Gabrielle (The Hot Yoga Doctor)

Thank you so much Trace

I am so grateful for your ‘voice of experience’ in this condition. Too often students are encouraged to do this yoga by pushing through or going to the pain. There is always a way to create growth and opening without pain.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hello sallyjo7

Welcome to the forum! I was wondering if you had discovered a couple of other posts/threads on piriformis syndrome. There are a couple of tips that will help you in there. If you haven’t then just type in ‘piriformis’ into the search box top right.

And since you are already a registered member (many thanks :cheese:) then you have access to a free at home stretch guide. Go to the home page and then click through from the bottom left where it says Learn Free!

To encapsulate some of the ideas: do some more hot yoga, try some yin yoga, try incorporating the long duration stretches in the ‘at home stretch guide’ and avoid sports that may have brought it on til you are fixed. There is a great tip for Standing Sep Leg Stretch too.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi blue

It is hard to know what to do when the dialog is limited to certain body types. In this case it doesn’t help people who have arms too short to reach the ground beside and behind them.

So here is what to do.

1) Come down to the floor with your hands in front of you.
2) Bend your leg and bring your hips down toward your heel.
3) Your strength on the day will determine if you can keep some space between your hips and heels (just notice what you notice)
4) When you are stable here, look forward somewhere in front of you and de-focus (a couple of feet)
5) Your spine is rounded when you are here supporting yourself with your hands in front.
6) Now, slowly start to straighten your spine and as you do, allow your hands to come up off up off the floor symmetrically at the same rate as you straighten your spine.
7) Keep the eyes from settling on any particular thing so that as you lift the only thing you are doing is straightening; because focusing tends to destabilize you. On the contrary, yogis with long arms can focus on one point because their spine is already in final position and they only have to bring the hands up off the floor.
8) As you straighten up, your hands approach each other.

Please let me know how you go

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hello artwednesday

Hanging your mat to air is really important. I think you could find something to spray on it to help kill the bugs…

I am pretty sure you are going to hear some great home remedies from the community here :cheese:

This is what we do at our studio: we have a spray bottle with drops of eucalyptus oil and tea tree oil in water and spray and then wipe down the mats after each class. And when we get the chance we place the mats in the sun for several hours. Basically a combination of sun, air and natural disinfectant. Works a treat.

The less often you do your mat maintenance routine the bigger the guns are that you have to employ to get the smell and offending material out!

I remember I have popped my mat in the washing machine. But that was before we started with the method I described above. I have never used bleach on my mat and am not sure as to what it would do to your mat, but I guess it would work well diluted. Be aware that your face may be down near your mat so that could determine what agent you will use (both for smell and safety).

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi cjl62281

Now there are a lot of things going on here! You seem to feel very concerned. So let me see if I have understood you correctly. Please fill me in on other details if they come to you.

Your neck is painful so the pain is seizing your neck up and making it difficult to turn and move. Any kind of bad spasm or tightness like this, there is always a danger that you will anticipate the pain and this makes the problem worse. So my guess is that your doc has given you muscles relaxants to help you get some ease and comfort around your neck so that you can operate in a normal way without constant pain.

Although you don’t like to skip classes you are probably doing the right thing in the short term. You are the only one who can say when you have reached a point where going to class feel safe enough for you. Having said that, there are things that you can do…

The very first hot yoga pose is often pranayama breathing and I would really encourage you to modify this. You can Skype me for a chat. The important thing with sore necks is to really use your active stretches to safely and gently open up the neck. So in pranayama for example you should be pushing the hands against the jaw and vice versa in both directions using nice slow movements. In backbends, if you can’t let your head go back completely without holding it up then you need some help (ask me: again skype is good).

For safety aspects of your muscle relaxant, best bet is to research it: talk to a pharmacist, google it, or talk to your doctor. Of course drug information is lengthy and includes everything (which can make them scary) – even when a reaction is extremely rare or unlikely. So just be aware that almost every problem under the sun can be mentioned in these documents. The good news is of course is that once you are over the acute problem you can resume your normal yoga ‘habit’. The trick is in working out when it is right for you to return.

