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| Hi there! Again, new to Bikrams. Practicing 4 times a week since Feb of this year, and did a June 30 day challenge.
Any suggestions for dealing with my right hamstring and hamstring attachment? History: since December 08 my right lower back began to hurt. It seemed like the muscle in my lower back down my glute and into my hamstring. Aching pain! So I started Bikram's in February. My lower back pain resolved around May. But my right groin muscle and hip flexor began to hurt. My hamstring attachment area still hurt. As of July, my right groin muscles and hip flexors have resolved but my hamstring attachment is OWEEE!!!
I don't usually feel it -- it aches when I sit, but when I walk and move normally I have absolutely no pain. I feel it most right in the upper attachment area in the following poses: Hand to Feet pose, Standing head to knee pose (not too much cause I'm still working on getting INTO that darn posed!), standing separate leg stretch, and sitting head to knee pose. The last one in particular.
Any thoughts as to what I can do? Am I overstretching this -- I work to PAIN then back off. Should I not work this at all? Or should I work it harder? Or stay with what I'm doing and have more patience???
Thanks
Freia |
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| I would not work it at all--without properly trained teachers to keep you from over doing it, especially that blasted Standing head to knee pose, you're just asking for continued pain and injury. Prime directive I was taught and practice is that yoga is not supposed to hurt. |
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| a lot of those bikram yoga poses are just begging to tweak a hamstring...
hyperextension out the wazoo
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| If I were you I would ease off on the poses you mention. Let yourself get a gentle stretch in the hamstring in those poses, and don't push further into pain or discomfort. See if that starts helping. And make sure you are getting the form as perfect as you can. Ask your teachers for their advice. They have seen what you are doing, and should be able to give you some guidance. |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 399
 
Location: Oregon | As someone with a weak lower back, this is one of my issues with Bikrams. I agree with what others post here, do not push too hard in the poses you mentioned. I'd also do downward dog at home and warm ups before class. I've also become a big fan of pigeon pose. I love that stretch for my lower back and thigh/hip. |
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| I think it's important to listen to your Bikram instructor but not to REACT. |
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| Thanks, everyone. I do listen to the instructor and believe in pushing myself BUT I am responsible for myself and what I do. I guess my big issue is that since December, my hamstring is no better but no WORSE...so I was just wondering. I think I'll back off it for now and go just to where I BEGIN to feel it. The problem comes in the forward bends, because I can't figure out HOW to do these without activating my hamstring. And I am clenching my quads (ALL of them) to release my hamstring, but I feel it in these.
I'll talk to the wonderful studio owner and see what she comes up with...
thanks
Freia |
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| The forward bends you talk about are all hamstring stretches. If you don't have the flexibility yet, you will feel it there. Many people start to develop tightness in the hamstrings during a challenge. This comes from being over zealous, mostly. The dialogue tells us to pull as hard as we can on our heels in the first forward bend. If a strong person with tight hamstrings takes this at face value, it can lead to trouble. (It caused some problems for me for a while). As hard as you can needs to be interpreted, I believe, to as hard as you safely can, and that means learning to find your edge and just pushing at it without pushing through. |
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Regular
Posts: 66
| It sounds like you have the same condition as myself, which I recently had diagnosed as "High Hamstring Tendinopathy".
Its an overuse injury, not from a single event such as a tear etc. It does not respond to rest. I never overstretched to the point of anything giving, tearing, or even pain. It just developed slowly over time. I was told mine is from using my hamstrings so much through cycling, yoga, etc, and my core muscles not working correctly, possibly due to a hip/pelvic imbalance and the ensuing muscular imbalance that caused. This caused my hamstrings to work overtime whenever i exercised, walked, etc. The type of yoga wasnt the problem, doing anything other than sleeping or sitting on the couch would have been working my hammies and leading to the issue.
Had I corrected my hip/pelvic issue years ago after an accident correctly, or worked on my core better the last umpteen years, that may have prevented it 
There are a few web pages that talk of it, its a fairly uncommon injury, typically found in sprinters and some other runners.
http://trisportstraining.blogspot.com/2007/03/high-hamstring-tendonopathy.html
I'd recommend talking to a doctor, preferably one in sports medicine, and finding a good PT.
Currently im going through a physiotherapy program, and deep tissue massage, to get it better. The recovery is slow, its not a 6 week 'easy stretching' routine to get back to where it should be. The physiotherapist also stated to not not stop my cycling or yoga, just dont overdue anything.
Good luck ! |
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| Thanks for the awesome responses,all, and a special thanks for the link. I've checked it out and it seems to be exactly what I'm experiencing. Especially since I USED to be a runner (a few years ago) and avid cyclist. I'll see my physiotherapist this week. I got back from Hot Yoga and during that class, I made sure I ddin't stretch to the point of pain at all. So a fairly comfortable class...Being up here in Canada, I'd need a referral to a sports medicine physician with a wait of around 6 months (!) if not longer. So I'll take it to my physiotherapist and let you know what happens...
