Caitlin is the 11-year-old daughter of my regular client, Rachel.
Problem
When Caitlin came to me, she had serious hip and shoulder pain. She’d been told she was experiencing growing pains. This seemed unlikely to me. I checked her posture and found the arches of her feet were collapsed. She also had muscle imbalances in her shoulder blades.
Treatment journey
To start, Caitlin did Spiral Stabilisation exercises under my supervision for 30 minutes, twice a day for a week. Young people pick things up quickly and their bodies are very responsive. Caitlin was no different. By day four, I noticed changes in the position of her arches and her shoulder blades. After the first week, we reduced the regularity of the supervised sessions to once a week then once a month. Throughout this time, Caitlin was exercising for 10 minutes every day to commit the new patterns to muscle memory. The key to improvement is little and often.
Result
In my experience, it takes six months to make new patterns of movement habitual, and one and a half to two years to make permanent posture changes. Now Caitlin does ballet, karate and gymnastics every week without pain. She’s a great example of the benefits of early intervention. Little people with big dreams sometimes need our help to make the most of their natural gifts.