Hi Thomas,
I know only too well that muscle imbalances can cause bad pain. And I agree that doctors and physiotherapists are pretty clueless when it comes to treating the more complex cases.

I’ve obviously focused on the imbalances associated with hip OA, but the basic principles will be the same. The body has evolved to move in a particular way so when something goes wrong the imbalance tends to follow set patterns.

If your psoas is causing the pain then my first point would be that it’s highly likely that the root cause is elsewhere in your body. You won’t get results by focusing on the psoas.

I strongly recommend that you stop stretching – too much risk of stretching the wrong thing and making matters worse. Your body tightens up to create stability – usually because a muscle somewhere else isn’t working. The solution is to figure out which muscle is lazy (usually quite a few of them), get that working and from there things tend to improve quickly.

I normally suggest a couple of quick and dirty tests for people to try to get an idea of what type of imbalance they have. However, I don’t want to do that with you as you are in so much pain.

Send me a private message using my contact form. Give me what information you can about your posture. Both now, and from what you can remember prior to developing this pain. For example, did you have an anterior pelvic tilt (a sticking out belly and big curve in your low back)? posterior tilt (backside tucked up) or swayback posture (hips thrust forwards, upper back leaning back)?

Have you ever been aware of one side of your pelvis swinging back or forwards more when you stand/walk?

Have you ever had a sense of one leg being too long? Or one hip being hitched up?

Tell me what you can. Also tell me what led you to believe the psoas was the cause of your pain as your reasoning might help to give clues as to the nature of the imbalance.

Don’t give up! It’s just a matter of finding the lazy muscles and getting them working again.

My name is melhem 37 yrs old,chatting from Belize City,I am a person that have been in pain for 15 yrs and in need of my both hip replaced,after November of 2015 the pains just got sevear,Im a person of great fate and im sure there is an angel out ther that will assist me,God is great so my prayers will be answered.My email is [removed for privacy reasons]

Hi Fran!!! – and thank you 🙂

Thank you Amanda. I’ll do my best to help. I think I can help a lot of people diagnosed with hip OA as that’s what I have first hand experience of and I now know of a curable condition that will be mistaken for OA. However many of the things that have helped me will be relevant to lots of OA-like conditions.

Nafisa, I agree that exercise is the best thing. I was advised to cut back on exercise. I went along with that advice for a while but I got worse. When I started training normally again things improved.

As soon as I get time I’ll post up details of what worked best for me for pain relief. There’s an awful lot possible without drugs!