0:00 This is Brent coming at you with another release and stretch video. In this video, 0:02 we're going to do the often forgotten muscle, the quadratus lumborum, commonly 0:06 known as the QL. Now the QL has a propensity to get overactive and short 0:11 in those individuals with an asymmetrical weight shift, and those 0:14 individuals with lumbo-pelvic hip complex dysfunction, specifically an 0:18 anterior pelvic tilt, may have shortness and overactivity in this muscle, 0:23 especially if they have a history of low back pain. 0:25 I'm going to have my friend Yvette come out and help me demonstrate this 0:28 exercise. Now this muscle is a little deeper. 0:30 This muscles a little different than some of the other muscles that we've 0:33 talked about with self-administered release techniques, so I want to take a 0:36 second to discuss anatomy here, 0:38 show you guys a little bit of a palpation activity, something you can 0:42 practice so you get a good idea of where this muscle is. If you find the back of 0:46 somebody's pelvis, go to their posterior ilium and find the rim. 0:52 Right, the top edge. You then put your hand on the last rib that you can feel. I 0:59 want you guys to stick your thumbs on the lumbar spine. You can feel the 1:01 spinous processes. Then use your index fingers to go to the posterior ilium, the 1:07 edge of that last rib, that little square you just made with your fingers outlines 1:13 the quadratus lumborum. You can then take your index fingers, move them inward 1:19 towards each other and then bring them down into the lumbar spine. All right so 1:25 immediately, this way, and you should be able to feel the edge of the quadratus 1:29 lumborum. It's definitely a pretty distinct border. Now what that'll do is 1:34 it'll give you an idea that this muscle is not superficial. It actually lies just 1:39 lateral to the lumbar spine underneath the thoracolumbar fascia, underneath the 1:46 external and internal obliques, as well as underneath the transverse abdominis. This 1:51 is a very deep muscle. 1:52 We're not going to be able to hit this with a foam roll across the low back. Not 1:56 that it would be a good idea, anyway. So I'm gonna have Yvette go ahead and flip 1:59 over. 2:01 Now what I've done guys is when I was walking my ginormous chihuahua this 2:07 morning; I know some of you guys are going to laugh at me for having a chihuahua, 2:09 but he's 22 pounds and is the biggest chihuahua you've ever seen. You guys can 2:13 look that up on Facebook. 2:15 We were at Petco, and at Petco they had a big bin of tennis balls, right, because dogs 2:19 love to play with tennis balls. 2:21 The nice thing about that is I could kind of play with these tennis balls to 2:23 find different densities, right, so some of these--like this one-- super, super, soft 2:29 and this one is a little bit more dense. 2:32 Why is that important? Well, if I'm dealing with Yvette here her 2:37 tissue depth is really not that much, and I just want to get to her 2:42 quadratus lumborum. I don't want to push past it to the point where we end 2:46 up with this huge lumbar lordosis. Now somebody like me, with a little bit more 2:50 tissue depth, 2:51 I would need a little bit firmer tennis ball. So, I just picked out three with 2:56 different densities. We're going to use the softer one for Yvette. 3:00 It's actually a pretty fairly easy technique to show. All you're going to 3:04 have them do is find the top of the pelvis. They can use their 3:07 hands. 3:08 So find the top of your pelvis back there, you got that, now I want you to put 3:11 this tennis ball underneath your back there, just on top of your pelvis and 3:17 then what you'll have them do is actually slide sideways in one piece. 3:22 All right, make sure that they don't do this squirmy pelvis thing because 3:26 that will actually contract the QL and then relax the QL and make it 3:30 harder for them to find any sort of trigger point that may exist there. But if 3:34 they kind of bridge and use their arms and slide in one piece, what they'll end 3:38 up doing is slide that tennis ball right into the QL and then slide a little 3:43 further until they find the most tender spot, and then you guys know what the 3:50 release protocols are. It's 30 seconds to 2 minutes, until we get a significant, 3:54 significant decrease in discomfort or we see an actual release, right, where we 3:59 feel that the muscle is letting go. 4:01 Now one thing I do not want to see 4:04 is you guys know I'm very fond of the training softball, right, that's a 4:08 softball with a soft outside. If Yvette tries to do a softball on her QL, 4:16 let's look at what happens. 4:18 So she's going to go through the same motions and then I'm going to go ahead and 4:21 tell her to relax, right, we can't have her 4:24 all tensed up or we'll never get a release. Well, as soon as she relaxed and 4:28 she puts her backside on the floor, 4:30 we get this lumbar lordosis. We get a little bit of rotation in her pelvis. 4:36 Probably the scariest thing for me thinking long-term is we get this huge 4:40 posterior to anterior force on the lumbar spine. 4:44 Now I'm not worried about one session. What I'm more worried about is if I give 4:49 this to her for homework, if I put this in her routine to do every day, because 4:52 I'm trying to correct whatever dysfunction exists that includes the QL, 4:55 and she starts doing this every day. 4:58 Is there a chance that posterior to anterior force is going to create 5:03 adaptive changes in the connective tissue around the lumbar spine, setting 5:08 up an instability and potentially injury? 5:12 I'm not so worried with the tennis ball, right, her lumbar spine was 5:17 flat on the floor. 5:19 There was no reason for me to think that there was really that much of a 5:22 posterior to anterior force that I might cause those changes, but something huge 5:26 like this, 5:27 that could be a problem. The same could be said about using a foam roll on the 5:31 low back. 5:32 It's not so much one session. One session is probably not going to hurt you, but if 5:36 you did it every day, 5:37 could you create those changes that eventually set up injuries such as like, 5:40 a herniated disc. 5:42 Now once I get this muscle released, now I need to start thinking how do I 5:47 lengthen it, right, I want to return it to optimal length, so I'm going to have 5:50 that get into Child's Pose position, which you guys have seen. We actually use 5:57 the Child's Pose for a latissimus dorsi stretch. 6:00 The nice thing about this position is it posteriorly tilts the pelvis, which the 6:07 quadratus lumborum is a very weak lumbar extensor, will actually be lengthened 6:11 just slightly by posteriorly tilting the pelvis, because it's the same as lumbar 6:15 flexion. 6:16 We can then side creep 6:20 as we did and the progression of that latissimus dorsi stretch, 6:25 the only thing we need to worry about now, is there a potential that the lat 6:29 is going to be the restricting structure and I've never actually going to get to 6:33 the QL? Well that's easy enough to fix. All I have to do is have Yvette 6:37 relax her arms a little bit, bring them in, she can actually use them to kind of 6:41 pillow her head. She can go a little bit more into lateral flexion until she 6:47 feels it at the QL. I do have to know guys, that this particular stretch, unless 6:52 somebody is really, really, geared up, 6:55 they're probably not going to feel this QL stretch. It's so deep and it's so 6:59 medial, so proximal to the lumbar spine, that actually takes a fair amount of 7:05 tightness before lateral flexion is going to lengthen it enough for the 7:09 individual to feel, going back to the regular Child's Pose stretch in that 7:13 case, is probably your best bet. So that, at least you're affecting the other 7:18 lateral flexors, the spine, being the latissimus dorsi, and the erector 7:22 spinae on that side. Do you feel this? 7:26 Yvette actually feels this and she has been having a little bit of SI 7:29 joint dysfunction and does have an asymmetrical weight shift, so this is 7:33 probably a good stretch for her. She's going to use the release technique using 7:36 the tennis ball at the appropriate density. Make sure you guys are very 7:41 careful at calculating which tennis ball you should be using. I hope you guys get 7:44 great outcomes from this technique and anybody who has been having some of these 7:48 problems gets great results. Talk with you soon. 7:53
