite there yet, but in a year or two will be skating circles around me. I'm not motivated to practice very often, because my shins become extremely sore. If I didn't have very strong hips, knees and feet, perhaps I would feel it there as well. The treadmill would have to place similar undue pressure because it is a similar movement.

I'm not a fan of treadmills, but that is simply because I'm not drawn to mechanized forms of exercise. Well...excluding low-tech mechanized equipment like bikes, skates, and skis. All of these place forces on our muscles, ligaments, and tendons that are different than walking on the ground. Does it mean we should give them up? Not in my opinion, but awareness that walking (and running!) are best is key.

What is the brand and model of your treadmill? I would like to see it in action, maybe Youtube?

Surviving, I think as long as you don't pretend that you get completely the same muscle action with your treadmill as you would get with walking, the treadmill is fine. It is getting your body moving, and enabling you to keep doing what suits you, whatever the weather.

I can see that when we walk we are propelling our whole body forwards, whereas on the treadmill we are having our feet propelled backwards and we have to keep our body over our centre of gravity. It might look the same,, and the limbs and body all have the same trajectory, albeit one is stationary and the other moving forwards, but it is quite different. I think it is good to use our bodies in different ways during exercise. This is the only way to ensure that the maximum number of muscles get moved through their full range of motion.

And something is better than nothing, especially if you can 'half-flap', at a time of year when it is oh, so tempting to curl up in front of the fire instead, and be a cat.

Much better to walk, yoga and dance when we can, and treadmill when we can't.

The biomechanist is all for ice/roller skating. The problem with the treadmill has to do with the belt - "The belt of a treadmill reverses natural gait from one that is posterior-driven (using the contraction of the posterior pelvic, hip, and thigh muscles to move forward) to one that is hip-flexion (using the psoas and quads). This means that there is no longer a natural balance to pelvic floor activity, slowly creating a situation where the pelvic floor can generate hypertonicity. Treadmill gait patterns call on body-position programs similar to the ones used for sitting all day."

I'm new here; just been officially diagnosed with rectocele and my book and dvd are on the way. I've been using a treadmill at our local senior rec center for 2 years now. Since I don't know enough about WW posture except the little I've read on the forum, I try to stand up straight, chest up, tummy out. I hope that's right. In the last few days, the bulge seems so much worse but then I had 3 days of a stomach bug so I'm sure that had something to do with it; all that retching and diarrhea.

I am new here too, and have been reading various posts in this forum as well as other resources on the internet as I look at ways to help my prolapse. I love the nurturing approach and the delightful femininity of the Whole Woman program, and the forum seems to be a wonderful supporting resource. It's wonderful to see a return to natural posture, and not needing to hold our tummies in is so freeing!

I have loved so much of what I have seen of Whole Woman, but I am dismayed to see the attitude Christine shows to the writer of the quote that is the subject of this thread. With a little research I was able to find out who was being referred to, and I found out that this person has a very strong science background, in mathematics, physics, and yoga. It's disappointing to me to see an attitude like this toward someone that is highly educated, unless there is good reason. Is there something in the attitude the author has expressed somewhere that warrants this response? If so, I hope Christine will be able to give examples to help me understand her position. Christine, why do you think her head is not connected to her body? I would appreciate links to things she has said that are wrong or misleading, so I can make up my own mind. From what I have seen so far of Whole Woman and Hab-it, it's pretty much a personal choice depending on which approach resonates most.

Something else that concerns me about what what Christine wrote was the way she described the muscles used when skating and on a treadmill. I have spent a fair bit of time on a treadmill, so I can affirm the statement that treadmill walking doesn't use the buns much. Skating however, is a different matter, this is something else I have spent some time doing. Christine describes skating as using the same muscles as tread milling, yet my experience shows me that is not the case. Skating most certainly requires a pushback motion with one leg, while the other leg glides somewhat passively until it too pushes back. No skater that I know of ever picks up one foot and glides it forward in initiating a forward motion, this is just not how skating works. Push back and glide is how I was taught in my figure skating lessons, and it seems to be the natural way most people skate with or without lessons. I question why you quipped "(betcha the author of that quote never donned a pair of blades!)” . Why would you presume that? If you are better qualified to advise on these matters, then please explain why you think the author has it all wrong in the quoted article.

I am commenting today because I have respect for Christine's work, I recognise that many people have been helped by it (I hope to be helped by it myself), yet here I come across comments that to my mind do not present either Christine or her work in a positive light. I welcome any help to understand these things more clearly.

Thank you Surviving, I will certainly look into the rest of Christine's work and also search the forum more closely for answers to my questions.

You are so right regarding education not being a guarantee of being right! That is why I am determined to do my own research, and not take anyone's say so without considering things for myself. I admit to being worried that perhaps WW may have serious flaws because of Christine's comments regarding which muscles are used for the activities mentioned above; I wondered whether if she has that wrong, what else might be wrong? Does she really understand how the body works, I found myself thinking? To me this was not nit-picking, just due diligence before I commit to a program. I stand by my comment that to make a personal attack on someone just isn't a good way to do business. By all means critique their methods and promote your own, but leave off personal criticisms: that's my take on it. Honestly, reading these comments had me seriously reconsidering whether WW was worth my time.

It seems to me that many people are gaining great benefits from all 3 of the programs I mentioned in my post. This tells me that each of them are doing something right. It is good to hear that you have had such a good experience with WW over the last 4 years.

Thank you for the advice to research and to look at the whole picture, I will do that.

Hi Miscryptic,

Well, let’s settle the skating issue first. In terms of push back, here is what I said:

“It takes the work of the foot arch to toe-off (or ‘push back’) in normal gait, an action that is dampened on the treadmill and obliterated with skate blades or rollers.”

Being able to fully extend the arch of the foot by flexing the toes is essential for proper functioning of gluteus maximus. That is the meaning of my statement, as clarified by the parentheses. Without adequate toe flexion the knees bend, the lumbar spine flattens and the gluteals become weak. The toes do not flex in shoe-skates and the skating motion does not include the essential human gait pattern of toe-off (push back).

As to your comments about skating push-back and glide, I disagree that the back foot is not lifted and brought forward. The following video elucidates my point:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uir3ZAxlUnw

If this woman did nothing but skate, she would build bomber quad and shin muscles, hyper-tense hamstrings and weak gluteals.

I believe highly expert skaters do glide forward on the back foot to meet the strong push-off on the opposite side. Both styles are seen in skating. I certainly pick up my back foot.

However, none of this has anything to do with my original point, as stated above.

As to your other concerns, I will try my best to explain.

Every other high profile person I know of who is teaching posture to improve pelvic, hip, or back health is under the same anatomic misconceptions saturating our culture with seriously erroneous information for over a century. The more conventional education you have, the more boldly you can espouse common anatomic misunderstandings.

From my perspective, my best credentials are that I am a mother (or was a pregnant woman), a dancer, and a clothes maker. Somehow I developed a different view of the human body than anyone else teaching anatomy has described.

If the human female body had been studied by orthopedists and anatomists I believe truly gross errors in judgment might have been avoided. A forward placed abdominal wall is an essential human trait. It develops as soon as we become bipedal and in so-called primitive cultures it is never lost. In normal human anatomy the abdominal wall is pulled up and not in. It is pulled up by a strong shoulder girdle, not “flared ribs” as our other experts insist. All other promoters of posture teach some level of pulling in the abdominal wall click here. They also teach to place most of the body weight on the heels, a completely erroneous concept that causes a low, sharp angle in the lumbosacral spine, stressing the sacroiliac joints.

Furthermore, such posture pulls the pelvic organs away from their normal positions against the lower abdominal wall so that instead of pinning the organs into position, intraabdominal pressure works to blow them backward and out of the body. It also places the center of mass over the front aspect of the acetabular roof instead of distributing the body’s weight evenly over the joint. This is why young women develop prolapse, and also why young athletes are developing almost as much hip dysfunction as bent-hip, bent-knee older people.

In closing, I think it quite odd that you would come here wondering why we can’t all be friends and that certainly we all have something to bring to the party. I disagree. Unless an instructor or therapist is teaching WW posture, they are placing women at risk of serious disease. I hope I have made myself clear.

Christine

Hello, not that this really matters at all and I may be very wrong but when I have looked at her work (completely ignoring the Hab it lady as I am with everyone else on this and Kegals don't work) but she always appears to be pretty similar to the whole woman work, don't shoot me if I wrong because I will be honest I don't understand all the talk about the muscles which is probably where I go wrong! It's too much for me. But she does state not to hold the abdominal wall in to relax it, shoulders down but not back and general posture with the lumbar curve so it all seems very similar. I also have issues with me knees and have to agree I find posture and the pressure on my knees a lot worse on a treadmill, it's also very difficult to use your arms or anything like both parties say is good. I don't suppose it matters whether you both agree with each other's works I just found it interesting as she actually seems pretty different to the standard kegal or standard Physio type person. Just thoughts shared allowed!

I too bought into the kegel exercises, bought the Kegel 8 and the Kegelmaster. Neither worked for me, although the websites were full of success stories. Prolapse cured. I just wish I had the money spent on both of those devices.
I am lucky to live on a street with steep hills. I always feel I get a workout just walking the mile every day.
Treadmills don't interest me, simply because I love to be out in nature and get some fresh air. Mentally the walk does so much good and I know I am working the right sets of muscles when I am in posture.

Just a couple more thoughts…

At the beginning of this thread, I was responding to Surviving’s inquiry about whether treadmilling would be risky for her. Although I well understand and correctly identified the mechanical issues of the treadmill, I responded to Surviving, who does not have hip or knee issues and likes her treadmill, to go ahead and enjoy it (in WW posture), as it is not much different on the muscular system than skating. In retrospect, the recent dredging up of this old thread and the pointed attack on me - that perhaps I don’t know what I’m talking about - smacks of playing marketing tricks and driving traffic to a specific location. I have since gone back and edited the thread to remove names and websites. I rarely do this, but it seemed warranted to me.

