Happy Thanksgiving!

The best holiday wishes to all of you today – I hope you are able to spend the holiday with your families and those you love. Enjoy the day off!

A season of giving back

My dance studio just announced tonight that our annual holiday show will be a charity fundraiser for a local nonprofit organization called Opendance, which is an arts and educational outreach dance company that provides dance classes and programs for children of all ages at schools and community centers throughout the area. This company focuses on giving positive transformation through dance to all students regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, skill level, or body type. This positive influence is so vital to any young person interested in expressing themselves through dance, so I’m so thrilled to be collaborating with them this year!

Opendance

 

Sparkle for the holidays

I cannot believe the holidays are here already! I have finally finished up my choreography for our studio’s holiday show and wanted to share the costumes I found for my advanced pointe class on discountdance.com because they are adorable! As I mentioned before, I decided to mix up my choreography a little bit this year and create a pointe/jazz hybrid dance, so this draped sequin tunic in bright red was the absolutely perfect thing – and at a great price!

Another Classic…

Here’s another one of my favorite pas de deux of all time……They are so gorgeous together 🙂

Extreme Ballet

So the music is weird, and there’s kind of some strange editing, but this is one of the most impressive compilations of male ballet tricks I have ever seen – Enjoy!

Some ballet humor to start the day

Bad stretching habits..and how to break them!

We all have our stretch routines before and during dance classes – but how much of it is really effective stretching? How can you tell when you’re pushing too far? Or not far enough? This is a fantastic article from November’s issue of Dance Magazine about how to turn your stretching habits into the most productive exercises for your muscles possible.

Teach-Learn Connection

Flexibility is a required and admired trait for dancers. But lounging in a split isn’t necessarily the most effective way to stretch. “The more flexible a dancer is, the more adaptable they can be,” says Anneliese Burns Wilson, owner of ABC For Dance, a dance education company, and a Stott Pilates instructor trainer in Dallas, TX. “But flexibility needs to be useful. There is a kind of flexibility where someone else can move the dancer’s limb through a wide range of motion, but the dancer themselves cannot, because they don’t have the strength to support it.” To help you stretch for optimal supported flexibility, DM spoke to Burns; Christine Wright, ballet teacher at Studio 5-2 in New York City, and Vanessa Muncrief, a physical therapist at New York’s Harkness Center for Dance Injuries.

Habit: Stretching to the point of pain

Though a deep stretch can feel intense, some dancers push beyond that sensation to actual pain. “We are a motivated and disciplined group of people,” says Wright. “Plus we want results quickly, so there’s this idea that if you stretch the muscle hard, it will elongate more. But that’s not true! The muscle doesn’t want to tear, so if you go beyond your stretch threshold, the muscle will contract to protect itself.”

Break It:

Learn to distinguish between a healthy stretch and a potentially damaging one. Wilson says that shaking, redness, bruising, or continuous popping are signs that you’re stretching too intensely. Wright adds, “When stretching, you’re asking your muscle to accommodate a different length. But the most intense feeling should dissipate after a few moments. If it doesn’t, you’ve gone too far.”

Muncrief says a change of mindset can be helpful. “Dancers often think, ‘If I just push harder, I’ll get better.’ Even our society supports that path of thought,” she says. “So, I try to bring my dancers some yogic principles of letting go. Get back to the joy of effortless movement. Think, ‘Yes, I need to work hard, but where can I do less?’ ”

Habit: Hanging in a static stretch

At one point or another, you’ve probably lain on your back against the wall, let your legs drop to either side in a straddle—and stayed there for a while. While this kind of stretching was once recommended for dancers, it’s no longer considered beneficial. Muncrief describes it as “gravity pulling on your ligaments, not muscle stretching.” Wilson explains, “An effective stretch works in the belly of the muscle to lengthen the muscle fiber.” When you hang in a straddle, “you’re stretching ligaments, the fiber that holds bones together. Once stretched, ligaments can’t tighten back, and that destabilizes the joint. It’s very harmful and dangerous.”