Thanks all
Freia
Edited by freiamaya 2009-09-07 8:09 PM
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| i'm in agreement with Jar on this one (sans specific "diagnosis").
it is an overuse injury from misalignment.
in my students, i deal with it by focusing on two fronts:
1. hamstring--get out of the tendon and into the belly of the muscle further down the leg (that is, away from the hip and between hip and knee.
people tend to "feel" their hamstring stretches in one of two places--knee or hip. this means that they're really hyperextending either out of the hip or under the knee. they are not stretching the hamstring muscle (between hip and knee), but rather are stretching the tendons at the ends of the muscle.
to 'treat' this misalignment of the hamstring stretch, i encourage my students to bend the knee while holding proper alignment until they feel the muscle of the hamstring stretching--in the middle of the muscle. the 'pull' of the stretch will have a feeling of two movements: a. the stretch between hip and knee in the middle of the back of the thigh, and b. a movement left to right as the three heads of the hamstring "draw apart" from each other.
a good 'at home' practice to feel this (and then take it to the classroom with you) is to take a blanket and roll it up. set up for paschiomottanasana (seated forward bend) and put the cushy rolled blanket under your knees. keeping feet flexed, drawing belly in, and tilting the pelvis back a bit, fold gently over the legs until you feel the hamstring in the middle of the muscle between hip and knee. then, as you hold this for 3-5 minutes, you'll begin to feel the separation left to right of the three heads of the hamstring.
once in class, see that feeling in all of these hamstring stretch poses.
2. really focusing on the hip/core alignment/use will make a big difference. by core, i'm refering specifically to the pelvic floor and transverse abdominals. it is not specifically mentioned as mula and uddiyana bandha within the dialogue, but it is mentioned as something like "drawing belly in all the way to spine" which is the idea of mula and uddiyana bandha. you can look up mula and uddiyana bandha online to get good descriptions of how to do it.
the hip alignment is often more specific to the individual. to talk about that, i'd have to look at you, because the shape of the hip, attachment of the top of the thigh bone, the 'set' of the hip (eg, my left hip 'set' has changed since i gave birth; i'm slowly getting it back to the original position), the q-angle of the thigh bone, the rotation that you specifically utilize out of the hip when doing hamstring stretches. . .all of these things have bearing on this element.
i would recommend either a. talking to your teacher about this specifically to see if s/he has any specific pointers to alignment, or b. find a teacher (i personally go for iyengar or well experienced therapeutic teachers for this) who does know about it and can help you out. you might want to take a private lesson to get the basic structures that you will need, which you can then practice and home and take to class with you.
now, the reason that i doubt "a"--as bruce does--is because alignment isn't specifically taught in bikram from what i can tell. by that i mean that the teacher's arent' trained in modifications, etc, for therapeutic use because it is considered a general, beginners sequence and the student is supposed to figure it out on their own (there's nothing philosophically wrong with this, btw--a lot of teachers from a lot of lineages believe this to be true and because i'm so freakin' liberal, i can agree with the argument.  ).
i had a long conversation last week with a very experienced, bikram-trained teacher (she trained 8-9 years ago at HQ), and she said that she never really learned alignment from bikram training or even classes, but rather from other classes that she took. as a teacher, she never deviates from the dialogue, but now that she has experience of alignment from other sources, she will help students one-on-one with specific needs. granted, she asserted, she doesn't "feel comfortable" with it, and usually falls back into the same line of thought that you'll eventually learn it on your own--but that may be with a number of injuries in the process.
so, it will depend upon the teacher and the philosophy and the experience and all of that.
good luck with it!
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| so zoebird, if i have hyperextended my knees - which was what happened to me a few weeks ago, do i still go for bikram class now? or wait till it heels? or like what you said, do some modifications, dont push too much? |
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| Thank you SO MUCH, Ms Zoebird! I will try exactly what you said. I actually find this quite interesting, because for the past 2 days, I have really backed OFF per se and tried to listed to my body to figure out what was going on. I notice that with hands to feet pose after half-moon, I feel the belly of the hamstring stretch when I align my feet, activate my inner thigh muscles and quads, and keep my knees bent. When I tilt my pelvis upwards (i.e. stick my bum up) in order to bring my upper body down from the hips, THAT is when I feel the OWwweee pain in my right upper hamstring attachment. When I back off (rotate my pelvis down), I feel the belly of the hamstring stretch and no pain in the upper attachment. The same goes for seated head to knee stretching (just before spine twist) -- if I keep my leg straight and lean over, my head does not touch my knee BUT I feel the belly of the hamstring stretch. IF I bend my knee and bend from the waist over to touch my head to my knee, the upper attachment "sings". If I bend my knee and don't lean from the waist so much, the upper attachment isn't activated so much. And I noticed that in standing separate head to knee pose (Dandayamana Bibhaktapada Janushirasana), I have that real intense OWWeeee pain when my right leg is in front and I am shifting my weight to align my hips in a straight line. So it seems that my alignment is crucial here. I will look into finding an alignment coach to help me -- a private alignment lesson may be in order.
Thanks again!
Freia |
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| hui: practice modified. keep knees bent, so that the quadriceps engage (which is what "locking the knee" means in bikram-speak), and keep the thighs spinning in the right direction (essentially in and back).
freia:
sounds like your back is very flexible/mobile and that your hips/pelvis are quite open. really focus on the core work to find how to balance that effectively and not go too far either way (into the attachment at the hip or backing off 'too far').
i find that getting head-to-knee is more valuable than the straight leg, because then you have the right alignment of the spine/hips, belly, and then the legs will open on their own, rather than being forced from the tendons.
in all hamstring stretches, so many people go for the straight leg, thinking that it's the most important part, when really it's how the hips and torso align, and then what the leg can do moving toward that. so, by keeping the knee bent and the emphasis in the belly of the muscle that you're stretching (and this pretty much can go for anything), then you are going to get real results, really fast. it will come more quickly than you think.
ironically, people lack patience. i can often see a difference week to week (to me, it's a big difference), but for them, they don't "see" the difference until they aren't using a prop or the leg isn't bent or what have you. the reality is, the changes are coming quickly, but to look like a book or another student, it may take years of practice. |
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Owee my hamstring!
