Balance activities for chronic pain and are one of the four types of exercise along with strength, endurance, and flexibility. Ideally, all four types of movement/exercise would be included in a well-balanced life. We need all these elements to live within our world and when starting to move beyond the pain, we need to focus on things that help us live larger and do the things we want to do and are important to us.
Balance exercises can be a nice way to give different inputs to the nervous system. This is important since it’s how we change the brain or the sensitivity of the system. Novel, new, and fun are great ways to help lower that sensitivity!
Many different types of exercises can improve strength, endurance, flexibility, and balance. For example, practicing yoga can improve your balance, strength, and flexibility. A lot of lower-body strength-training exercises also will improve your balance. It won’t take a lot of time and is easy to add to daily life. It also has the bonus of decreasing falls! ( Gotta love multi-purpose activities!)
How do I know how many balance activities to do?
Balance activities for pain can be done every day or as many days as you like and as often as you like. Remember, the point of rehab is to enable you to live in your life. I can’t stress this enough. Personally, I would work these into my movement bites during the day and not make this a big deal. We have enough to do in our family lives, rehab should be easy to add in. Not take up hours of our life and emotional energy.
So how often do you need to work on your balance? Are you wanting to be a tightrope walker? If so, you need to train a lot for that. Do you want to be able to walk up and down stairs without the use of your hands, so you can carry laundry or other items? Then you need to incorporate these types of exercises or movements until you’re able to complete the activities you want to participate in.
If you are unsure what types of exercises you can do to play with balance, read on.
Try these balance activities for pain
Sitting Balance Exercises
- Seated marches
- Alternating arm/leg reaches
- Trunk rotation
- Trunk flexion training
- Sit-to-stand exercises
Standing Balance Exercises
- Single-leg stance
- Romberg balanced stance
- Tandem / Semi-tandem stance
- Stand and reach
- Stand and bend
Dynamic Balance Exercises
Dynamic balance exercises are so important because they can improve many day-to-day activities such as dressing, bathing, cooking, and cleaning.
- Step-up with cone taps
- Reaching from single-leg or Romberg stance
- Lateral step up
- Half-forward lunge with arm reaches
- Squat with press-up
Balance Board Exercises
One of the most popular products to improve balance is a balance board. For about $25, you can purchase a balance board on Amazon. I love these for gaining confidence!
- Front-back rocking
- Side-to-side rocking
- Squats on board
- Squat with ball press
- Ball pass or catch on a balance board
Balance (Swiss) Ball Exercises
These exercises can be referred to as “swiss,” “stability,” or “balance” ball exercises. No matter what you call them, stability ball exercises are very effective in improving dynamic balance, core strengthening, and even decreasing aches and pains.
Wondering what size ball you need. Use this size chart here:
Your height. Ball Height
under 4’10” 18 inches
4’8″ – 5’5″ 22 inches
5’6″- 6’0″ 26 inches
6’0″ – 6″5″ 30 inches
over 6’5″ 33 inches
- Pelvic clocks
- Seated marches
- Arm extensions
- Head turns
- Alternating arm/leg lifts
- Modified Swiss ball plank
You can do balance exercises for pain anytime or anywhere.
- Try standing on one foot while working in the kitchen, waiting in line or
- Walk heel to toe around the house or office.
- Yoga and Tai Chi and ballet or barre workouts do not require expensive classes or equipment. YouTube has everything from seated beginner exercises to high-level balance activities. Search for a nice beginner yoga or Tai Chi video, they are free and easy to do at home.
Last but not least, here are some examples of balance activities on YouTube
Balance: https://youtu.be/E3j7nJyqLys
Chair Yoga: https://youtu.be/m4t9nCW3630
Tai Chi: https://youtu.be/cEOS2zoyQw4
Need a next step? Get some help designing an appropriate program tailored to you and your goals. Book a 60-minute consult with me and we will get ya set up!
