How to Rehab ANY Injury - 5 Key Steps

Regardless of diagnosis, the process of injury rehab involves similar steps, with the end goal being a normal return to your daily activities.

Let's go through these 5 key steps along with an example of this in practice.

Step 1 - Avoid irritation

No matter how good the rest of your rehab protocol is, you're not going to get anywhere if you're continuously poking the bear or picking the scab.

If there are motions that are significantly uncomfortable or stop you in your tracks from the pain, you need to reasonably avoid them or find ways to limit them for the time being.

The body is always trying to heal and recover, but you have to allow it to.

Step 2 - Keep moving

As important as rest and avoiding or modifying certain activities are, you need to keep moving to support a prompt recovery.

Muscles, joints, and nerves respond positively to movement. Just bringing blood flow and circulation to an area speeds up recovery time. It's part of why athletes will jump on a bike after an intense game.

Plus, when an area is injured, it tends to tighten up in a defensive posture. If you don't want to feel stiff as a board, you need to move.

Step 3 - Gradual exposure

Eventually, you want to re-expose yourself to the stimulus that was initially painful. If you followed the previous two steps, you should at least be less sensitive than before. This is a key step to returning to normal life and movement.

You may need to regress the painful motion to be able to tolerate it. You can do so by modifying variables such as:

• load (going lighter or using assistance to reduce load)

• volume (doing fewer repetitions or sets)

• tempo (moving slowly as opposed to explosively)

• frequency (how often you expose yourself to the movement)

It's perfectly acceptable to have some discomfort in this step. It's not okay to be in significant pain. Understand the difference using what I call the traffic light system.

Picture a pain scale numbering 1 to 10 (1 being barely noticeable discomfort to 10 being unbearable pain).

🟢 If your pain is between a 1 to a 4, you're in the green light zone. You're free to continue your activity, as this is an acceptable level of pain to push through.

🟡If your pain is between a 5 to a 7, you're in the yellow light zone. This is where we don't necessarily stop completely, but we proceed with caution, especially if we see the intensity of our pain increasing over time.

🔴If your pain is between an 8 to a 10, you're in the red light zone. This is your sign to stop and back off whatever you're doing. You may need to regress the movement or activity, or substitute it for something that's significantly more tolerable.

Stay in the green with a touch of yellow at most, and you'll be fine.

Step 4 - Build strength

The best way to not only get rid of current pain but also prevent it from returning is to continuously build strength. The reason we get injured in the first place is that we do something beyond our capacity.

So what better way to prevent injury than to build up your capacity?

This will depend largely on what physical demands you have daily and what activities you want to do. But having a balanced training program of strength, mobility, and cardiovascular work is key.

Step 5 - Return to normal activity

With your newfound strength and reduced (or completely gone) pain, it's time to return to normal activity.

A practical example

I recently worked with a client who had severe shoulder pain to the point where he couldn't lift his arm at all. This was problematic for his job because he worked with his hands.

For him, we started by reducing the load on that shoulder by taking some time off work while avoiding painful overhead and reaching movements at home. (Step 1)

While the area calmed down, we continued to work on getting activity in other ways, including lower body training, getting in a certain number of steps each day, and upper body weight lifting that triggered no pain in his shoulder. (Step 2)

As his shoulder calmed down, we began to perform isolated work on the weak spots of his shoulder, notably movements like lateral raises and external and internal rotation. We kept this light or even just with his bodyweight as he built up his strength and tolerance. (Step 3)

His shoulder was now able to tolerate more, so we increased our intensity of work on the area in addition to building on his newfound mobility. (Step 4)

This client made a full recovery and now has zero pain in his shoulder. He thought he would have to quit his job, but he's back full-time and thriving. He's continuing to build strength and mobility in his shoulder. (Step 5)

There's nuance in every individual case, but if you follow these steps, you'll be on your way to a successful recovery.

To your good health,

Coach Stephen

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Thanks for reading.

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