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How will scoliosis affect my tennis? - Talk Tennis
Hey everyone. I've had scoliosis for quite a while, since I was like, 11.
I'm 16 now. When I first noticed that I had it, there was no indication that the scoliosis would affect my health, just my appearance (I have a curved back and a hunchback that I can actively correct when I'm conscious of it), so I ignored it.
Nowadays my scoliosis has progressed a little bit, and I still suffer no negative symptoms of the scoliosis (besides the cosmetic issues);
Until recently that is.
It used to all just be bad posture, but starting from about two weeks ago, I've been having unusual muscle aches, particularly in my shoulders/back.
I first noticed them when for tennis conditioning we were to do pushups, and I suddenly felt this sharp pain around my upper back;
The muscles around the shoulder blades.
I immediately stopped, except my stupid coach asked me why I stopped and made me keep going...
And I'm not one who wants to get on her bad side.
Anyway I continued by shifting my weight into my left side of my body, and that was the end of the pain.
Except shortly after practice was over and I went home (and finally relaxed my muscles), my back was sore in a way that I've never felt before.
Unlike normal sore muscles, it felt like everything was numb, and it was difficult to move my arms (though there was no pain/discomfort), and there were occasional spasms (I almost thought my back had a pulse of its own...) Also, my shoulder level was no longer perfectly horizontal;
It was tilted toward the right, as though my neck/shoulders were having trouble holding my right arm up.
And it's not just pushups that create the problems.
Quite a while ago, I learned how to do the twist serve (thanks to a certain handful of people on the forum, you're all awesome).
I got the aches that came with contorting your back for the first time to perform the motion, and that went away.
For a long period of time, twist serves NEVER gave me any sort of physical problem, until around the same time as my pushup problem.
Suddenly, every time I used the twist serve, I became sore in the way that you get sore performing the serve for the first time, and there is no reason that this should happen.
I play tennis nearly every day, and I use a wide variety of motions in my tennis;
I don't see why suddenly my muscles should behave like its their first time working.
The stress runs along the length of my spine, which is why I feel that I should blame scoliosis;
Only the muscles near my spine are uncomfortable.
I would probably have never thought about the possibility that scoliosis might finally be hurting me, until one of my teammates looked at me doing the pushups and suddenly said, "Whoa, whats with those curves...?
Hey, do you have scoliosis?".
And I suddenly panicked...
If anyone has any helpful information they can share with me, experiences, advice, anything, please share.
I'm a little nervous, and I want to know what I'm losing due to the scoliosis;
Or, if anyone can explain a possibility that it may not be the scoliosis, that would be even more relieving.
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The issue is not how scoliosis will affect your tennis but rather how tennis will affect your scoliosis.
Tennis entails constant vertical trauma and twisting motions -- this may not be an ideal activity with scoliosis.
You might be better off getting into swimming.
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The first thing you should do is see a medical professional who specializes in this area.
Working with you and your family, the professional can work out a plan so you can still pursue the actitivies you want.
You really don't want to treat any kind of back problem lightly.
Pilates can be very helpful but you want a qualified instructor, someone taught by Romana, not someone at a gym.
Some of the best instructors in the world are in the LA area.
Here's a website that is screened with qualified instructors listed only:
http://www.classicalpilates.net/stud...ate=California
If you contact an instructor, they will screen you and can also work with your doctor or physical therapist.
Many pilates instructors are scoliosis sufferers which is how they got into it in the first place.
I'm not an expert, but I don't think you want anything to do with a twist serve.
But again, I cannot emphasize enough that you need to work with medical professionals and be sure that you explain to them that you are an aspring junior so they know what kind of tennis you are playing.
Good luck with it.
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Thanks Diablo, Julieta, for your input.
I've heard around that tennis may make my scoliosis worse, except it's really the only sport that I'd ever want to play.
If people ask me to go play tennis with it, I'd 100% say yes..
Swimming? I wouldn't be too particularly interested...
I do swim somewhat often, especially during the summer...
I probably won't even get near a pool for 3 more months, honestly.
Too cold for me, and I don't see how our swim team can get up every morning and go to practice at 5 am.
I'd freeze.
I've seen a chiropractor, about three months ago.
He gave no input on whether or not I should/shouldn't continue tennis.
He just gave me a therapy program for about a month, except my mom suddenly changed her mind and told me that we wouldn't be going anymore...
He did this electrotherapy thingy where he put contacts on my back and forced muscle contractions;
Then he used this weird thingy and ran it all over my back (Used ultrasound) and told me that it would break down scar tissue which would relieve my stiff muscles.
I have NO idea if this worked.
As for pilates, I just did a google search on it, and looked up a few sites about it.
It seems interesting (the concept of working on balance seems excellent), but I'm afraid that I might have to wait until I begin college before I can actually get steady free time to work on it without having to break off randomly.
Thanks for you advice, again!
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If you wanna look to james blake..
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Quote: : Baggins if you wanna look to james blake..
I didn't know Blake had scoliosis.
Thanks for telling me about that, I kinda feel relieved now that a tennis player actually had scoliosis and went pro.
Not saying I'll ever go anywhere near that but still.
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I have 5 degree scoliosis(doctor said its so mild its nothing), but i know what u feel becuase i get muscle aches on lower backs and shoulder.
I cycle and when im in a crouched position my back kills me, but my chiropractor helped me with it alot.
I have about 10 sessions.
He cracked my spine like crazy.
But it felt good after.
the only thing i can tell u to do is stretch!