Break It:

Try this new version of the wall straddle: “Lie on your back with your bottom against the wall, legs straight up,” Wilson says. “Then envision your toes reaching away from each other. Don’t focus on your toes going to the floor. Instead concentrate on your turnout and sending energy to the side walls. If you can’t pull your legs back together, and if they release into your sockets, you’ve relapsed into static stretch.”

“A few-second stretch won’t lengthen the muscle either,” Muncrief points out. Hold a stretch for 30 seconds to a minute, and repeat several times. “Muscles respond to a low load over this period of time.” she says.

Habit: Stretching Cold

Walking into the studio and dropping to the floor to stretch before class is a common routine. “But stretching should actually come later,” Muncrief says. “Think of muscle like silly putty: When it’s warm, it’s pliable. But if you put in the fridge and it’s cold, it snaps! Muscles have the most power in normal resting length, so deep stretching before activity won’t yield the best results.”

Break It:

To warm up, “Do full-body movements, like marching in place or doing a light jog,” says Wilson. “Sweating is a good sign that your body is warm, but don’t try to artificially heat your body with plastic pants or a too-hot room. You haven’t created mobility for yourself. Artificial heat just puts you at risk for injury.” Wright suggests using a ball or foam roller to release muscular tension without over-stretching. Muncrief recommends moving through active yoga poses: “You’re stretching but also working your muscles and building heat.” The best times to stretch are between barre and center, and after dancing, when you can take advantage of the body’s warmth and pliability.

Habit: Stretching “Key” Areas Only

Wright observes that when a dancer identifies a personal weakness, “they will work like crazy to improve that area.” This might mean stretching a certain muscle group over and over. Wilson adds that teachers also sometimes concentrate on a specific area—like lengthened hamstrings for extension—and fail to communicate that the body works as a whole system.

Break It:

Think of the body as one network rather than separate compartments. The fascia is integral to this concept. “Fascia is a continuous band of tissue that wraps your entire body. It connects all the pieces. Think of it as shrink wrap,” says Wilson. “If your fascia gets a kink in one area, it can affect a different body part. You could do something to your right little toe, and you won’t find out until your left shoulder hurts. So if you are working on one area and it’s not getting better, try investigating other body parts, too.”

Schedule a few sessions with a physical therapist to address to your personal stretching needs. “It’s best to work with a PT individually, even just a few times,” Muncrief says. “They can specifically take into account the roles you dance, classes you take, and your cross training activities.”

Quite the pair…

Not precisely ballet or teaching related, but this video is absolutely exquisite. Partnering is way more challenging than most professionals make it look, but when done properly the results are breathtaking.

What to do when it hurts…

Considering my recent injury, I found this article and thought it would be a good one to share. Unfortunately, chronic pain is a fairly normal condition in any professional dancer’s life. For me, it was bad hips and knees – for others it’s their back, feet, or susceptibility to muscle strain or pulls. Although pain certainly is part of the profession, the smart thing to do is always go get a professional opinion if the pain is chronic or extremely sharp. I know for my own part, I hated going to see doctors for injuries while I was performing because I didn’t want to risk taking time off. Today I always tell my students if it hurts badly in a way it shouldn’t, they need to stop whatever it was that caused the pain and go have someone check it. This article is very informative – perhaps the most important part to note is that habitual improper technique can easily lead to years of problems with pain and injury. Read and enjoy!

The Hurt Factor

By Nancy Wozny

Andrea Dawn Shelley navigates the controlled adagio of Spencer Gavin Hering’s new work Ash with steady precision and understated femininity. No one would know she’s struggled with knee pain most of her dancing life. Shelley, a former dancer with Dominic Walsh Dance Theater and co-founder of iMEE, a dance company in Santa Barbara, California, has been dancing with pain since the age of 14, when her knee cap dislocated coming out of a pirouette. Four knee surgeries later, Shelley finds she’s in as much pain during rest or slow rehearsal days as when she’s dancing.

