Movement
Nervous System Regulation
Science-Backed Education
Holistic Self-Care and Sustainable Healing

Nav Social Icons

Looking for something?

Skip to primary navigation
Skip to main content
Skip to footer

Home
Blog
Shop
- Products
- Cart
- My Account
About
Contact
Contact
Meet the Team
FAQ

Mobile Menu Widgets

Connect

Search

Looking for something?

PT Complete

Promoting fitness and wellness for the mind, body, and soul.

Home
Blog

About
Contact

Holistic Self-Care and Sustainable Healing

Sort By:

Burnout and Fatigue

Habits for Healing

Navigating Long-Term Pain

Rest and Recovery

Strong Looks Different Now: Working Out With Chronic Pain in Real Life

7 Tips to Break Sedentary Habits Without Overhauling Your Life

Body Awareness: The Foundation of Movement, Regulation, and Healing

How to Reconnect With Your Body (When You’ve Felt Disconnected for Years)

Back Pain Travel Tips: A Physical Therapist’s Guide to Long Drives and Flights

Managing Arthritis Pain in Cold Weather with Simple Daily Strategies

← Previous
Page 1
Page 2
Page 3
Next →

Follow Along

terasandona

Chronic pain coaching for high-achieving women
Licensed DPT • Regulate first, rebuild second, then layer
👇🏻 Free nervous system workbook

Honeymoon photo dump incoming!! 🏝️☀️🌊👙⛱️🍾💍❤️

Honeymoon photo dump incoming!! 🏝️☀️🌊👙⛱️🍾💍❤️

I stood in front of my fridge for an hour. Couldn’

I stood in front of my fridge for an hour. Couldn’t decide, not even sure I was hungry. Just stuck. And one decision felt like the hardest thing I’d been asked to do all day, even though I’d made decisions all day long without a second thought.

I kept wondering what was wrong with me. Turns out, nothing was.

Fight, flight, and freeze are all protective responses your nervous system reaches for under threat. Fight and flight speed you up. They give you the energy to push back or get away. Freeze does the opposite. It shuts things down because there’s nothing left to fight with or run from.

That fridge moment wasn’t a discipline problem. It was my nervous system running out before dinner could be decided and made.

Freeze doesn’t get talked about as much as fight or flight, but it’s just as real and it shows up in the most ordinary places…a kitchen, a closed laptop, a decision that shouldn’t be hard and somehow is.

If you’ve had a night like this, you already know exactly what I’m talking about.

If this sounds familiar, tell me in the comments, or text someone who’d know exactly what I mean.

I reached for the weights I used to lift before my

I reached for the weights I used to lift before my brain caught up.

It took half a second in my garage. The half second was the moment I realized I couldn’t even lift the dumbbell. I registered the gap between the body I used to train and the body I have now.

I dialed back down. Instead of the 30s, I picked up the 10s, and I did the work that fits what my system can absorb right now.

Nobody warns you that the rebuilding work has these moments built into it. The half-seconds when your old identity reaches for a load your current capacity can’t carry, and you mistake the disappointment for evidence that you are failing.

Your current body is not a smaller version of the one you used to have. It is a different body, doing real work, on a different scale.

You can train this one.

Tag the woman who’s still reaching for the weight she used to lift. Remind her she’s not alone.

I currently do not squat, lunge, or deadlift. I g

I currently do not squat, lunge, or deadlift.

I get why everyone defaults to these movements. They’re efficient, they build strength, and if your body can tolerate them, there’s nothing wrong with having them in a program.

For a long time, I assumed that if I pushed through it, my body would eventually catch up. That’s not how it works when you’re dealing with chronic pain. Pushing through leads to a setback fast.

Your back is tied directly into what your hips and legs are doing. Careful form can only take it so far out of the equation, especially when weakness is involved.

A few months ago, I was doing bodyweight versions of these same exercises at home. Every time, it aggravated my back. So I stepped back to isolated machines instead.

Here’s what made it click. I couldn’t even tolerate a leg extension machine at 30lbs. I weigh about 120. There was no version of me safely squatting my own bodyweight and that’s still true right now.

Isolated machines do exactly what they’re built for. They isolate one muscle group and take my back out of the equation so I can still train and progressively add weight at a pace that’s safe for my body.

If a compound lift keeps interfering with your back, this is where I’d start looking instead.

If this is the kind of order-of-operations thinking that’s useful to you, hit follow. That’s exactly what I break down here.

Follow on Instagram

Footer

On the Blog

Movement
Nervous System Regulation
Science-Backed Education
Holistic Self-Care and Sustainable Healing

Info

About
Privacy Policy
Contact
Disclaimers
Terms of Use

stay in the know

.

This website is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

Copyright © 2026 · Theme by 17th Avenue