This also reinforced for me once again how important it is that women understand their own anatomy, and the anatomy of prolapse, which is not described anywhere else but WW. The old way of understanding the pelvis - that it is a bowl with a soft tissue floor at the bottom - is what is promoted. One of my major complaints about the person referenced above is that she launched a campaign against WW posture by teaching women with prolapse that it is detrimental to a healthy spine to lift the chest. I have not been on her website in quite some time, but historically she has been all about tucking the ribs and keeping a ‘neutral’ pelvis. It is all the conventional same-old, same-old. If she is talking recently about holding the abdominal wall forward, that is purely WW, which is fine. However, she will have a hard time correlating other aspects of her historical teachings, such as placing most of the weight on the heels, etc. What she does or doesn’t do and teach is not my concern.

What is important is that every woman understand the true nature of her anatomy and the actual reasons for prolapse. This will best be accomplished in a very systematic way, which we are working day and night trying to bring about. Stay tuned!

Christine

I definitely wasn't attacking anything as I will be honest and say I follow your posture and DVDs but I am bad that I don't really understand the muscles or how my own body is formed that well, I really struggle to even imagine where organs are etc, I don't know why I just seem to be very slow with these things, I don't know why. I appreciate the site and the work. Was more a question really, again you both work individually and differently!!! Thanks for explanation though

I was only referring to miscryptic. Thank you for your kind words and I am determined to create a program that explains this work through and through. xC.

Thanks Christine for taking the time to clarify, I very much appreciate it. I am considering buying your Prolapse First Aid DVD, so I hope you know I am serious about trying to understand your program.

Nothing I have written has been with the intent to attack or to drive traffic anywhere. When searching the internet for information about treadmills and the pelvic floor, this “old thread” came up right near the top of the search results, and I joined in the conversation without even looking to see when the last post was made. I do not have a background in science, but now that I’m in my 40s I’m finding great motivation to research and learn as much science as I can as it relates to how my body does and doesn’t function! Yes I did question whether or not your information was correct, that is how my mind works.

I have researched various independent sources in my search for knowledge that indicate strongly that gluteal muscles are used when skating. Seeing that the opposite was said here took me aback, and as an investigator of and potential buyer of the WW program, brought up strong doubts that I expressed here. My thinking is that if I don’t understand something, if it looks to me to be different from what has been described, then I ask questions with the intent to add to my understanding. Sometimes I can be too direct, lacking in diplomacy. I apologise for any offence caused.

I absolutely agree with Christine’s statement “The more conventional education you have, the more boldly you can espouse common anatomic misunderstandings.” This is why I’m trying to use my own common sense, as well as asking questions to people like yourself. Your credentials are are not in question, I am convinced that multiple degrees and PhDs aren’t necessary in order to see a better way to do something. Your years of experience and the number of women who have received benefits from your WW program are what drew me to WW in the first place, but still, I will probably always be someone who has to ask ‘why’ when I see something I don’t yet understand. Thank you for your patience.

I would like to add that you have completely convinced me about staying away from kegels, thank you for the wonderful information on the WW site on that topic. I have deleted the Hab-it DVD from my wish list.

Thanks for following up, Miscryptic. Understanding our female anatomy the very best we can is critical to our own efforts to affect our conditions. We are being snowed by the conventional perspective and that’s why I have little patience for the authoritarian teachings of so-called experts.

What I love about the WW work is that it is self-evident. In this way, with a basic anatomical understanding as to which major muscles do what, we can determine for ourselves how the female body works.

Let’s apply the self-evident principle to the skating problem. In your bare feet, and with palms spread firmly over your buttocks, walk across the room in WW posture, taking long strides, and flexing your toes with each toe-off. Feel how powerfully your gluteus maximus works in hip extension.

Now, keep your hands in exactly the same place, but bend forward a bit, bend your knees a bit, and take gliding, skating motions across the room. Notice the changes!

In the first instance, you are primarily using gluteus maximus to extend your leg to the back. You were also using the top fibers of the lateral gluteals (abductors). That powerful movement is so easily felt, but much less so if you have the beginnings of hip dysfunction, which includes toes that will not fully flex and chronically bent knees.

In the second experiment, you feel much less roundedness of the butt muscles. Now you are using your deep external rotators, the bottom fibers of the abductors, and your hamstrings are very tense as they are taking over much of the work of g. maximus.

Yes, kegels make no sense, not that we don't need to use the full range of motion of those muscles. But the primary role of these body walls is to manage intraabdominal pressure.

The entire beginning and end of the story is that the organs have not fallen down, they have fallen back from the lower belly. Our work is to push them forward and away from the pelvic opening at the back.

Wishing you well,

Christine