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About Maggie Downie

Thank you for giving your time to stop and read my blog. I hope it encourages you to keep moving. Move and the body will be happier. And when you're moving you can hike, run, swim in Jell-O, race over non-Newtonian fluids, travel the world or build igloos--if that's your thing. If not, you can watch me do it. This is just a spot to try and feel good about life.
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You Are Not Complaining

With my private clients, my first question to them is almost always, “How are you feeling,” or “How is your body?” As you can imagine the answer can vary greatly from person to person and day to day. But often when someone has pain somewhere and they tell me about it multiple weeks in a row, they start to apologize.

Even in my group classes when someone informs me of something going on in their body, if they are still bringing it up a few weeks later, they will often apologize. I’ve done this myself when I take classes. No one wants to be seen as a whiner. And none of us wants our body to hurt.

But I can’t preface enough, you are not whining. You are not complaining. I need and want to know what is going in your body. It helps me help you move better. The more feedback the better.

I’m not sure where this apology comes from—a desire to please (thinking any pain or injury makes us less pleasing), a frustration in the discomfort itself that we’d just like to will away, the fact that in our society we […]

You Are Not Complaining2022-08-26T12:14:54-04:00

Wrist Exercises

Who wants to do wrist exercises when we could be working our abs, butt, and thighs, right? Unless they hurt our wrists are not the first body part we think to workout. And when I was younger, you’d have a hard time convincing me I should waste any workout time on my wrists. Ah, youth!

But it’s like any part of the body. Everything is integrated and we need strong and flexible wrists or our wrists will impede other exercises (like plank, pushups, and even potentially weight lifting). Type a lot? Don’t want carpel tunnel? You want to consider your wrists.

If you have wrist pain, these series of exercises are really helpful. The first video takes you through a series of moves that both strengthens and stretches the muscles. The second video is a series of deep stretches. If you choose to do either of the videos, listen to your body. Start small. Ease in. These are small muscles, and you can progress over time. Both videos are beneficial, but if you only have time for one, do the first.

If you don’t have wrist pain, I know it will be harder to convince you to make time for your […]

Wrist Exercises2022-08-15T10:59:38-04:00

National Disability Independence Day

July 26th commemorates the day the American Disabilities Act was signed. It reminds us of actions put in place to help create independence for people with disabilities. According to the CDC 1 in 4 US adults has a disability while 1 in 7 has a physical disability that impairs mobility.

Those are the statistics, but people are more that data. We are all in need of regular movement for optical health and independence. The general guidelines for exercise (30-minutes of moderate movement a day) is the same for everyone. But exercise can be much more daunting when you live with a physical disability.

What are the options when movement can pose additional challenges?

Water

Get in a pool or a body of water. Water is a great place for many different types of disabilities or pain. My father-in-law had a type of muscular dystrophy (Charcot-Marie-Tooth) and he was a different person in the pool. Not only can the water enable the body to feel great, but it also creates resistance so we can get good strength work and even cardiovascular work.

Walk

I’m not sure we all think of waking as counting as exercise. Often people think if they aren’t working at […]

National Disability Independence Day2022-08-09T10:23:57-04:00

Forest Bathing

Last week some of the Personal Euphoria instructors went forest bathing. I didn’t know what to expect. Really, it has a terrible name. For me it brings thoughts of nudity, a bit of hokeyness, or potential images of cleaning the forest with sudsy bathwater. I know it’s none of those things, but the name does the practice no real service. My basic understanding was that it was meditating in the forest. Knowing that trees make humans feel better, I thought this might be a good excursion. It was.

We met at Pleasant Valley Preserve in Lyme, CT (a location I can’t recommend enough if you haven’t been there). This is a quiet treasure near the southern border of our state. We walked slowly through these beautiful woods, took deep breaths, did gentle stretches, and sat or wandered in specific areas—all guided by Regan Stacey. She invited us to hone into all our senses and encouraged us to explore. It was always an invitation to do something, not an order.

Forest bathing is not hiking. I’m one of those hikers that likes to move. I like to get to the top, to the view. […]

Forest Bathing2022-07-30T22:21:29-04:00

Squats and Lunges safe for the knees!

A number of people are afraid to do lunges and squats because they think the moves are bad for their knees. If you have knee issues, you may need to modify, take precautions, or starts slow and small, but you don’t want to cut lunges and squats out of your exercise routine. We need to keep those muscles strong because we squat and lunge in many practical ways throughout the day.

You squat to get off the toilet, up from a chair, in and out of the car, to get down and up off the floor. And if you want to lift something heavy using your legs and not your back, you need to be able to do a deep squat (otherwise your back is still very involved).

So let’s talk about form so that we can do these moves safely:

Basic Squat:

  • Legs hip distance apart. That might be closer than you think. It’s where your femurs (bones in your thighs) come into your pelvis, not where you’d put your hands on your hips.
  • All ten toes pointing forward.
  • Then crease at your hips, stick the butt out and let your torso hinge forward holding a neutral spine—trying not to […]
Squats and Lunges safe for the knees!2022-07-09T15:50:05-04:00
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