Stretching and Back Support
• He also better not start out trying to touch his toes while he keeps his legs straight. That kind of exaggerated stretching can lead to problems. Most likely some of the exercises he learned as a lad have since been proven to be injury-inducing.
• Year round, he should stand up straight and tall. Backs love good posture.
• In the workshop (overseeing the elves), Father Christmas needs to choose a seat that supports his lower back. Same for in the sleigh. And there he needs the seat far enough up so he can reach the pedals without stretching. (Assuming a flying sleigh has pedals.)
• One hopes that he and Missus have a good, firm mattress. It’s fine if they want to use a pillow but not if it forces up their neck up at a severe angle.
The Clean and Jerk
• Now a few words about lifting. Santa better lift with his legs. And he better know where he’s going to set down whatever he plans to lift and how he’s going to get from one spot to the other.
He needs to bend his knees so his arms are level with the gift — and avoid lifting it overhead. Instead, he should use a footstool or sturdy ladder.
If an item is heavy, he should just put it on a hand truck and move it that way. And he needs to remember that pushing is safer than pulling.
Santa’s Check List
Since Santa is known to be a list-maker, it would be wise for him to jot this summary down:
1. Exercise regularly. (Take Rudolf for a walk.)
2. Get to and maintain a healthy weight. (Skip the cookies.)
3. Use good posture. (Stand tall, stand proud.)
4. Use back-saving lifting techniques. (Bend those dimpled knees!))
If he — and you — do that, folks at the North Pole and in your own home will be less likely to hear “Ho, ho, holy cow! What have I done? My back!”
Bill Dodds’ latest books are Your One-Stop Guide to How Saints Are Made and Your One-Stop Guide to the Mass (Servant Publications); and 1440 Reasons to Quit Smoking: One for Every Minute of the Day and What You Don't Know About Retirement: A Funny Retirement Quiz (Meadowbrook Press). His website is http://www.BillDodds.com. You can email him at BillDodds@BillDodds.com.
The fact is that because we humans pad around on two legs, our backs take a lot of day-to-day punishment. But they simply weren’t designed to take additional abuse. Like Santa, we do abuse them, however. Even now, as we hibernate for winter, ’tis the season to hurt your back by…
Getting those big boxes of Christmas ornaments up from the basement or down from the attic. Pulling out the ladder to hang those lights on the house. Trying out that brand-spanking-new exercise machine we found under the tree. Shoveling snow. Pushing our car when it’s stuck in that miserable white stuff.
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
In one way, your back is like Santa himself. It knows if you’ve been bad or good. If it’s been the former, you might think everything is A-OK one minute and then — whang! — you’re in big, big trouble.
So be good for you own sake. Prevention is less work than recovery. And certainly a lot less painful.
So how can you save your back? Let’s use Santa as our example.
Exercise Regularly
• St. Nick should exercise regularly, not just step out on Dec. 24th and start lifting. (We’ll talk about how he should lift in a moment.)If he had stronger arms, legs and lower body, his back wouldn’t have to work as hard. He would be wise to do some stretching, too. Before exercising and certainly before tackling his Christmas run. Stretching would get his muscles warmed up.
• But Mr. Kringle needs to check with his doctor or physical therapist before beginning an exercise program, especially if he’s hurt his back in the past or has a health problem, such as osteoporosis. (All those glasses of milk help build strong bones, but the cookies…) He’ll learn that some exercises — swimming, for instance — tend to be easier on the back than others, like jogging on ice-covered roads. (And if he does that he needs to pay careful attention to avoid falling. Falls can seriously injure a back.) Whatever his choices are, he needs to start slow.
