Recommendation: Pivot Physical Therapy in Mechanicsburg

If you're a regular reader of my blog, you know I was in physical therapy for about five weeks due to the lower back pain I was experiencing during my runs and throughout my workday. The lower back pain was really starting to affect my training, and of all things, my teaching. My back would ache all day from standing and walking around my classroom. It was very frustrating. I finally decided I needed to see a physical therapist.

It's a big step for me to decide to go to PT. I'm busy, and PT is time consuming. It can also get expensive. Therapy three times a week (which is what PTs normally want you to do) adds up to $90 in co-pays and $360 a month! I would pay any amount of money to be healthy and be able to run without pain, and course the goal of PT is to make that happen... But oftentimes when I would go to PT I felt like I was just paying to do the same exercises I do at home, and my PT wouldn't watch, help, or progress my exercises when I went to the clinic. In the past, PT just seemed like a waste of time and money. (I even wrote a post 5 years ago about how I thought PT sucks! It got a lot of snarky comments from PTs telling me I am stupid.)

I'm sure many of my runner friends can relate to this! We hate being "injured". We hate spending money. (Unless it's on running gear!) We hate taking time out of our busy schedules to drive to a clinic, have a session, and drive home. We're finicky people, us runners. We'll spend an hour pounding the pavement during a run, but drive 15 minutes to PT? Hell no!

I've been to lots of physical therapists over the years, and I have never, ever gone back to the same person twice. But that, my friends, has changed. I found a PT who I trust completely. For anyone who lives in the Harrisburg area who finds themselves needing a PT, I highly recommend Scott McGeary of Pivot Physical Therapy in Mechanicsburg.

Scott was recommended to me by a running friend. I called him on a whim and was able to get an appointment right away. I read his bio on the Pivot website and learned he was a runner. That was a good sign. Runners get other runners.

At my evaluation, Scott determined I had an anterior pelvic tilt which was causing my lower back pain. This was also causing my tight hip flexors. (Hmmmm.... every single PT I ever saw told me my hip flexors are tight!)

After my initial evaluation, Scott taught me some exercises and told me the purpose of each one. The exercises were mostly to engage my lower abs and activate my glutes. He seemed very knowledgeable and I trusted the information he gave me.  

I felt good when I left my first appointment, but of course I always feel hopeful when I leave physical therapy for the first time! However, I was pleasantly surprised that when I went back for more sessions (twice per week) I was always under the supervision of Scott. He did not pass me off to an assistant. He was always right there beside me to make sure I was doing my exercises correctly and that I engaged the right muscles.

As the sessions went by and I got better with my stability and glute activation, Scott progressed my program. He answered all of my questions, offered advice, and moved things along at my pace. I never felt like I was wasting my time at physical therapy. Each time I left, I felt like I learned something new about my body and how I could take care of it moving forward.

My back pain slowly started to subside, but my progress didn't go in a straight line. I would have several days with no pain and then a day or two with pain. But eventually it got to the point where my back pain was no longer the norm but an anomaly. These days, I have maybe one or two days per week where I feel it ache a bit after a run. Before PT, it was aching every single day. That's huge progress in less than two months! And I'm running 20-30 miles per week, so it's not like I'm just sitting around and resting.

It is such a relief to make it through my work day and teach seven 40 minutes music classes and two instrument lessons per day without being plagued by back pain!

Obviously, no one ever wants to go back to physical therapy, but at least now I know I have someone I can trust.

I highly recommend Scott and his team at Pivot Physical Therapy in Mechanicsburg!