Back in December 2017 I was introduced to a
new concept in physical rehabilitation and gym work, Seona my Personal trainer
from Frampton fitness, knows a lot of people, she had been speaking to a friend
of hers who is a nurse in specialist, who had attended the Para
Olympics as part of the healthcare team linked to the wheelchair rugby. She had
worked with a Gentleman called Ed Baker who has now helped to set up a new type of gym in
the Bristol area. The company already have 2 established gyms in Watford and Gatwick, Neurokinex
provides activity based rehabilitation. The Bristol branch is an addition to
the gyms in Watford and Gatwick which already specialise in neurological
rehabilitation for various forms of paralysis.
Their vision is to make high
quality rehabilitation and wellbeing programs more accessible and inclusive for
those living with various forms of paralysis. They make it their responsibility
to stay up to date with the latest breakthroughs in neuroscience, by delivering
specialist neurological rehabilitation in such a safe, positive and supportive environment
can have a profound impact on the quality of life for someone living with
paralysis. Neurokinex provide forms of
rehabilitation to conditions such as spinal cord injury, stroke, transverse
myelitis and multiple sclerosis.
Activity based rehabilitation
has two main goals, to stimulate the whole body to work as one unit again and
if possible to re-establish some form of link or pathway between the paralysed
and functioning parts and too improve the body’s condition as much as possible
to allow the client to be stronger, fitter and more independent. The approach is
to target the entire nervous and musculoskeletal systems rather than only the
functioning areas of the body. The centres uses a variety of weight-bearing
activities, balance, stand training, gait and loco motor training, electrical
stimulation, upper and lower body, vibration therapy and strength training.
The benefits of this type of rehabilitation are improving muscle bulk, balance
and trunk control, skin and bone health, neurological function, cardiovascular health,
strength and stamina, and boosts psychological wellbeing.
I am now going to
have weekly sessions at the gym in Bristol, working with the leg up for talent scheme. I will provide weekly lifestyle blogs and the gym will cover and follow my journey and this will advertise the amazing benefits of neurokinex. I am over the moon, this is absolutely fantastic as all
the benefits I will receive to help with my ongoing rehabilitation for my
spinal injury and this will keep me in shape for my riding. I went this morning
for a session. The session is an hour long and we start with some stretching. My
feet are suffering from foot drop as the Achilles and calves have shortened,
this means that my feet are always in a drop position, I have to stretch them every
morning and massage my calves. I get quite a lot of resistance at first and the
clonus is quite bad. (This is when my feet spasm). Ed has to work on getting me
to flex and extend my feet and also we work up my legs and do lots of pushing
away and pulling back to me. For my knees and thighs we do similar exercises and
this is quite hard. The faces I pull are hilarious. Once we have stretched out
the lower parts then he moves up to my hip flexors. This is also shortening
from being sat in a wheelchair all day, it’s very painful to lie flat and my
legs draw up so stretching this out is so helpful.
Following on from this I transfer
into a EZ stand aid and I am then upright for my next lot of exercises which is
hand bike and cardio. I have to sprint for 1 minuet on a high resistance and
then rest, the aim is to increase my cardio output and blood flow, this acts as a warm up and to prime the nervous system for the actives ahead in order to
help with the circulation. By standing and weight bearing the nervous system becomes more excitable and receptive to input, I can feel my pins and needles tinging in my legs, it’s
really hard to explain the feeling that I get from the pain as its nerve pain
and there all the time always feels like I am sat in a cactus, it become like white noise though in the background, the more
exercise and suppler my body is the better. I really want to work on the
standing as my allowing my legs to have weight going through them help with the
bone density and this will be very helpful for me moving forward with my
riding.
Wow this gets me really out
of breath and I can tell I need to get fitter; I am going to try a few things
that might help this! We then move onto another machine which I have to do core
strength. While in a stand position leaning forward from my waist and trying to
pull back up. This trunk work in the standing position also uses the muscles around my hips, this will be really valuable with my position and riding, by working against gravity, using my trunk to bring me back up is key This is to help strengthen my back, which I find impossible to do
at the moment, things will improve as I get stronger. By now I am shattered as
the team are really good at pushing you to achieve more, so we go on, more
pulling weights forward and leaning back and trying to pull myself up. Anyone
who knows that due to my spinal injury my core stability has gone completely. I
have worked really hard at the core/stomach to hold myself up. Otherwise I would
just flop forward or backwards. This is really obvious when I am sat on the
horse. My balance is shocking. I won’t give up easily though as I want to
achieve this possibility of riding again. It’s hard for me mentally to try and
forget how I did things before and now am trying to learn a new way of doing things;
it is not so easy at my age!! Ha ha.
We finish the session with a
machine that I lie on I think its called the total gym and again work with small movements to push and pull up
my knees. I am performing weight bearing exercises, for my legs against resistance, I am helped to bend and straighten my legs and this is helping control a proportion of my bodyweight. My body gets feedback from my feet being in contact with the footplate, Ed is able to support this movement by ensuring I work in a safe range of motion and push myself as hard as possible without danger. I have to really work hard and by now I am totally fatigued.
I love the session especially being upright for so much of the session, this really feels good, I am working at getting up right into my stand frame at home and working up to being able to do this activity myself, as to stand and pull the straps around is quite hard for me, I have achieved it a couple of times. The more I do the easier it will become; I am working towards standing x3 a week for 1 hour. At the moment I need my hands to hold on, but as I work on releasing one hand at a time I will be able to do my hand exercises at the same time.
I love the session especially being upright for so much of the session, this really feels good, I am working at getting up right into my stand frame at home and working up to being able to do this activity myself, as to stand and pull the straps around is quite hard for me, I have achieved it a couple of times. The more I do the easier it will become; I am working towards standing x3 a week for 1 hour. At the moment I need my hands to hold on, but as I work on releasing one hand at a time I will be able to do my hand exercises at the same time.
Go girl rehab goals!!!!
