Why your posture matters

Posture could mean a lot of things as far as the English language is concerned. However, for the purpose of this article, I will adopt one of the definitions of the term by Google English Dictionary provided by Oxford Languages. It defines posture as the position of the body when sitting or standing.

For a couple of weeks back now, I have been battling with series of challenges on this side of life. Anyone that follows my blog would already notice how irregular my publishing has been on the chain for some weeks now. The peak of these challenges is the health status of one of my sisters who happens to stay in the same town as mine.

The whole problem started with occasional complaints of back pains. The pain seems to come and disappear after taking mild pain-relieving tablets. Only to appear some weeks after. Until she decided to visit one of the teaching hospitals in town here.

She was prescribed some tests, including an x-ray of the vertebral column. The x-ray revealed that the cartilage in between one of the vertebral joints seems to have worn away and the grinding of the two joint bones against one another is what is causing her the pain.

The only way to fix it is surgery and the outcome is even a '50/50', quoting the doctor. Fortunately, though, her condition has not gotten to the surgery stage and the situation can be maintained with a change in lifestyle.

^{Good posture and bad posture. Image source: flicker}

The lifestyle here refers to her sitting and standing posture. In order not to worsen the condition, she was advised not to stand or sit for too long. Guess the kind of job she does?

She operates a hairdressing salon.

Not just that. She stands virtually throughout the day while fixing the hair of her clients. Each time I visit her salon, I normally complain and warn her of the consequences of standing for too long. She will simply waive it away and move on to another topic. Even when the back pain started, she thought it was all a joke and that the pain will subside with time.

She was given some drugs and discharged.

The pain got worse after a few weeks and this time, not just the back. She was feeling extreme pain in her left leg. She went back to the hospital and after some back and forth between the general outpatient and physiotherapy department, she was recommended for a special scan outside of town. The scan cost about $300.

We had to rally around in order to get the scan done. The result was sent to the consultant that recommended the test directly. He explained using so many medical terms that I cannot recollect.

The summary of the whole thing is that one of the arteries that supply blood to the left leg has got hooked in between her pelvic bone. There is no other way around it. She was recommended for surgery.

A surgery that will cost us thousands of dollars.

Things have got so bad that she can hardly walk now. We are still in the process of raising funds for the surgery ( I may have to make a special post about this).

Your posture matters

Whether you are standing, sitting, or walking; it is very important to maintain the right posture. Wrong postures may not cause immediate problems but their long-term effects may be devastating.

A visit to the physiotherapy section of any hospital and a large percentage of the patients you see are those with complications derived from their posture - like the case of my sister.

Complications that have been recorded from poor postures include degeneration of joints, spinal dysfunction, respiratory problems, back pains, neck pains, displacement of nerves or blood vessels like my sister's case, etc.

People whose daily bread borders around sitting or standing for long have the tendency to assume bad postures. This is a call to those of us that create writing content, programmers, etc.