Get Rid Of Piriformis Pain Fast & Forever

Here's what no one tells you about piriformis pain. The piriformis isn't even the problem. It's often taking the blame for weak glutes, tight hips, and movement compensation patterns you've been doing for years. — That's a mouthful, Mike. — It is. — But, we are going to give you options, uh some massages, stretches, and strengthening exercises to clear this up. — And to do this, we're going to take a look at an older video Bob and Brad did 3 years ago explaining all of this, but make sure to stay tuned cuz we come back, we got some more options for you. — go. Now, are you ready? — I'm staying. — We're ready back there. Okay, we're going through the time warp again. All right, here we go. The tardis is

here. Could you get Gumby? I don't want to take him with us. Yeah, here we go. Ready? Here we go. — [screaming] — Okay, first of all, we need to know the anatomy of the piriformis muscle. And if

you look from the backside, it's going to actually connect underneath the sacrum, and then it comes out and this pink tape actually represents where it is. It's a pretty good representation of it, actually. It goes over and connects to the hip. The hip, the greater trochanter, that's just outside the ball of the hip. Okay, now if you look, you're going to see this yellow, this represents the sciatic nerve. Now, if this muscle tightens up too tight, it can put pressure on that sciatic nerve. Not only does it cause pain here from the muscle being contracted and over tighten, but it can put pressure on the nerve and give symptoms all the way down to the foot and into the toes. — called fake sciatica, sometimes. — Right, exactly right. So, usually sciatica comes from the back. In this case, similar symptoms — coming — from this area. So, with that whole goal is to relax this muscle, take the pressure off the sciatic nerve, as well as the pain of the tight muscle just being relaxed and uh relieved.

Okay, we're first going to cover some soft tissue work and some stretches that can often times help relax that muscle and work well. Uh Bob is in what we call the 90/90 position. — Right. — Lying on his back, you can do this in the living room with a chair. Uh we just have a stool here. You use a stool or a chair. And often times — the ottoman often times this will offer relief right away and you'll feel that muscle relax. The next thing you can do now so actually let let's talk about an option if you don't have that or simply go in what we call hook lying position. Now, let's say Bob has his piriformis on his right side's tight. He's going to grab his right knee and pull it up and over across to his opposite shoulder. That stretches. You will feel this. If you had a tight piriformis, you will feel it right there in the buttocks. What you can do if that's a tight one, put that down and to test it, do the other leg. Every time I had someone with a piriformis problem — Me, too. — and you have them compare one side to the other, they say, "Oh, is there a big difference? " Yep. — Uh so, then you're going to work on that. Sometimes a stretch will be enough to eliminate that tight muscle. Sometimes it's so tight we need to work a little bit harder. Okay, the next stretch that can work really well. This is for uh someone who's pretty mobile. Uh it can be a little challenging, but if you're mobile and you know, more athletic, it works really well. Although, we can both

do it. We're old. — So, you go in this position and then bring this foot across. This is the way I do it and I just simply reach here and I reach here and it's the pigeon pose. I'm really not This is a yoga stretch and I'm not you know yoga people — vision. — Yeah. And yoga people say there's a couple things you're doing wrong but I definitely feel that piriformis being stretched right there. I'm fairly tight with this stretch. I just start working on it in the last few months. But again, do this side say if that was my tight one and then do the other side and you will and actually my right side is tighter. — It does. — Yeah, see — that boy that's a big difference. — I don't have piriformis syndrome but obviously my right hip and piriformis is tighter. So that's why I'm working on it at home. So work with that you're going to hold it for you know 10 up to 30 seconds. If you feel that muscle relax and just melt away and the pain go away you know you're right on. If not, we've got another option.