I have had plenty of students with neck injuries. One of my first students came to me with a very bad problem that she was going to have an operation to fix. Less than 10 classes later, her persistent problem had vanished and to this day has never had that op. I helped her modify her pranayama and supported her in particular poses.

Your turn :cheese:

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi cjl62281 (my what a catchy name! 😉 ) and Rebecca

It can be so frustrating to be foiled by your own sweat. :cheese:

Ideally you don’t want to use a towel to wipe sweat for any other reason than if it stings your eyes. But of course if your grip is REALLY*** compromised then sure, either wipe it off once, or place a single layer of towel over your legs so that you can grip your legs or hands or whatever you can manage.

***Some students do use a towel when they don’t need to, and then they can’t seem to drop the habit easily. Case in point it is rare to really need a towel for ANY standing pose. If you are someone who routinely uses a towel for anything other than lying or standing on, then drop it and see how you go. Get used to practicing without it and before long your practice will quickly strengthen. If you have to use it then go ahead – be very discriminating.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hello blue

We both know you have to take responsibility for you, and if I can be so bold, this is NOT entirely your ‘fault’ if I can use such a term.

Setting the scene and giving newcomers some basic ground rules about the how tos and the what to dos is the job of their teacher.

Things that are for most part ‘controllable’ are the preferences to do with:
* movement
* leaving the room
* drinking water
* the direction of their visual attention

Notice that I said preferences. You can tell anybody anything you want, but in the end if it is a demand or unreasonable or not explained with enough logic or detail to invite them into your model of the world, then they will feel controlled and probably look to buck the system or resist your will.

So, I agree, it is very annoying when new students leave the room. The fact that they do one after the other is testimony that they have not been asked in the right way or given the reason why they should not leave the room. As an example our new students have a 5-10 min orientation before their first class so all the logistical and behavioral stuff including a couple of key elements to the class are covered. Once we started to do this, compliance to the ‘rules’ in class and new student comfort and return rate drastically improved.

If there is enough call for it from teachers who want to know our formula, then please respond in this forum, or write to me and I can put something together.

Blue, remember when you were a newbie? Probably feels like a distant memory! I remember when I first started. I was one that made occasional noises (not loud grunts though 😉 ). I don’t do that anymore. I wonder what it was that you did? Perhaps your focus was not as good as it is now. Maybe you looked around or reached for your water bottle too often. Often newcomers make noises which show how much mental noise is going on for them. And as yet they are unable to manage their emotional state through a quiet body. Their growing levels self-acceptance are reflected in the way they castigate themselves (often audibly) or they make all sorts of movements or stances that really result in distracting themselves from what they will eventually find: focus in the mirror, on themselves and their practice.

Stuff like that I am sure every regular student recognizes and has some patience for. It is when the acceptable stuff is in addition to the really annoying stuff where it even has the potential to upset your own class. As you have probably heard: ‘don’t let anybody steal your peace’.

Tips you ask?
When you are experiencing this you can bring your attention right back to your breath (classic direction! :cheese:) and if you can’t do that, then try for some empathy recognizing your own previous path reflected in the first-timer. Self-empathy works too: try to recognize what it is you yourself are feeling, acknowledge it (for example:
I acknowledge that I am feeling upset that my needs for flow and focus are not being met) and observe it and then let it go!

