Kirkland Life Chiropractic

Body tempering is not a massage and it is not gentle.

It is dense, sustained pressure rolled through whatever took the most volume this week — quads after a soccer weekend, lats after throwing, calves after a meet. It is for muscle that has gone stiff and stopped moving well between games.

It's the service athletes ask to come back for. They feel the difference walking out, and with a teenager that is the entire battle.

Best booked the day after a hard game or tournament.

He will tell you he is fine. He will mean it.

And he will also lie awake after the match that rattled him, and be a half-second slow into the first contact session back, and neither of those things will come up at dinner.

Settling after a collision, sleep the night after a match, nerves before the return — this is Katy's part of it. The nervous system doesn't get cleared by anyone, because nobody checks it.

Coming back to a contact sport has a step that coming back to volleyball does not: at some point he has to be willing to put his body into someone.

Physically, the work is adjustments for neck and mid-back once he's cleared, soft tissue for the side that compensated, graded movement work as contact returns, and red light through the week while it ramps.

The other half is Katy's — sleep, settling, and the nerves before the first contact session back. Hesitation in a tackle is how people get hurt, so this isn't a soft add-on. It's the safety part.

We are proud supporters of the Eastside Lions Rugby Club ! Please come watch this weekend !

With players joining from Liberty Rugby Club and Seattle Vikings Rugby Club, The Lions welcome touring side from London. Kick off 11:00 AM Saturday at UW Rec. Field 2.

Game is the curtain raiser for University of Washington Men’s Rugby's Alumni weekend game against WWU Mens Rugby.

Seattle Seawolves Rugby Rugby Washington

A rugby player's neck does a job no other athlete's neck does, and almost nobody trains it until something goes wrong.

Through a season: neck and upper back mobility, hamstring and hip prep for repeat sprinting, Jason's body tempering between matches, and red light and the vibe plate once the match is behind them.

The recovery day is the one families get wrong. The day after a match is when the body decides what the rest of the week is going to feel like, and it's almost always spent doing nothing. Get them in the first day we're open after a match weekend and the difference shows up by Thursday.

Rugby week.

Rugby asks a body to do everything at once — sprint, stop, take contact, get back up and do it again. The injuries we see most at Kirkland Life aren't the dramatic ones. They're the neck and upper back strain that builds up over a season of scrums and tackles, the shoulder that stops feeling right after a hard hit, the hamstring that goes in the last ten minutes, the hip and groin that tighten from cutting.

Most of it is manageable if you catch it early. Most of it gets worse if you don't.

If your athlete is hurt, get them evaluated first. Then we can talk about keeping them on the pitch.

All week we're covering rugby — what we see, what helps, and who on our team can help with what.

Club Volleyball season does not have an off week. It has Monday.

She played four matches Saturday and three more Sunday. Then Monday she goes to school, goes to practice, and starts the whole thing again on a body that never got a reset.

Twenty minutes or less in the Red Light Recovery Room — standing, eyewear on — is the version of recovery a sixteen-year-old will actually agree to. No technique to learn, nothing to talk her into.

The first day back after a tournament weekend is the appointment worth booking.

Here is the thing about a hitter that nobody tells you.

She swings overhead a few hundred times across a weekend, and the shoulder only has so much range to give. When it runs out, the arm starts borrowing from somewhere else — usually the lower back, usually without her noticing.

That is what Jeremy is looking for. Not the sore shoulder. The place she is quietly stealing range from, and the side that has been doing more work than the other one for about a month.

She will not tell you about it, because she does not know. It does not hurt yet.

The easiest time to find it is before it does.

The hardest part of coming back is not the pain. It is that she is cleared and still a half-step off, and nobody can tell her why.

Usually it is this: she spent weeks protecting one side, the other side took the load, and now the whole chain is organized around an injury that has already healed.

So the comeback is mobility and alignment as she returns, soft tissue for the side that has been compensating, a movement reassessment before she goes back to full volume, red light as training rebuilds, and Katy's work for the athlete who is still guarding.

Full clearance and full confidence are two different dates on the calendar.

The honest version: nothing stops a volleyball injury. Jump enough and tissue complains.

What you can do is stop the small asymmetry from becoming the thing that ends her season.

Shoulder and mid-back mobility, so the arm is not borrowing range from her lower back. A movement check before club season, not in week six when something already hurts. Jason's tempering for quads and lats between tournaments. Red light on the heavy weekends.

Dr. Jeremy's whole job on this one is finding the side that is quietly doing more work. She will not tell you, because she does not know.