Fashionable handbags have become increasingly larger in the
last few years, and the number of complaints about neck and lower back pain has
risen accordingly. Gone are the days of your granny’s little clutch purse that
held a small wallet and perhaps a pair of gloves. These days it’s common to see
women toting all sorts of things in their handbags, not just your standard
wallet, phone and makeup. Many women also manage to fit in books, magazines,
gym clothes, water bottles, spare shoes and almost anything else they can cram
in, even the occasional laptop! Though it’s convenient to have all life’s
little necessities at your fingertips, it’s likely doing a number on your back.
If you suffer from frequent pain in your back, neck and
shoulders, frequent headaches or feel numbness or tingling in your hand, this
may be the result of carrying too heavy a handbag. The strap puts pressure on
the shoulder area where the nerves that run down your arm are located. Our
spine was designed to bend only forward and back, and hanging a heavy weight
off one shoulder forces the spine to bend sideways, which causes muscles to
stretch unnaturally on one side and chronically contract on the other, often
putting your spine out of alignment.
The American Chiropractic Association recommends that you
carry only what is necessary for the day, and make sure your handbag weighs no
more than 10 percent of your body weight. So clean out any spare items you may
be carrying around with you. Nevertheless, that may still leave a lot to tote,
given our increasingly active lives where we often have to rush directly from a
business meeting to the gym and don’t have time to stop home to pick up
clothes.
If you find you must carry a lot of belongings with you, try
to make the load as ergonomic as possible. Get a handbag with a wide a strap
that’s adjustable so you can wear the bag diagonally across your body rather
than having it hang off one shoulder. This will help keep the weight more
centered so it doesn’t pull your shoulder down on one side. You also won’t have
to lift your shoulder to keep the bag from falling off. You should also try to
regularly switch the side on which you carry your handbag in order to keep the
muscles that support the spine on either side from getting overly stretched in
one direction.
Another solution is to carry a backpack, as they are
designed to distribute the weight more evenly across your shoulders and back.
But it’s only ergonomic if you use both straps. Hanging a heavy backpack off
one shoulder is just as bad as toting a heavy handbag. Even better, purchase a
backpack with built-in wheels so you can take all the weight off your back from
time to time. Regular chiropractic treatment can also be useful in reducing the
risk of chronic back pain from carrying a heavy handbag.