Okay, now we're going to go into some options for some soft tissue work. We're going to get into that muscle and relax it through being a little more aggressive. We can start out with a tennis ball. I'm going to go down on the floor, put the tennis ball here. Right there is where that piriformis is and you'll find out when you start rolling on it. I'm supporting my weight through my arms and my feet so I'm not getting too aggressive and you'll find when you hit the tight spot it's going to bite a little bit. — Right. — But if it feels like oh it hurts so good and then you get off of it and it feels better you continue to work it. — Right. — If it hurts and you stop — it hurts down the leg. — Yes, exactly. You don't want it to hurt so bad that it makes pain down the leg. That's a bad thing. — If it recreates the pain. — Right, exactly. So use it gently to start out with and see how it responds. You may spend a minute or two with that. If you have a foam roller these can work very nicely as well. They're not as aggressive as the tennis ball. Um and then you're just going to work on it here and back and forth. And work around it often times works better and then get onto that tight spot of the piriformis. — Woah, you're back. Welcome back to the modern

time. — Yes, that was a nice trip. Everything went smooth. I forgot Gumby. He would just turn 3 years younger. That's all right. We'll get him next time. — Uh, so we're going to talk about some other massaging options. Uh, so what we're going to do is I said a lot there.

Anyway, we're going to go into massage guns cuz if you happen to have one, you could use that as well with the piriformis. Now, you can use different sizes, whatever you have available to you, but Brad had You normally do this laying down, don't you? — I do. Um, you know, a bigger gun if you're a larger person, if you want to get a massage gun, if you're a smaller lighter person. Uh, but you know, actually those smaller guns, if you're not real serious about getting deep into your muscles, they do a pretty good job. I've used both of them for me and they both work fine. This one definitely gets in deeper. — Now with massage guns, you have to figure out how sensitive the piriformis area is for you. It is rather muscular, but if you get on the bone of the outside femur here, it can be kind of sensitive. So you may want a softer head on your massage gun attachment uh, to use initially before getting into an aggressive or firmer one. I like to personally sit when I'm doing this or even lay down on my back. Uh, so if I'm just going to go to the floor here real quick and I will stretch the area out as I'm kind of massaging it. So you can either go across body like this. You could try just a figure four. If you really struggle with lifting your leg up, you know, you can just lay on your side if you're really that tight or have limited mobility and try massaging it this way. And if it is your piriformis and you're in this general area, you will feel it right away. And then if this is too gentle on you and you want to get a little more aggressive, you can use a firmer massage head, but just take caution with it. — Yeah, uh there's alternates like this C2 Pro has a red light massage head, you can see it here, and it heats up. That feels good, it makes it nice. Uh one thing that I really like about the this is a new head as well. It's curved and it's broad and it spreads out the forces. So, it really um gets a nice massage that's not too aggressive. So, yeah, I don't know if you'll be able to see this too much, but I'm going to work it here and you're really going across a broad area and it's not real aggressive, but it definitely works it out. I really I'm really I really like it. Go ahead, I'm going to keep massaging. — So, I'm going to show you some exercises. We're going to go over four different options you can try depending upon what your fitness level is and what you're comfortable with. Often times, if your piriformis gets tight, your glutes are weak or you're compensating for something. So, we're going to start with the glute max. We're just going to do a

simple bridge. Lie on your back. You can do this on the bed if you struggle to get to the floor, but it may not be as steady. If you can get to the floor, do it on the floor. A glute bridge, you're just going to squeeze your butt cheeks together. Make sure your tummy muscles are nice and tight. My low back is into the mat and then I'm going to lift up in the air. You can hold for 3 to 5 seconds and come back down. You can have arms for support if you're really weak. If you can get all the way up in a nice line like I am right here, you can try advancing this a little more. If the you struggle can barely lift up, first master how to get into a nice neutral line like this. Uh if this becomes easy, you can try making it harder by adding a band loop around your hips. Uh thank you. — There you go. — So, just put this around your knees on both sides. You can do this way, so now you're getting some external rotation with the glute pumps like this and the bridges. If this becomes easy, you can take the band away again and just do one leg variations if you're a little more active and agile. But, that is a simple way to do a glute strengthening exercise. The next one we're going to hit the rotators a little more. So, we're going to do clamshells. — The clamshell. — So, we're going to lay on our side and then rotate out away from you and back down. If this is really hard or you have