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You should definately work with medical professionals..
Ideally, it would be nice to get 2~3 different inputs on how you should go about managing your condition.
If you are interested in yoga or pilates, I agree with the person who said that you should work with a certified trainer.
Yoga is a great exercise, but not something you want to do on your own.
And, if you are going to start treatment, do it soon while your bones and muscles are still malleable and flexible.
Once you are in college, you will actually have less consistent free time to work on anything.
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Quote: : i have 5 degree scoliosis(doctor said its so mild its nothing), but i know what u feel becuase i get muscle aches on lower backs and shoulder.
I cycle and when im in a crouched position my back kills me, but my chiropractor helped me with it alot.
I have about 10 sessions.
He cracked my spine like crazy.
But it felt good after.
the only thing i can tell u to do is stretch!
I believe my doctor told me that I had around 10 degrees, but that's the issue.
He said "round". I think I heard him talk about it with me when I wasn't really paying attention, and I think I heard 12 pop up often, so I think I have 12 degree scoliosis.
And yeah, my chiropractor did so many weird things, all my bones in my spine would crack in a row and I would freak out!
And then realize it felt good...
And I do stretch, stretching helps a lot.
Except often my stretch is just getting on the courts and hitting lightly for about 5 minutes..
Before getting serious.
I guess I should actually stretch from now on, huh...
Quote: : You should definately work with medical professionals..
Ideally, it would be nice to get 2~3 different inputs on how you should go about managing your condition.
If you are interested in yoga or pilates, I agree with the person who said that you should work with a certified trainer.
Yoga is a great exercise, but not something you want to do on your own.
And, if you are going to start treatment, do it soon while your bones and muscles are still malleable and flexible.
Once you are in college, you will actually have less consistent free time to work on anything.
I guess this prompts me to ask a question based on time...
About how often are you supposed to work on yoga/pilates every week?
Once a week, twice, thrice?
Currently my schedule this year is really annoying.
My teachers can spontaneously give us a load of homework, or sometimes go two weeks without any..
At the same time.
And then there's tennis practice which can randomly end around 4 or 5, especially when season is coming up in two weeks, then my schedule will REALLY be random.
It would help to know the frequency that you need to work on yoga/pilates, so I can get an idea of when/how I can stick it in my schedule...
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I don't know how often you need to do yoga / pilates.
I'd imagine at least twice per week?
With yoga, you want to learn the proper posture and way of doing things instead of reading a book and doing it on your own.
If you can go to one session per week and learn some exercises, then you can do those ones alone at home.
In any kind of treatment, I think consistency is the key...
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Quote: : I don't know how often you need to do yoga / pilates.
I'd imagine at least twice per week?
With yoga, you want to learn the proper posture and way of doing things instead of reading a book and doing it on your own.
If you can go to one session per week and learn some exercises, then you can do those ones alone at home.
In any kind of treatment, I think consistency is the key...
That's why. Once season starts, I will have no consistency in my schedule...
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Although i don't have scoliosis, pilates/yoga did wonders for my posture.
I can swear by it.
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A scoliosis can dramatically affect your play and life, due to the fact that the joints in your spine are not moving in the proper planes.
It will alter everything you do from the windup to the uncoiling motion as well as flexing to get to low balls.
It was interesting that a study was done in England that showed a high percentage of their juniors w/ 2 handed backhands had some degree of scoliosis, which led to problems later.
I obviously don't know the severity of your case(Degree of curve(s), complicating factors), you will have to be evaluated by a licensed Dr.
I would highly recommend trying to find a chiropractor who has been trained in the Woggon (CLEAR Institute) Scoliosis Correction method.
The CLEAR Institute's method is getting fantastic results usually faster than traditional care.
It may take some research to find a certified Dr.
In your area, but it would be well worth it...
For more information you can take a look at this website, and you can learn more about what options are and how it can affect your life...
NOT just your tennis.
This website can help you find a Dr.
Trained in the CLEAR method.
http://www.clear-institute.org/
Hope this helps!
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Quote: : A scoliosis can dramatically affect your play and life, due to the fact that the joints in your spine are not moving in the proper planes.
It will alter everything you do from the windup to the uncoiling motion as well as flexing to get to low balls.
It was interesting that a study was done in England that showed a high percentage of their juniors w/ 2 handed backhands had some degree of scoliosis, which led to problems later.
I obviously don't know the severity of your case(Degree of curve(s), complicating factors), you will have to be evaluated by a licensed Dr.
I would highly recommend trying to find a chiropractor who has been trained in the Woggon (CLEAR Institute) Scoliosis Correction method.
The CLEAR Institute's method is getting fantastic results usually faster than traditional care.
It may take some research to find a certified Dr.
In your area, but it would be well worth it...
For more information you can take a look at this website, and you can learn more about what options are and how it can affect your life...
NOT just your tennis.
This website can help you find a Dr.
Trained in the CLEAR method.
http://www.clear-institute.org/
Hope this helps!
Wow. Thanks for all that information!!!
I've felt that my strokes were always funky, but never to the severity that I'd want to blame scoliosis.
As for the severity, I stated above, something around 10-12 degrees (this was checked 3 months ago).
And, interestingly enough like you said, I use a 2H backhand.
Particularly I like to do jumping backhands...
Now that I think about it, that's a lot of torque involved, twisting your body around in midair...
I see that things are starting to line up..
As for the that scoliosis correction method, I'm going to keep looking at it right now...
Thanks for your help
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