Dancers know that pain comes with the profession. Each body is unique, and so is the discomfort that it can generate. Pain that lasts over three months earns the “chronic” label. It has a different character and different causes than acute pain, which comes from sudden injury or the post-surgical healing process. The fact that pain is an invisible aliment further complicates the situation. Dancers can be torn between fears of time off and a life lived in discomfort. Yet no dancer blindly accepts pain as a constant. Think of it more as a problem to be solved—and solved before pain patterns settle in. Aggressive research of pain’s origins, coupled with physical therapy, advances in surgery, and alternative treatment methods, have helped dancers break out of the pain cycle.

Know your pain

Diagnosis plays a key role. Chronic pain need not be inevitable, says Dr. Peter Lavine, an orthopedist who treats dancers in Washington, DC. He recommends rigorously sleuthing your pain’s source. “Pain doesn’t sneak up on you,” he says. “Usually it’s related to an injury you are extremely familiar with.” Dancers often accept an initial diagnosis without investigating further. “Never hesitate to get a second opinion,” says Lavine. “Sometimes you need a new set of eyes on the problem.” Understanding pain’s root makes a difference in the entire approach to treatment. For instance, Lavine makes a distinction between neurological pain, where damage to nerves is involved, and degenerative pain, a by-product of overuse injuries or inflammatory conditions like arthritis. “An epidural could help neurological pain, while it’s not effective for problems like arthritis,” he says.

Getting to the bottom of your pain profile involves a thorough physical exam. Sometimes pain traces back to a condition that has little relation to dance. Your primary care doctor can rule out sources of spasm such as ovarian cysts or irritable bowel syndrome. “Food allergies can be a culprit,” says physical therapist Marika Molnar, who treats New York City Ballet dancers. “Lyme disease is another one that is frequently missed.”

Dancers tend to avoid any kind of treatment that might take them off-stage even for a short period. New York City Ballet principal Joaquin De Luz danced with knee pain for nearly two years. Finally tests revealed a serious tracking problem in his knee. “Adrenalin is a powerful drug,” says De Luz. “When the spotlights come on, you go out there and think you can overcome injuries.” After researching the best knee surgeons in the country, De Luz opted for surgery. After four months, he was back dancing pain-free.

Habit and help

Sometimes pain stems from something as treatable as how you are working. Molnar has seen many a pain problem resolved by looking more closely at a dancer’s technique. Change the habit and pain levels can change as well. “It’s possible to learn how to do things with the body in a way that changes the message to the brain,” says Molnar. (See sidebar.)

Even when technique doesn’t seem the culprit, alternative somatic practices like the Feldenkrais Method can yield real benefits. This uses gentle movement sequences that explore the brain-body connection and gradually alters habits that may be contributing to pain. Shelley investigated Feldenkrais early on in her professional career when she first began having pain. “While it didn’t make the pain go away,” she says, “it opened my mind to how relaxation is a factor in reducing it.”

Molnar has seen dancers benefit from less familiar alternative approaches, like skin rolling, also known as myofascial release, which is like massage. In this hands-on technique, the skin is lifted, stretched and squeezed. Because of the amount of nerve endings in the skin, practitioners say this permits new information to flow through the nervous system. “Lifting the skin can send a different message to the brain,” says Molnar, “and cut in between the pain.”

The emotional cycle of pain

There’s a longstanding debate about pain’s mental aspects. What can’t be seen is in your head, right? Yes and no. A dancer might feel more discomfort than the diagnosis indicates. Pain signals play out differently in each person. “What we tell ourselves about the extent of our pain can influence the amount that we feel it,” says Rachel Winer, Ph.D, a Houston psychologist and former dancer in private practice. “Pain can be facilitated or inhibited by attention, memory, and emotion.”