limited range of motion, you don't have to use a band initially. Just start like this. You can do anywhere between 5 to 10 repetitions. You can do it for two to three sets. Make sure to do one side, you turn over and do the other side. And go nice, slow, and controlled and as far as you comfortably can with this. Don't just go back and forth in this little motion cuz you're not doing a lot. And don't compensate with your whole body by turning toward the ceiling like this. — Mike, I got another idea. — What? — If you're lying on your back, go back to your back and do the uh abduction. With Now, you have the band

on. I think and this is something that people could try to instead of work the piriformis, put it on slack. Take that out once. And then squeeze. Squeeze. — adductors. — Yeah, so you get the adductors more. Um you know, play your in. — While we're doing this or while we're doing the bridge? — ahead. Bridge. Yeah, that's what I meant. Mhm. — Now, you can do a pillow or you can take a small rubber ball. Like not quite a kickball size, a little smaller. — Yep. Yeah. — can squeeze that in between your legs as well. If the pillow seems too much or you can take it and fold it up this way if that's too aggressive to do it thin. But, yeah, it's a different You get inner groin kind of muscles, your adductors, firing in as well, in case they're not working properly. — Yeah, well, I think sometimes they get overlooked, so I wanted to point that out. — Next is side lying hip abduction. So

I'm laying on my side like this, my leg is straight, I have a nice straight line, I'm not bent too much, and you're just going to kick up towards the ceiling. I like to bend my bottom leg like this, so I kind of make a kickstand, so I don't feel like I fall over. You can certainly keep it straight if you feel nice and steady. Go up as far as you can, don't compensate by rotating out or falling out too much. Again, you can do five to 10 repetitions, do two to three sets per leg. Just take your time with it. Again, you could add a loop band if this seems too easy or a cuff weight around the ankle to add some resistance there, and it's going to make it a lot more challenging. — Uh, I'm a little sore. I ran a marathon 2 days ago, so this is work for me right now. Anyway, uh, that's option three for exercises, and we got one more. Now, if you are still having a lot of pain, you maybe don't want to do this one yet, um, but if you are able to, it's just a single leg deadlift. We also call it, what did you guys used to call it a golfer's lift or something like that? — Oh, I was going to say, yeah, that's a golfer's lift. — the back leg hinges back, and you just go down and then come up. So, hold on to support if you need, keep a nice straight neutral spine. Notice I'm not hinging like and you'll feel it in your glutes as well as your hamstring area like this. So, just hinge down till you feel a stretch, come back up. They call it a golfer's lift because if you're golf you're golfing, you're bending down to pick up your golf ball at the hole, you go down like this and rotate up. Some common things I see issues with are people start rotating like this, or they hinge too much, so try to keep a nice neutral spine as you hinge forward. If you're really struggling, hold on, Otherwise, you don't have to if you're good at it. — You're making it very complicated to pick a golf ball up. — Well, you don't have to pick up a golf ball. That's the beauty of it. Again, if that becomes easy, you can certainly add weight. Just grab a dumbbell or something very light, maybe a half gallon of milk, and then you can add some resistance. Just going like that. — Not water? Half gallon water? — Well, water won't spoil if you leave it out. So, maybe water. So, those are your options for strengthening. So, give those all a try. Try the stretches, the massaging, and the strengthening, and just pick which ones you feel like do the best. You don't have to do everything in this video, and give it some time, and see how your piriformis area feels after that. — Right. It typically doesn't go away in one day. Oh, there you go. — Now, piriformis pain can also be similar to sciatica pain, or can cause sciatica.

So, if you are not getting relief from this, you can click the video link on the screen. — Yeah, how to relieve sciatic pain in seconds, and long-term success, which is what we really want. — You're out of breath talking and

exercising at the same time. — You're doing good after running a marathon. Wow. — My legs don't agree, but okay. Thanks for watching. — Bob and Brad, the two most famous physical therapists on the internet.