Ache Free (Revised and Up to date Second Version): A Revolutionary Technique for Stopping Continual Ache

Literally changed my life.
Full transparency, I have been working with an Egoscue therapist for a few months before I got the book. I got the book before an extended vacation in case I had a flare up and wanted a different menu to try.BUT, Egoscue in general has changed my life. That is not an exaggeration. And this book is a great intro to it if you are having pain.I used to be up all night in tears with back pain from a herniated disk in my back. I couldn’t do any of the activities I used to love – run, dance, hike, even clean my house! My back locked up all the time. My doctor diagnosed the herniated disk and I went through about 5-6 months of physical therapy. The physical therapy helped. I was 100% compliant. I literally did it every day. It got me to a place where I could sleep most of the night and lock-ups were infrequent. But I almost always had mild pain going on. Their fix was to just focus on the area of pain, strengthen my core and told me to always engage my core 100% of the time. I said, well you can’t clench your stomach every moment of your life. They said well no, but to get as close to that as possible. I was JUST starting to be able to do other activities on a very small scale through the pain with PT and then both my doctor and my therapist said that I was as far as I could go and I was out of PT.I was “But I still have pain. It’s better, but it’s there at a low-grade level almost all the time.”They said, verbatim. “Well, you are always gonna have the pain. it’s never going to be what it was ever again.”I am way too young and stubborn to accept that a little bulging disc is gonna hurt and compromise me for the REST of my life.An exercise expert recommended Egoscue. I met with them EXTREMELY skeptical. Within 20 minutes after a few small adjustments and simple exercises that pretty much anyone can do, I walked with ZERO pain in my back. I realized I hadn’t felt that in years. It was so unbelievable I started laughing and crying. At least there was a LIGHT at the end of the tunnel. The Egoscue therapist said, we can get you to no pain.Fast forward a few months, and yes the road is slow, but I now have more time with ZERO pain than with pain. I’m just starting to get to full days without any pain. I’m SLEEPING! I’m doing activities again. Not all, but I am running multiple miles, strength training, and cleaning my house. I know I’ll be able to dance again one day.I also know what I can do to remove the pain if I feel it coming back. I know what ways I’m holding my body that cause it and what I can do. I rarely take an OTC pill to help manage it. I fully believe if I keep doing the exercises, it will go away completely cause I will have retaught my body how to hold itself properly and in a relaxed state – undoing years and years of imbalance.I have especially liked the menu in the book for herniated disc back. I also have learned so much from the introductory chapters about how and why this works.But this only helps you if you are willing to do the exercises and approach healing with movement. I recommend trying the book’s exercises before more drastic measures like surgery or strong pain killers. Give it a week, a month and see if it helps. I do the exercises every day – sometimes multiple times a day. They aren’t hard. Most are very simple, but effective. I do it while watching TV at night.But if you aren’t willing to move and do active things to help your alleviate pain on a consistent basis, then this book won’t help.I was in so much pain I was about willing to try anything. And now I’m stronger and healthier than ever, no pills, no surgery. And I can’t wait until I’m totally pain free!

Never knew how easy it was to get rid of body pain by realigning myself with these exercises. Totally recommend!

I have no affiliation with the author, and my approval can’t be bought. That said, this book is seriously life changing. Pete essentially figured out some critical connections in the body that resulted in a huge aha moment that where you’re actually hurting isn’t where the pain is originating from. Like say your upper back is killing you– turns out that’s caused by misalignment of your shoulders and hips. Or your hands/wrists are burning when you game too long… that’s a shoulder issue, so you can chuck the wrists braces (which apparently make things even worse), do the recommended exercises in this book and WOW, noticeable improvement within DAYS (not weeks or months). He also has YouTube exercise videos which are great. He believes repetitive motion injury is a crock, and that the body can do endless repetitive motions if it is correctly aligned. As for the exercises, they feel practical, not ridiculous. Plus the RAPID improvement totally keeps you going.Huge pros for me are as follows: he addresses UPPER back pain (find it via the index in the back). That’s what hubby needed help with, and everyone just wants to focus on lower back, so this was a total score. I always run internally cold, which indicates low metabolism. Hubby was putting on some padding due to being immobilized so long from back pain. We have been doing his “total mobility” YT video maybe a month now, only every other day, and my metabolism is revving. I’m wearing shorts in winter, hubby is starting to lose weight again– it’s just a winner all around.Of course no one’s perfect. While Pete marvels at the body’s ingenious design, he fails to see a DESIGNER behind it, and instead credits the whole thing too dumb luck (aka evolution). Another minor beef is his promotion of Yoga’s “cats and dogs” pose, which is a horrific exercise that will give you severe lower back pain after a short while. But every field has its politics, and you can’t be pro-God or anti-yoga if you want to get popular, so there it is. Yoga wasn’t designed to help the body, its designed to move magical fluids around your body so a specific supernatural entity will slowly slither from the base of your spine into your brain (sounds creepy, I know, but some people feel this is a great goal). Yoga is a religion that puts spiritual goals over physical health. So I’d recommend skipping the few yoga poses that he throws in (easy to do, bc they are rare). But the majority of his stuff is bang on and you’ll be shocked at how much it can ease your misery. I highly recommend this book before you go see another doctor or buy another brace. Definitely a rare gem.

I’m following it exactly with a little help from You tube so that I can make sure I’m doing the exercises correctly. My hip has definitely improved. So I’m happy with it.