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Blue

I am not entirely sure of what you are asking so please let me know if I don’t answer your question…

Foot pain is definitely going to have the capacity to affect your balance. As far as flip flops go, my recommendation is to never wear them and that is NOT about pain. It has to do with the mechanism to keep the thing on your foot. The toes have to clench as you walk, and in order for the ‘shoe’ to stay on your foot you will probably notice that your big and second toe have to squeeze together. I have noticed that many people who routinely wear flip flops have deformed feet. The big toe is stronger and is much more involved in your balance. It tends to move toward the second toe to squeeze the little flip flop stalk. If you have feet that tend towards having bunions then flip flops seem to worsen the problem. This is my anecdotal observation and I have not done any clinical trials :cheese:. I have however spoken to podiatrists, physiotherapists, and chiropractor students of mine about this…

So next time you wear flip flops take a look down to see what you have to do when you are standing still and walking with them on. Can your feet relax? Or are they mostly ‘working’ to keep those things on?

Would love to hear your thoughts, your opinions, your counter argument 😉

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Samantha

Alignment wins hands down in my book! Go for alignment every time. And here I mean when it concerns the body overall. The shoulders are where you should put your attention – drop them down and back and work on minimizing stresses and tensions in the head, neck and shoulders. Your poses should become charged with more ease as a result and you will find better flow on effects throughout your body.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

PS Half moon won’t be the only pose where you have to ‘sacrifice’ palms together. There is a similar question from Stefan who has a bigger length difference. I gave him some ideas here: One arm 2 inches shorter than the other. There may be some clues for you there. Would love to hear how you go.

Hi there stixaz

Welcome to the forum.

Certain poses can elicit particular responses. For me, if I am feeling particularly stressed, or if I have had a break from yoga for a little while, I get a headache at the end of or coming out of Camel. It could be something like that for you. And yes, it could be that you are coming out too quickly. When you come out of this pose please ensure you let your head ‘hang’ behind you to avoid tensing and stressing the ‘wrong’ muscles (that could cause some damage).

If you are a newbie to this series then perhaps your body is still in its beginning clear-out stages. :cheese: In all likelihood, your headache reaction should disappear quite quickly.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi Connie

Specifically for Rabbit: I need to ask you a couple of questions regarding your technique.

1 Can you describe your grip to me? As far as you know are you gripping correctly with your palms facing forward thumbs on the outside?
2 You can get your head to the floor, so please tell me what part of your head touches the floor exactly?
3 Please also tell me where your chin is: do you manage to keep it on your chest the whole time or because of the difficulties does it move away when your head gets to the ground?
4 What can you tell me about your arms?
5 How do your feet feel in this pose, tense or relaxed or somewhere in between?

Looking forward to your reply

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hello Andrea

I hear what you are saying. 😉 Surely with a name like Wind Removing pose you should feel more in the abdomen. But believe me the colon is being massaged. A similar technique is used to help babies by maneuvering each leg to the chest and then both legs in. In this pose, you are bringing each leg up and out just enough as if you were aiming for your underarm. Any closer in to the midline and you collide with your ribs (not comfy!) and any further out and you create a little too much hip twist (and at the same time negate the compressive effects).

One technique that will really help you: consciously ‘release’ your hip. In other words don’t use the muscles you don’t need. You should feel a lot less resistance when you do… and more compression and more hip opening too.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Hi SillyRabbit :cheese:

I must say it does feel rather silly calling someone I ‘hardly’ know, silly.

Knowing that you can do the pose well is great! And I am pretty sure that regular human beings like us 😉 go through a similar process when we embark on our hot yoga journeys. Do you remember when you first started when the teacher would mention your name, it would be so off-putting that you would fall out of the pose?

It is a dance of keeping the ego in check, that is for sure.

As far as Rabbit pose is concerned, I am glad you found your key. It is certainly great for you to find the distinction that makes it work for you. As an experienced teacher I can tell you that this is THE pose that most people have difficulty cracking. I have taught thousands of students, and am completely dumbfounded how students who have practiced even years in other studios can have been doing it wrong for all that time. Luckily, diagnosis from a competent teacher can transform it within a minute. For you the grip was ‘it’. For others with perhaps a different body geometry, or abilities it could be something completely different.

Keep on inspiring other yogis with your mathematical genius 😆

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