Preventative Yoga

“Haven’t Got Time for the Pain” has become our life’s mantra

Jo Ann has recovered from her injuries through continuous motion, systematic yoga practice, and meditative healing.

She understands your pain, firsthand!

However, when her surgeon suggested replacement knee surgery, Jo Ann decided to increase her physical activity and yoga. Nearly a year afterward, her orthopedic surgeon gave her a clean bill of “knee health”, stating that she should continue what she has been doing.

Despite popular practice today, consider that surgery may not be the solution to your pain issues or immobility problems. Yoga may be the most palliative remedy that not only relieves you from pain but also strengthens your tendons and muscles. Despite advancements in medicine, your own body parts will offer you the best mobility.

“Surgery is the first step in reclaiming your mobility when medications, therapies, and treatments don’t work. By 2030, total knee replacement surgeries are projected to grow 673% to 3.5 million procedure per year”

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ORTHOPEDIC SURGEONS

Jo Ann’s weekly classes and workshops can offer the preventative exercise you are seeking, and you should join a class once or twice a week if you can. However, the one-on-one preventative yoga session will focus on your specific need, and Jo Ann will be able to dedicate undivided attention just on you.

Patients of all ages have benefited from her personalized therapy. Jo Ann’s approach has been successful with:

Pain Release

• General Back Pain – Today’s sedentary lifestyle has inflicted many painful conditions that can be reversed with yoga. Jo Ann’s classes, workshops, and personalized instruction have alleviated pain for many and helped integrate a healthier lifestyle that includes daily yoga practice.
• Scoliosis – Many ailments can lead to the sideways curvature of the spine. Even in its mild form scoliosis can cause pain or can impact the functionality of neighboring organs. Jo Ann’s yoga therapy has been the most effective way to restore symmetrical alignment and support effortless posture.

Increased wellbeing

• Focus – Information overload is having a distracting impact on our lives. During Jo Ann’s yoga practice we are reminded to focus on our breaths and intentional posture that helps us connect within. Without these reminders, our minds will unconsciously wander dispersing our energy.
• Allergies – Many are plagued by seasonal allergies and the number of sufferers will continue to increase, due to factors such as environmental pollution, poor diet, and increased stress, which make our immune, nervous, and respiratory systems hypersensitive. When the seasons change and pollen counts increase Jo Ann introduces postures that release stress on the respiratory system and focus on pranayama (the conscious awareness of breath exercises).
• Temporomandibular joint (TMJ) – Pain associated with a tight jaw is more common than we acknowledge. Instead of relaxing we tend to pop a painkiller or wear a mouth guard to prevent from grinding our teeth. Jo Ann is conscious of these complaints and reminds us throughout the class to relax our tongue and inner ears and to soften the skin at the corners of your mouth. With focused intention, we increase our sensory awareness.
• Insomnia – Quality sleep is crucial and directly impacts our quality of life. While there is evidence that over 40% of Americans do not get enough rest, the bedding market is experiencing a boom offering more sophisticated and costly sleeping solutions. On the other hand, yoga offers much more comprehensive solutions, engaging our breath, reducing the wandering mind syndrome and thus increasing relaxation. In short, yoga prepares you for restorative sleep.

This morning, before going to perform at the concert, I practiced yoga for about 30 minutes, ending with a long shoulder stand. I remained calm throughout the concert and played very well. I appreciate Jo Ann’s yoga practice since it had such an astounding effect on my musical abilities.

JOE COX

Women’s health

• Menopause – The complexity of hormonal changes leads to a cascade of physical and emotional adjustments that are often experienced as destabilizing and distressing. They can profoundly affect a woman’s physical, psychological, and psychosocial landscape. Jo Ann has worked with many women during this complex phase of their lives and suggested asana to help them navigate into a more aware and healthier lifestyle.
• Pelvic Organ Prolapse – This physical discomfort also causes emotional distress and for many, a disruption to the activities of daily life. Yoga exercises are a noninvasive, self-managed and inexpensive way to restore muscle strength. Recent studies are encouraging and show as much as a 74% decrease in urinary incontinence in the study group randomly assigned to yoga practice.

“Basic yoga poses prevent falls in elderly women according to research by Gait Study Center”
…24 elderly females who were enrolled in an Iyengar yoga program, specifically designed for those over 65, found that at the end of the nine-week program, participants had a faster stride, increased flexibility in the lower extremities, an improved single-leg stance and increased confidence in walking and balance.

TEMPLE UNIVERSITY’S GAIT STUDY CENTER, PHILADELPHIA

Healthy aging

We live longer than ever before. For many, common age-related movement limitations can make it harder to enjoy the same freedom to enjoy all life has to offer as we did when we were younger. Yoga can play a positive role in this process, by:

• Realigning the spine, and preventing the dreaded Dowager’s Hump.
• Increasing flexibility and balance, and thus reducing the risk of falling, especially for individuals with osteoporosis.
• Rheumatoid arthritis, a common autoimmune condition creates inflammation inside the joint spaces can be eased with yoga by increasing flexibility and applying stress management poses and equanimity practices to help with pain and stress.
• Preventing surgery, or helping strengthen the body and coping with the aftereffect of hip or knee replacement surgery, which is so common today.