I accidentally prescribed 400 exercises per day to a client & here are the consequences.
I am vulnerably sharing with you a mistake I made 4 years ago, because there's a huge lesson for you in there.
So before Hand Coach Corinne, I worked at a Level 1 Trauma hospital in their outpatient hand therapy clinic for 7 years.
Many of my clients there had suffered from some sort of trauma or surgery to their hand; and as you can imagine, this requires a different type of effort than the prevention gems I am so often sharing with you.
One of my clients in particular stands out to me. We will call her Joanne (not her actual name).
Joanne had broken one of her wrists from a fall, then a little less than a year later after she had 'graduated' therapy, she fell and broke the other wrist.
Heartbreaking, right? She is also the sweetest human ever.
So I was rehabbing her hand after her second fracture, and she had JUST been cleared by her doctor for active motion exercises.
Over the course of maybe 2 sessions I had shared with her a few exercise sheets she should work on at home so she could benefit outside of therapy as well.
There's one thing about Joanne you must understand... she was such a rule follower, she had taken the exercise sheets I had given to her and had made a calendar with 5 time slots per day to do her exercises.
FIVE times per day, Corinne????
Yes, I used to prescribe that many exercise sets in a day.
It’s pretty much the norm for outpatient therapy - the therapist prescribes 2-3 sets of 10 exercises 5-6x/day but we don’t think about the consequences of providing such hard and fast rules...
...we don’t think about the fact that our client has a life, their own routines, their own demands...
...and that prescribing that many exercises just like it’s nothing, no big deal, could have significant consequences on their mental wellbeing.
So I prescribed the exercises, it was probably two quick 20 minute visits because that’s how it often is in outpatient hand therapy.
(let me know if this picture resonates with you at all lol)
You get word vomited at for 10-15 minutes...
...you receive an exercise sheet that’s been photocopied 5,820 times...
...you practice each exercise with your therapist ONCE, if you're lucky...
...then you go on your merry way, and you’re supposed to just be cool with doing these exercises you barely understand, have barely practiced, 5 TIMES A DAY!!!!!!
So Joanne returns to me after those sessions, and again - she’s a big rule follower - and had mapped out her entire exercise routine and color-coded it out for the entire month.
Y’all, she was SERIOUS about getting her hand back, ok????
And at first we were so excited about it.
But the next time she returned to me, when I asked how her exercises were going, she seemed less enthusiastic.
That glimmer in her eye was fading.
And by the following week, the entire session Joanne seemed totally disconnected.
When I asked her if she was ok, she said something like,
“I am just getting pretty tired of doing my exercises. Like, I feel like I can’t even see my friends or family because I have to do each one 2 sets of 10, 5x/day.”
At first I was shocked - I mean, yes, while I prescribed this level of exercises to her - because isn’t that what EVERY therapist does - I didn’t think she would actually do them all.
To the degree that the sheets that had been photocopied 5,820 times had said.
Which truly WAS 2 sets of 10, 5x/day
If you calculate that out, for 4 exercises at 2 sets of 10, 5x/day, that’s…80 exercises per session... times 5x/day… makes it 400 hand exercises each day.
400.
I truly don’t believe any therapist ever intends to prescribe this many hand exercises per day, I think therapists are often busy and just see the easy, timeless (🙃) exercise sheet with a generic rule about frequency and over-prescribe...
...because we think we know that no one would actually do that many exercises...
...so somehow we still need to prescribe it because we fear if we were to prescribe something more reasonable, our clients would do less still?
I'm calling BS on this narrative. And I used to buy into it.
This narrative is A) showing that we as therapists don’t believe in our clients, in you.
Which is unintentionally communicating that we don’t believe you will actually do what we tell you to do.
It’s unfortunately communicating that we don’t TRUST you, and if WE, the authority, the therapists, don’t trust you, why the FLYING FUDGECAKE should YOU trust YOURSELF???
😓 This way of approaching exercises ultimately often leads to you not trusting in yourself or in your own judgment.
Overprescribing exercises also often B) sets you up for failure.
Like, why are we setting you up for failure? Why are we, as healthcare providers, therapists, doctors, nurses, etc. so often making quick, sweeping, broad generalizations that in turn set you up for failure because they’re either unattainable, or not even necessarily pertinent to you as an individual??
(And this could easily turn into a whole other conversation regarding the state of our healthcare system, because this certainly isn’t just limited to therapy, but for now I’ll leave it at that)
So this is exactly the reason why I have created The Exercise Vault.
Rather than making you DISTRUST yourself, you’ll feel like you trust yourself more than ANYONE ELSE, especially when it comes to your health and your hands.
Instead of getting that exercise sheet that’s been photocopied 5,820 times, you'll get access to replayable videos and very clear printable sheets with pictures of my own hands doing the exercises.
We’re ditching the rigid rules here and instead, I am showing you how to actually HAVE FUN with your exercises to create a SUSTAINABLE ROUTINE THAT 👏 WORKS 👏 FOR 👏 YOU!
I hope sharing my story as a therapist resonates with you in some way.
I hope if you've ever been made to feel like you have to somehow *do it all* when it comes to your hands, or your health in general, that you leave this email feeling empowered that more is not more.
'More is more' just burns you the heck out.
Here's the truth:
Less is more, my friend, on a very consistent and sustainable basis.
And trusting yourself and your discernment???
Absolutely priceless.
Much love.
