S Curve Posture:
Pain, Weak Brain
​& Lack of Glute Gain​

S curve posture is forward hips, sunken chest, and forward head that can cause:

• Pain anywhere: back, hips, neck, shoulders, etc.
• Deep stress in the nervous system
• Restricted circulation & breathing to deliver nutrients and detoxify the brain and body.  
• Stiff, weak movement, underdeveloped muscles

​Muscles position bones that, when misaligned, can pinch the nervous system to cause pain, like in your back.
 
Misalignment of spinal and cranial bones also restricts the flow of cerebral spinal fluid from the hips to head so that you get less oxygen and nutrients to your brain and more toxins accumulating.
 
A toxic and nutrient deficient brain means less energy to think while being irritated by toxins making it harder to relax, sleep and heal.
 
Health depends on alignment through movement as one of the pillars of rejuvenation and high performance.

A new paradigm for pain explains chronic pain in terms of the whole system. 

The old paradigm treats the symptom of pain directly where it hurts often through dependence on body therapists.  
 
The new paradigm aligns the whole body to include the root causes that can be distance from the symptom through Do It Yourself changes to lifestyle movements and the environment of shoes and chairs.  
 
The Whole S Curve Posture explains the Pain.  
 
Pain is often caused by the whole system and root causes are distant from the most noticeable symptoms like pain in the back. The entire unhealthy S curve posture from head to feet can produces that weakest link where pain is felt. 

S curve posture is forward hips, sunken chest, and forward head.
This is at epidemic levels as the most common pattern of misalignment, although there are others.
The S curve has 3 possible root causes that originate at top, bottom, and middle.
 
Systems can be understood by unraveling ever wider circles of causation centered around the pain point.  

• Pain point on nerves pinched by two vertebrae, like between L5 and S1 in the lower back.  
• Vertebrae pulled out of place by from tight imbalanced muscles.
• The entire region is unbalanced from wrong hip angle, forward hips….
• From key tight muscle the psoas, the core of the abdominal core,
• Sitting in chairs tightens and shortens psoas muscle creating forward hip posture (that explains causation from the middle of the S curve.
• Shoes and foot angles also push hips forward in bottom-up causation.
• Muscles on the back side, posterior chain become week: glutes, adductors, hamstrings, calves.

​From the top of the S curve in the head it gets more complex and subtle:

• Head is forward to keep airway open
• Airway too narrow because the upper dental palate, maxilla is underdeveloped (maybe snoring or apnea)
• Maxilla  underdeveloped due to lack of hard sucking in breast feeding that presses the tongue up on the palate to expand it and drive development of all cranial bones.
• Bottle feeding babies does not encourage hard sucking, but tongue trusting forward.  
• Resting tongue posture is low, not up on the roof of mouth to retain expansion of the palate and cranial bones.  
• Cranial bones lack enough degree of separation at the sutures or cracks between the separate bones of the cranium, restricting circulation of cerebral spinal fluid, lymph, and blood.

Alignment of the teeth, bite and cranium can help with anything from digestion to increased athletic performance in anything from power lifting to increases to professional level football (soccer), in personal stories I have heard.  The nervous system is firing stronger to command muscle performance.
 
Below the neck alignment is determined more by muscles balance front and back, as the case with the posterior chain.
 
When balanced, muscles on one side don’t have to strain to hold up the body due to the collapse on the other side, resulting in chronically tight and even painful muscles and associated connective tissue and vertebrae and sacral bone displacement under the strain.
 
When the spine is strait and cranium expanded there is better circulation of cerebral spinal fluid, CFS.
The lymph and blood that feed the CFS also circulate better with proper movement that loosen and strengthen muscles for alignment.
 
If all these points were illustrated on a diagram of the whole system arrows would be pointing in every direction to convey complex causation without a central staring point—it’s non-linear feedback loops of vicious or virtuous circles.
 
All this starts to sink-in when you contrast it with what NOT to do.
People who don’t understand systems thinking do funny things.
 
Lumbar Support Cushions
 
This is an example of intervening where the symptom shows up that is distant from causes.
 
Lumber support cushions attempt to create a curve of the lower back by pressing an object straight into the curve. What this does is make people lean back over the cushion, pushing their chest back and head forward to perpetuate the S curve.
 
Spinal alignment of the back is determined by hip angle, so it is more helpful to use a wedge cushion, for example to sit up straight on the edge of the chair, rather than lean back into the chair and collapse.
 
When the hips are aligned, the vertebrae stack straight up naturally without as much effort from muscles on one side straining to maintain the upright position.
 
Car seats in which you must lean back have a different solution, but I can’t get into that here.  
 
Physical Therapy Strengthening Compensating Muscles
 
Physical therapy can be an improvement over chiropractic that merely pokes bones into place because PT takes into account that muscle positions bones. But PTs don’t always deal with the system as a whole.
 
With pain in the shoulder area associated with working at desks and forward head posture, PTs will often attempt to strength the shoulder muscles. But these muscles are already overworked due to the stain so that can backfire. They miss changing the angle of the spine that is determined from the hip angle below.
 
They also have no clue that forward head posture may be due to a narrow palate and airway, so the body will not benefit by straightening up. Most body workers have no understanding of dental and cranial causes of misalignment and actively resist hearing about it: it can’t be true.
 
New Paradigm: Lifestyle and Environment   
 
Everyday movement should align posture and distortions from sitting should be minimized.
Correct walking and shoes help hips to stack the spine from the bottom up.
This will result in a smoother, powerful, sexier walk with better development of the glute muscles.
Aligned movement increases circulation to the brain.
Cranial problems can benefit from some do it yourself things but often require orthodontics for a deeper solution,
 
Solutions are complex, individualized, and cannot be demonstrated by writing in social media comments if you are reading this there.
I cannot explain further or give personal advice in comments.  I don't have videos. 
Please don't think Functional Patterns covers all of this.
You can read more of my writing on these pages to understand more deeply.
 

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