[ This post is going to be informal, and more of a instagram type post. It will explain the importance of moving your hips for your emotional health, in an non scientific way and more of a personal/social view points with some medical knowledge. Please do not take this as medical advice ! ]
Recently, I've heard a lot about the importance of moving your hips in order to release stress. Sounds weird right ? What do our hips have to do with our emotions ?
We do know poor mental health and poor physical health can go hand in hand. One impacts the other in some way. The link between our hips and emotional health is commonly spoken about in yoga. This is because yoga is not only a form of exercise but is equally about our mental, emotionally and spiritual wellbeing
Let’s start with the anatomy of our hips
The hips are both strong and flexible, in order to bear our weight and allow us to move around freely. It allows us to move our legs back and forth, side to side and moving the toes around. The hip joint includes hip bones; femur and pelvic bones, articulate cartilage, muscles, ligaments and tendons and synovial membrane and fluid to lubricate the joint.
Our hips are likely to become ‘tight’ due to sitting for long hours and not getting enough movement, although the hip muscles are usually tight to help support our movements without causing pain or any problems.
From an emotional stand point, our hips become tight as they store negatives emotions and trauma. When we are stressed, angry, upset, traumatised, anxious, stressed, we tend to clench/tighten our muscles. Some notice they’re doing this and some don’t and it is easier to notice yourself tightening/clenching our jaw, fists Or shoulders. However, tightening/clenching our hips is probably something you wouldn’t notice you’re doing.
This is why it is necessary to work on opening and moving our hips. For someone who is Hypermobile, such as myself, this can be difficult as we can injure ourselves easily. In my case, i have to be particularly careful as one wrong move, even slightly, can end up temporarily paralysing my leg or i can rip a tendon/muscle or even end up with a stuck back (Non of which are fun to deal with!)
Exercises such as yoga is very effective for opening our hips and releasing negative emotions. I have included photos below of poses you could try. For me personally these can be a little difficult for many reasons and so i prefer doing slow small circular motions, moving them side to side etc. This is easier when done to songs and especially if you used to dance (as i did).
Personally, it does make me feel a lot better moving my hips. It feels freeing and less stressed. Of course this is something that would need to be done regularly for it to be effective. In the mornings before getting out of bed, i do some light stretches (as is recommended for PoTS patients and for my hyper-mobility) and do hip release motions (what i call it) at random times of the day.
Please do be careful and take it slow. If you have any health conditions such as HEDS please consult your doctor !
