Butt Amnesia

Over the weekend I attended Vestido Rojo, A Day to Wear Red event in Corpus Christi, Texas by the American Heart Association. The event had different breakout sessions and one of them covered butt amnesia!

Yes, butt amnesia...it's a thing! It's more dignified name is gluteal amnesia butt (haha...typo humor) it is also known as "dead butt syndrome." Why? Essentially, your butt has forgotten how to do it's job. 

So what is your butt's job? It's job is to fire, that is, to work. Your butt is a muscle (more like 3 main muscles) and muscles are made to be used when we need them to work so we can do things like run, squat, climb, jump, lunge....are you seeing the issue yet? How many times during your day do you do any of those things?  I'm guessing almost never...

Unless you are making a cognizant effort to exercise, you too are probably suffering from butt amnesia! You might even be thinking I forget why I walk into a room on a daily basis already, how bad is this butt amnesia going to be??

First off, forgetting why you walked into a room is not related to normal aging (it's a sign of stress - something else I learned at Vestido Rojo).

Secondly, your glutes (butt muscles) are in the middle of your body, the stabilizers of the whole sha-bang that is YOU, and YOU cannot afford to have butt amnesia. Gluteal muscles not only stabilize your hips/pelvis but also connect to the rest of your body. If your muscles aren't firing the way they should, you run the risk of having lower back pain, balance issues, knee and ankle issues and asymmetries...butt amnesia is no joke!

So what's the real juicy double on this butt amnesia thing? The gluteal muscles aren't being used like they used to be thanks to the sedentary lifestyle Americans have become famous for: sit for work, sit for school, sit for TV watching (Netflix, anyone?), sit for getting around town, sit while your dinner is served, sit for video games (teenager?), you get the point...and now our gluteal muscles actually stop working properly and we get the butt amnesia label! Crazy! 

So what can you do to combat butt amnesia? Hip bridges and deadlifts. These will target the butt and set it on fire (good fire!), plus, you'll get that nice peachy butt lift 🙂

When you get ready to deadlift, look just a few feet in front of you, so that your neck is in line with your back. In the deadlifting picture, my neck is too extended, my gaze needs to be more down in front, not up so high.

Enjoy trying these "natural" booty lifting exercises to combat butt amnesia!

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