Physio-Dynamics can show you how to therapeutically ease back or neck pain, how to straighten bow legs, knock knees, to fix flat feet, sway back, scoliosis, slumped or rounded shoulders, scrawny neck, puny chest, flabby arms, knee problems, fat ankles and just about any other distorted shape you've managed to create with your body. The answers to these problems and many others are available in the manual mentioned above.

To make an appointment for a private posture session which includes body analysis, movement training, deep tissue massage and therapy and a personal exercise prescription, call the Physio-Dynamics mentioned here.

Size 34-26-38 ?!!!

Is your caboose the engine on your train?
Are your saddlebags carrying too much payload?
Do you prefer to sit on it rather than show it off?

You've dieted down to nothing. You've exercised and exercised. And still, your hips are way out of proportion to your body. You may have thought you were dealing with a fat rear end, but what you've actually got is bad posture.

According to Bernice Danylchuk, who has been teaching posture in her Physio-Dynamics to some of Hollywood's most beautiful bodies for more than 30 years, large hips, thighs and butts are caused by improper body alignment. Remember, form follows function. If your body is not being used correctly, your form is going to be less than ideal.

If your hips are way out of proportion to your body, take heart. You can be relieved to know that it is possible to restructure your wide rear end. However, you're going to have to make some big changes in the way you use it, if you want to lose it.

TUCKING UP THE PELVIS

The technical term for sway back is lordosis. You can think of it as LARDosis, however, because of what it does to your rear end.

If you stand in front of a mirror you can perform a simple movement that illustrates how a sway back dramatically widens hips. Stand with your toes pointing perfectly forward and your knees slightly bent. Arch your back as much as you can. Your hips will flare out wide. Now tuck your pelvis under hard and see your hips slim down visibly.

In order to tuck your pelvis under, lift the upper spine up lightly, pull the tail down gently and curl the tail end of the spine under. You will feel a faint contraction just above the pubic bone that tells you when the pelvis is in balance.

Some people have arched their backs for so many years that they may find tucking the pelvis under to be difficult at first, but it can be accomplished with practice. If you have trouble, think of pulling the pubic bone way, way up and pretend you are hooking it onto your sternum (or breast bone)

Another way to find the movement is to lay flat on the ground, knees bent and feet flat on the floor. Push the small of your back firmly to the ground. When your back is completely flat, notice how your pelvis has curled up. Memorize this feeling. This is where your pelvis should be in every waking moment. No ifs, ands or BUTTS!!

The pelvis needs to be tucked under whenever you stand, sit, walk or move. And, especially, when you exercise. When you exercise in a sway backed position, you are increasing the width of your hips by creating unwanted baggage in the form of hard lumps and knotty muscle. Meanwhile, the muscles you should be using are wasting away. Your rear end gets wide and lumpy while the muscles you need to hold your thigh bone in its socket atrophy (more on this later).

If you've been knocking yourself out at the gym all these years, wondering why your hips wouldn't trim down, now you know why. Unless you've been exercising with perfect posture, your hard work has actually been preventing you from earning a better body!!!

When you start to move with the pelvis tucked under properly, you will begin to strip away all those lumps and bumps that make up the extra baggage you hate. Remember, form follows function. Adapt the right function, in this case a tucked under pelvis, and the form you want will follow. And isn't the form you want beautiful slim hips?

SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THOSE WITH STUBBORN PELVISES

These instructions are for those people who are very sway backed, have definite large rear ends or are unable to press their lower backs to the floor.

If your pelvis has been held in the wrong position for many years it may take a little extra umph! to get it into the right spot. Be sure that you are pulling it under as far as it can go. In order to get it fully tucked under, you may need to stretch out some tight muscles, ligaments and tendons.

KICK BUTT EXERCISES

One excellent way to stretch a stubborn, frozen or blocked pelvis is as follows:

Stand with your legs wide apart and your pelvis tucked under and back. Make sure your toes are pointing perfectly forward and press the weight of your body directly down into the ball of the foot right below the big toe and the number two toe. Bend your legs so that your knees are directly over your feet. Now tuck your pelvis under as far as you can and squeeze the buttocks together. Pull up really hard on the quads, the inner adductors and the psoas.

Pull up hard on the quads, inner abductors and psoas.

Pretend you're pulling so hard that you are about to wrap all those muscles up around your neck. This is the feeling you want to experience as often as possible for the next few weeks as you stretch out your pelvis and train it to tuck it under properly. Don't worry if it seems a little strange, a bit uncomfortable or difficult at first. Just keep doing it as often as you can. It will be worth it. Soon it will be like second nature to you.

KEEP YOUR PELVIS TO YOURSELF!

Watch Michelle Pfeiffer or Melanie Griffith in a movie and you will see how they hold their hips back as they walk and move. If you start to observe people as a habit you will see that people who are structurally slim hipped and straight legged have pelvises that are tucked well under and held slightly back.