Calling All Dancers!
Are you a dancer? Do you want to know how to recover from an injury that you’ve been dealing with? Or do you want to learn ways to drastically reduce your chance of injury? What about learning how to become even better with your technique?
It doesn’t matter if you are a professional who has been dancing for years, a teacher who spends many hours on your feet, an amateur who just does it for fun, or a 5 year old who dreams of becoming a ballerina some day. It also doesn’t matter what dance style you are interested in – ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, Irish step, West Coast Swing, ballroom, Latin, etc.
No matter what level you’re at and what discipline you’re pursuing, we can help you! I am not only a physical therapist, but also a trained dancer for most of my life. I started at the age of 3 with ballet and tap. I continued my training in these styles, with the addition jazz, until I was 18. I joined a special Performance group at my local studio when I was 9, and was then able to participate in two seasons of performances per year and audition for special roles. I took some time away from formal dance lessons while working on my undergraduate degree, but found that I was truly missing the dance life. I’m pretty sure that I drove my parents crazy with my leaping and spinning around the house, instead of taking classes. In physical therapy school, I ended up teaching lessons over the lunch hour on campus to anyone who wanted to learn. By the time that I finally began taking classes again, I was finishing my physical therapy degree. I added hip hop training, as well as some salsa. This is also when I fell in love with West Coast Swing. I continue to compete on the local and national circuits in West Coast Swing, including occasional travel to other cities for competitions.
Even as a physical therapy student, I had begun to learn how my background as a dancer could be helpful in my new profession. The most vivid memory of this took place during a clinical rotation in Washington, where I worked full-time for 8 weeks with a brilliant therapist. She had been a PT for at least 25 years, and was known to be an expert in the region. I was so fortunate to be able to train with her! We had a young dancer who had injured her hip, and had already started working with my instructor. By the time I’d arrived to the clinic, the dancer was back to “normal person” normal, but not “dancer normal”. My instructor felt like she’d hit a wall – she’d done everything she could think of, and had even made custom orthotic inserts for the girl’s pointe shoes! I timidly spoke up one day, asking if I could try something from my dance background. Within 2 weeks, I had our young dancer back to where she needed to be. I felt so proud when my instructor told me, “I probably would never have come up with the things you did. I’m glad you were here.”
That patient’s story, like so many others over the last several years, have inspired me to create a fusion of my two passions, and has led me to adding this special population to my clinic. In my many years of dance, no matter what style or venue, I have seen so many different injuries, whether it’s from one specific incident, or just from years of being tough on your body. I’ve also come to recognize certain injuries with different styles of dance, because of the demands placed on the body. My goal as a physical therapist is to now use my knowledge from both realms – dance and therapy – to get dancers back to their best, and to keep them at their best.
So if you are any sort of dancer and have any concerns, please call us at Back in Step Physical Therapy to get an appointment, and I’d love to work with you to meet your goals! Learn more about our dance specific services here.
Also check our our Dancer’s Kit!