Unfortunately, Shelley eventually came to equate dance with pain. “I remember the day I realized pain was separate from dance,” she says. “I had assumed that everyone was in pain.” For Shelley, pain has been more about resolve than resolution. She takes a disciplined approach to managing it. Shelley found that aggressively icing sore limbs, occasional pain medication and a rigorous approach to warming up made dancing doable. So did taking hold of her artistic life. After several years with Houston’s Dominic Walsh and other companies like Miami’s Maximum Dance Company, Shelley wanted more control. She and her partner Spencer Gavin Hering recently started iMEE Dance Company. As co-artistic director, she decides what movement she can—and can’t—do. “I know my limitations,” she says. ”I don’t need to go over a new phrase repeatedly, and I can stay away from movements that cause me trouble.”

At peace with pain

While few dancers manage a pain-free career, they can have more control over pain than they realize. “Dancers need to become good pain discriminators,” says Winer. “There’s a big difference between good pain from learning a new movement and the kind that doesn’t go away or gets worse with time.”

Many dancers act as though ignoring pain were a way to make it disappear. But pain is the body speaking directly to the brain. Though many dancers shy away from medication, thinking it can make them fuzzy, Dr. Peter Lavine finds traditional anti-inflammatories a good place for dancers to start. And for nerve pain, “Ultram and Lyrica have been shown to be helpful and are non-narcotic,” he says.

Lavine, Winer, and Molnar all agree that, in most cases, moving (correctly) improves chronic pain. “It’s essential to life and pain reduction,” Molnar insists. “Movement circulates the blood and gets your body working again. Dancing is good medicine.” De Luz remembers his first pain-free plié post surgery. “My knee felt rusty, but it was amazing,” he says. Shelley maintains her resolve to stay a creative performer despite unpredictable pain. “Sometimes, I go through dark places,” she says. “I think I should quit because I have been dealing with it for so long. But then I step onstage and it’s all worth it. I am not willing to give that up. I enjoy it too much.”

Nancy Wozny is a culture and health writer in Houston.

Working Correctly

What you do makes a difference.

Poor technique can set a dancer up for prolonged trouble. Unless you change the pattern, the pain will remain. Ask a physical therapist to take a look at what you are doing at the barre that could be contributing to your pain. Remember that where pain feels like it occurs may not be its source. Pain often points to one place doing too much while another place is doing to little.

Marika Molnar, NYCB’s physical therapist, cites a dancer who came to physical therapy complaining of pain in the left knee at the infrapatellar junction (where the patellar tendon inserts). The pain began as intermittent, but had become constant. Molnar observed him do a series of basic movements such as demi-plié, relevé and tendus. “It was clear that he rolled in excessively on his left foot,” Molnar says. “He needed a greater awareness of the turnout of his left hip. Focusing on motor control of the hip, knee, and ankle maintains a healthy alignment and takes the stress off of the patella tendon.” The dancer felt a marked reduction in pain when he began to take a more holistic view of his body, concentrating on the connections between the foot, knee and hip joint.

To address similar problems, Molnar recommends doing 20–25 demi pliés in parallel while maintaining correct alignment. She then increases the neuromuscular challenge by having a dancer do the same movement with weight on just one leg, adding variety, complexity, and diversity to the neural system to gradually retrain the dancer’s work patterns.—NW

Nothing like a new pair of shoes to cheer a girl up…

So for the last week I have been coping with a pulled back muscle as a result of some potentially over-zealous teaching – needless to say it’s been a tough several days! My mood drastically improved, however, when I got home to find the gorgeous pair of brand new Gaynor Mindens I ordered had finally arrived! I have been using Gaynors for about eight years now, and they are by far my favorite brand of pointe shoes. I have extremely strong, high arches, and I used to use Russian Pointes with the strongest shank possible. Even those I used to break in after only a few weeks of use. After snapping the shank of a traditional pointe shoe mid-performance, I finally decided to make the switch to these modern-material shoes. They are extremely quiet and durable, and well worth the extra money I pay for them every few months.