How Poor Posture Affects Your Body

By Randi Morse

It still astounds me that even though I am 40 years old I can hear my grandmother's voice in my ear every time I slouch. "Sit up straight," she would say whenever I slouched at the dinner table. I don't know if most children were like me, but I always assumed that the reason she wanted me to sit straight was for manners' sake. She told me once that standing and sitting straight showed that I was proud of who I was, that I was confident. What I didn't realize is that bad posture can have some seriously bad side effects on your health.

Bad Posture and Your Body

One mistake that we commonly make is to think of our body as a collection of parts. When our wrist hurts, for example, we don't connect the pain to our back. The truth is that all of the body is connected, and when something goes wrong with one part of your body it can have adverse effects on another part of the body. This is what happens when you exhibit bad posture. 

Headaches - If you're dealing with a lot of headaches, your posture may be to blame. Poor posture creates neck muscles that are too tight. This extreme tightness pulls on the spinal cord and tendons around the neck, creating what's known as tension headaches. 

Back pain - This seems like a no-brainer, that bad posture causes back pain, but we often don't realize that we're exhibiting bad posture, so we don't connect it with the back pain we're experiencing. If you are dealing with recurring back pain, your posture may be to blame. 

Sleeping - When the body, and spine, has restriction issues, it can cause problems with sleeping. The spinal cord protects the central nervous system, which brings messages to the brain. If the spine has restriction problems the nerves aren't able to send the messages as thoroughly as they should be able to. This means that your body gets mixed, or incorrect, messages, which can cause sleep problems.

The good news is that most problems caused by poor posture can be fixed by learning to sit and stand correctly. The chiropractors at The Joint Chiropractic are there to help. With your chiropractor's guidance you can repair any restriction problems that may have been caused by your poor posture and you can also learn how to have better posture to avoid these issues again.

To learn more about your health, wellness and fitness, see your local chiropractor at The Joint Chiropractic in Columbus, Ohio.