Maggie Downie, Author at Personal Euphoria: Pilates & Fitness Classes in CT

About Maggie Downie

Thank you for giving your time to stop and read my blog. I hope it encourages you to keep moving. Move and the body will be happier. And when you're moving you can hike, run, swim in Jell-O, race over non-Newtonian fluids, travel the world or build igloos--if that's your thing. If not, you can watch me do it. This is just a spot to try and feel good about life.

Dinosaurs Didn’t Drag Tails

Just Say NO to Tailbone Tucking!

Dinosaurs didn’t drag their tails and neither should you. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure when I was a child pictures of dinosaurs depicted their tails on the ground. Even the T-Rex was pretty upright with a tail on the ground. But it turns out, dino tails didn’t drag. At least one of the reasons science now leans this way is because for all the dinosaur tracks out there, they haven’t found a lot of tail drags. It doesn’t seem too hard to believe. Dogs and cats don’t drag their tails on the ground.

But we shouldn’t drag our tails either. Now, we don’t have tails, but we do tend to tuck our tailbone under, especially when we sit at a desk all day or drive in a car. Even when we stand many of us push our pelvis forward in space, ultimately tucking our tailbone—an unhealthy position for our low back, hip flexors and pelvic floor. So next time you’re sitting down, or if you are sitting now, try to untuck your tail bone and sit up […]

Dinosaurs Didn’t Drag TailsMaggie Downie2017-09-12T19:31:12-04:00

Chill Out for Better Results…It’s Not All or Nothing

The barefoot running movement got a pretty bad reputation because anecdotally lots of people got hurt barefoot running. If I got seriously injured doing something I attempted to do for my health, I’d stop too. If I loved running before I altered the way I did it and hated it now, I go back to my old ways. It makes sense.

One of my friends tore both his Achilles tendons running with minimalist shoes. But what he did and what many barefoot runners did was push too much too fast. The barefoot running movement and the makers of minimalist shoes all said if you want to make this change you have to start slow—really slow. Go too fast and you’ll get hurt. Taking on more than we are ready for is a major reason people new to exercise stop moving. They work too hard in a hope to get quick results, get hurt and don’t want to continue. Some people associate exercise with pain and getting hurt. That’s always been their experience. Moving doesn’t have to hurt, and should NEVER hurt in a “bad” way. The concept of no pain no gain has been disproved, but it is a really hard […]

Chill Out for Better Results…It’s Not All or NothingMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:49-04:00

89-Year-Old Grandma Crawls Inside Igloo

My Grandma turned 89 in February. A couple months ago we went shopping for a new pair of slippers. She balanced on one foot while untying her shoe, slid her foot out of her shoe and into the slipper. She may have held my hand through the process, but her balance was impeccable. And this is a woman who had polio as a child. Her legs are two different lengths. There was a point in her life when all her leg muscles had atrophied after spending months strapped to a wooden board, immobilized.

Ruth at 89 outside the Igloo

Still, it came as no surprise when she announced that for her 89^th birthday she wanted to see the igloo we had built, and she even wanted to go inside. You had to crawl to get in. My mom suggested we could lay down a tarp and pull her in if Ruth inside the igloo!

she couldn’t get in on her own. I’m not sure when something turns from fun game with Grandma to elder […]

89-Year-Old Grandma Crawls Inside IglooMaggie Downie2017-10-25T15:59:36-04:00

Does Movement Feel Good?

When was the last time you went to a fitness class and it felt good? Hopefully, the answer is, “Yesterday, I love the way my (insert class name here) feels every week.” I hope you thought that. I’m with you. I love to move. Throw me in almost any type of class and I’m going to enjoy it. I’m happy in motion, probably to a fault. But even when it feels good to move, it’s not always fun.

There is a free, silliness to movement that we tend not to hold onto as we age. It’s been drilled out of us. I watch my friend’s kids giggling over summersaults. They will spin in circles until they collapse in a heap. I’m not advocating circle spinning. The thought of doing that now makes me nauseous. The last time a rolled down a hill (about a decade ago) I learned that it is more torture than fun in my body. Things change. But kids get so much joy out of motion, and half the moves are concocted, on a whim and beyond goofy looking. They don’t care.

I saw the video of this little girl, who was clearly enjoying herself dancing to a different beat […]

Does Movement Feel Good?Maggie Downie2017-10-25T15:49:42-04:00

Neck Hurts When I Do Ab Exercises

Where does the neck look the happiest to you?

Have you ever felt neck pain when you lift your head off the ground to do an abdominal exercise?

If yes, you’ve come to the right place.

If no, you may be the luckiest person on the planet.

If you have a neck injury (have had whip lash, have a disc-related issue, or slept on it funny, etc.) than you need to relax. That is not pain you want to work through. You may need to reign in the exercises you are doing and only do ab-work with the head down for the time being. You can get a really good abdominal challenge with your head on the floor.

If you don’t have any neck issues, but your neck often or always hurts when you do ab work, there is also no reason you should work through bad pain. But it is worth experimenting to find a place you don’t feel pain. What I’ll call bad pain puts your neck at risk and is a sign that you’re abs aren’t really doing the work. So, why work through […]

Neck Hurts When I Do Ab ExercisesMaggie Downie2017-09-12T19:31:13-04:00

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