Is your bag damaging your health?
Ladies we love our bags! Whether it’s the latest fashion tote or our sturdy gym bag. The average woman’s handbag is over 5lbs!
We have our Blackberries/iPhone’s, laptops, diaries, Kindles, purses filled with all manner of credit and store cards, makeup bags, and if you’re a mother then you have the massive nappy bags with bottles, extra clothes, changing mats – everything but the kitchen sink…
Unfortunately, these can cause a whole load of trouble on our necks, shoulders and backs, causing our muscles to go into spasm, thereby increasing headaches, migraines, chronic neck pain and frozen shoulders due to the stress and weight on our neck and shoulder muscles.
The problem is that we tend to hold our bags on one side and use the same shoulder all the time, so we have to scrunch our shoulders up to maintain the weight for extended periods of time.
So what can we do?
- Posture – Try not to lean to one side and have shoulders relaxed and down.
- Strength – Exercise core muscles to protect the back and strengthen the muscles.
- Relaxation – Once you have reached your destination, sit on a chair and shrug your shoulders 10 times to release and relax.
- Change – Swap your bags about, use different sizes and weights and only take the items that you will need for your journey, do not take everything, will you be using your Kindle….?
- Straps – If it has a strap, use it especially if it can go across your body so that the weight is evenly distributed, and swap shoulders to mix it up.
Questions:
- So what does your bag weigh?
- What do you carry in your handbag?
