In a recent workshop the teacher told the class to have ‘an anterior tuck of the pelvis, but counter nutation of the coccyx’.
For some people this sentence is easy to decipher, for others it requires some investigation. I have translated it into Sandra-speak for those who would like some deciphering.
‘Stick your bum out, like a duck waddling sexily and at the same time tuck your tail under like a scared whippet dog hiding his tail’.
Does that make sense to you?
Give it a go. Doesn’t it make you start doing weird humping motions in mid-air?
So down a rabbit hole or 5, I venture…
Rabbit hole number 1- My scared whippet tail
Do I have a tail? Not anymore… There are lots of things we once had, but evolution meant we lost almost all of their original functions. Here are a few examples of this human vestigiality : muscles of the ear, wisdom teeth, the appendix, body hair, a fold in the corner of the eye and having a tail.
Rabbit hole number 2
Can I wag what is left of my tail? No Sandra, because you don’t have a tail. Besides you can’t move your tailbone (coccyx) independently of the low back (sacrum).
Rabbit hole number 3
If I move my low back (sacrum) can I then wag my tail? As much as you’d like a tail, you really don’t have one, so stop it… You can’t move your sacrum independently, let alone consciously.
Rabbit hole number 3.1
Has anybody ever had a tail? Yes, but it is extremely rare and seen as an abnormality. Men are twice as likely to have them than females and are surgically removed as they are inconvenient to have. In some parts of the world human tails are stigmatized, but in some parts of India they are considered blessings or gifts from the gods.
Rabbit hole number 4
Does this area ever move? Technically speaking no, if you are still thinking about a tail or raising that area like a pinkie finger while drinking a cup of earl grey. However, there is some minimal movement at the sacroiliac joint as everything is bound so firmly. Every tilt, rotation, and postural shift of the pelvis as a whole effects the spine.
Rabbit hole number 5
What is this sacroiliac joint? In a foetus, each hip bone is made up of the ilium (the bony bit of the hip), the ischium (the bony bit when you sit) and the pubic bone- (the bony bit hidden by pubic hair) These 3 segments are fused together in adults.
If you slot the sacrum and coccyx (the lowest part of the spine with ‘tail’) into this structure, then we have created a rather ingenious apparatus.
Where you've slotted these two structures into each other is the joint called the sacro (from sacrum) iliac (from illium) joint. The movement in this area is a hotly debated subject which at the moment is from 2-18degrees.
So what about this cue of ‘an anterior tuck of the pelvis, but counter nutation of the coccyx’?
Well, you can tilt the pelvis backwards and forwards. In this case, I can tip it anteriorly and get my duck waddle on, but then asking me 'to tuck my coccyx like a tail underneath me' isn’t anatomically possible. BUT if you pretend you can do it then, you are more likely to keep the pelvis in neutral and engage inner muscles that keep the whole of the lumbar spine long.
Why not just say ‘keep the pelvis neutral and the spine long’? I’ve not found a good answer to this question, except perhaps it might sound as though we are not meant to do anything and that is not the case.
What is your point Sandra?
Listen to your body and chose the cues that make sense to you and work for you. Cues are just suggestions, not the law.
For some pelvises that naturally spend most of their time in a tuck position -a suggestion of an anterior tilt or duck butt might work wonders.
For those whose home is in the opposite direction, tucking in their tail might work wonders.
For those of us who want tails, it just makes us go down rabbit holes only to come out the other end with a different type of tale.
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