Healing an injury the wholistic way

Injury management- for a process that is completely natural, recovering from an injury can sometimes seem incredibly complicated! By making sure that you  have everything that you will need to heal is the best, fastest way to get on the road to recovery. Firstly, remember that your body has evolved to heal all by itself, so rather than thinking you need to ‘do something’ to make your healing begin, remember that to work effectively it is important to make sure there are no handbrakes on your personal recovery. I love the analogy of the ‘House of Health’; if the roof is your health, then you need a solid foundation, and enough pillars to hold it up.

The foundation for healing an injury is a solid foundation; if your posture, or structure isn’t sound, then slowly but surely ‘stress cracks’ can appear, not immediately, but over time. This makes you more vulnerable to injury, but actually interferes with healing as well because it can be causing stress or damage to the injured part. If you are great at doing your exercises, eat well and rest enough, but still don’t seem to be shifting that injury then this one is for you. It is important to manage your health from the ‘inside out’. A posture and movement assessment should be your first port of call when managing your physical prowess.

You then secondarily need enough ‘pillars’ – these are things that are a requirement for health (not a treatment) but come from the ‘outside in’. I describe them broadly as hydration/nutrition, movement and exercise, rest, sleep, social health, and spiritual health. Few people manage all pillars well at all times, but you need to have enough of them in order to hold up your ‘roof’.

Finally remember one of the most important principles of healing; respect the time involved in the process. Healing is a process, and there are expected healing times for every injury. Make sure that your expectations are not a shorter healing time than physically possible 🙂 Your House of Health must be managed for not only your recovery time, but also to promote and encourage your health over time.