Wee! Hey everybody, it's Doctor Jo! Today I'm gonna
show you some aquatic therapy exercises standing in one place. The best thing to do is get
a set of weights for you ankles. If you don't have any weights and your in the pool, sometimes
you tend to float up a little bit and you want your feet to be on the ground. These
are just 1.5 pounds each, so 3 pounds total. That's what you want to start off with something
light, but if you get stronger, then you can add more weight. So I'm gonna put my weights
on, let's get going. The big thing to remember about aquatic therapy
exercises is to have good posture while you are doing it. If you're swinging and you can
see the sky and the pool, then you're not doing it right. You want your upper body to
be nice and straight the whole time. So the first exercise I'm gonna show you is just
a hip flexion and extension together. You want to pull your toe up tight. That's gonna
lock out your knee because you want to keep your knee nice and tight. That's going to
give you some good resistance. So you are going to bring it to the front and to the
back keeping it straight the whole time, and do that about 10 times. Remember if you feel
yourself swinging, then you're not doing it right and you want to start over and not push
quite as hard. Do 10 on one side, and then switch and do 10 on the other side. You want
to work both legs even if you only have an injury on one side because while I'm swinging
my left side, working that side, I'm stabilizing with my right side. So you're actually working
both sides as you do it. The next one is gonna be doing hip abduction and adduction going
across your body. You really want to keep your toes pointed forward the whole time.
Many times when people swing out, they kick their foot out this way. That is changing
the muscle you are using. So try to keep your feet pointed forward the whole time. Lock
out that knee and kick out to the side and across your body. Remember to do 10 on each
side. Then you can work your way up from there. The next one is going to be a hamstring curl.
With the hamstring curl, you really want to keep your hips in a neutral position. The
hips aren't moving. You're just going to bend at your knee and kick back like you are trying
to kick your bottom. If you hip bends and your knee comes up forward, that's not the
exercise that I'm looking for. So push that leg back down, if you have to put your hand
on it, that's fine. Keep your upper body nice and straight, and kick back. Remember to do
it on both side. The next one, we call it the Rockette kicks. Yes, we are testing your
balance and your dancing ability. Keep your upper body nice and straight. Bend your knee
up towards you, kick your leg out, it's really going to stretch your hamstrings. Pull back
in and come down. If you get too much of a stretch or you can't straighten out your knee
when you're kicking out, then don't bring your knee quite as high. Just about halfway
bring it up and kick out, because this is a big stretch back there and that's what you
want. Make sure you do both sides, kicking out, coming back in. Now you are going to
work your calves, and your anterior tib muscles in the front. Spread your feet out about shoulder
width apart. You're gonna go up on your toes as high as you can. Really stretch high, and
then roll back onto your heels. Now, I'm not sticking my bottom back, I'm really just pulling
my toes up when I do that. So rock back and forth. You can start off with about 15 of
these. Up and back. And then finally, you're gonna do some squats. Now the squats are just
as important in the pool as they are on land. You want to spread your feet about shoulder
width apart to give yourself some good balance. If your knees come in front of your toes,
remember that's not what you want. You want to keep your knees pretty much in the same
spot. Stick your bottom back, bring your chest forward and keep your feet flat on the ground.
If you're coming up on your toes, then your not quite doing it right. And if you're rocking
back on your heels, then you don't have good balance. So keep the back straight, chest
forward, bottom back. Just like you are going to sit down in a chair. So try about 15 of
those. Those are the simple exercises. If those are easy, you can not hold on, kicking
back and forth working on balance. Or if that's easy, hold on start off with your slow, do
about 10 of them, and then do 10 fast. Not quite as big movements, but a lot faster.
That will give you more resistance. But remember if you are swinging, that's not what you want,
and you are not ready for those yet. Those were some aquatic therapy exercises.
If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section. If you want to check out
some more videos, go to askdoctorjo.com. Don't forget to follow me on Facebook and Twitter.
Remember be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon!