The gift of bilateral movement

This time of year, most mentions of gifts invoke mental images of colorfully wrapped boxes adorned with ribbons and nestled under Christmas trees. But the gift I’ve been thinking about most this past month doesn’t come in a box. Nor is it a gift you can receive. Bilateral movement is a gift you can only give yourself.

What is bilateral movement? Biomechanists define bilateral movement as any movement that moves both arms or both legs at the same time, like pulling with both hands or squatting. I prefer to think of bilateral movement as moving — and using — both sets of limbs equally. 

The goal of bilateral movement is to maintain (or develop) strength equally on both sides of the body.

I began bilateral movement in farming several years ago when a hand injury forced me to learn how to prep teats, attach units, and carry milkers with my left hand. After my right hand healed, I committed to using both hands/arms equally while doing chores. I now alternate prepping and attaching with both hands, using my left hand when milking a cow on her left side and my right hand when milking on a cow’s right side. I alternate carrying milkers with each hand. I make a figure-8 in the barn while cleaning stalls so that I can switch hand positions on the shovel. And I push up feed on both sides of the barn going from east to west so that I can switch arms.

I don’t worry about my legs as much, because I squat to prep and attach. But, if I kneeled on one knee to attach like some farmers do, I would switch legs each time I kneeled. Dan learned the hard way in wrestling last year what happens when you only use one side of your body for a specific movement. Wrestlers usually only shoot from one leg or the other. (Shooting is a lunging motion that involves dropping one knee to the mat and driving into the opponent.) Dan shoots with his right leg. After he injured his right knee, it became apparent that his right leg had become significantly stronger than his left leg from all of the shooting he was doing. He’s now more conscious about maintaining equal strength in both legs.

I’ve found that bilateral movement also helps maintain and develop coordination in your non-dominant hand. When we clean refusal out of the manger, we use a shovel to throw it over the stalls into the gutters. When I started cleaning mangers bilaterally, it took me a while to figure out the mechanics of flipping the shovel over the stall with my left hand forward on the shovel handle. For thirty-some years, I had only operated a shovel with my right hand forward.

Maintaining strength and coordination in both hands has proven to be invaluable. Six weeks ago, I slipped, fell, landed on my elbow, and injured my right shoulder. The impact of the fall ruptured one my rotator cuff tendons and tore my biceps tendon. I’ve been farming with one arm since I fell, which was way easier to adapt to because I had already been using my left hand for just about everything. I will admit, though, that attaching nipples to bottles with one hand is something I should have been practicing more.

I’ve also had to switch to using my left hand for eating and brushing my teeth – and a million other little things, it seems. Again, I’m certain becoming left-handed would have been way worse if I had’t already been using my left hand as much as I was.

By this time next week, I’ll be sporting some new titanium shoulder parts. The good news: My doctor said that because I insisted on early diagnosis, the retracted tendon hasn’t started to scar, and I can expect to regain full strength and range of motion after surgery. The bad news: It will take six months of physical therapy before I regain enough strength and range of motion to farm with both arms.

I’m fully prepared for the challenge. After rehabbing my left shoulder five years ago, I know how frustrating and painful the process will be. But I also know what it takes to fully recover. And, by the time I’m done, I expect I will be pretty darn close to being completely ambidextrous. 

Merry Christmas to you and yours. If you don’t already, I would encourage you to consider giving yourself the gift of bilateral movement. You never know when you’ll need that strength and coordination.

Sadie Frericks and her husband, Glen, milk 100 cows near Melrose, Minnesota. They have three children: Dan, Monika, and Daphne. Sadie also writes a blog at www.dairygoodlife.com. She can be reached at [email protected].