Dancing Stronger: Smarter Training for Bendy Bodies with Jennifer Milner

[01:03] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Welcome back, every bendy body, to the Bendy Bodies Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Linda Bluestein, the Hypermobility MD, a Mayo Clinic-trained expert in Ehlers-Danlos syndromes and hereditary disorders of connective tissue, dedicated to helping you navigate hypermobility and live your best life. I am so thrilled to bring Jennifer Milner back to the show today. As you probably know, Jennifer is a Pilates trainer and ballet coach who specializes in working with dancers and athletes with hypermobility. She has trained Olympic medalists and dancers from New York City Ballet, Royal Ballet, and more. Her ability to address biomechanical imbalances and technique dysfunctions in a practical strength training way has made her a sought-after guest speaker for dance schools and companies, and her wide and varied health and dance science background, along with her dance experience and her own encounters with injuries, give Jennifer a unique perspective on getting and maintaining a strong, healthy body at peak performance level. You also probably know Jennifer as the amazing original co-host of the Bendy Bodies Podcast. I am so excited to speak with her today because I have so many questions that I've been wanting to ask for such a long time about her perspective on hypermobility in dance. As always, this information is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for personalized medical advice. Stick around until the very end so you don't miss any of our special hypermobility hacks. Here we go.
[02:26] Okay, so I am back with Jennifer Milner, and I have to just calm myself down because I'm so excited to be chatting with Jennifer today. You commented one time when you and I were interviewing Miss America — you were like, "Oh my God, you were fangirling so much." I'm so excited to be with you today. I just have to take a breath and calm myself down. But thank you so much for coming to chat with me.

[02:51] Jennifer Milner: Of course. For me, it's just an excuse to get to chat with you, because we now have to schedule it on our calendars to be able to sit and catch up.

[03:00] Dr. Linda Bluestein: I know, right? It's something that we need to do more for sure. So this is long time coming. I've so wanted to do a follow-up with you. Of course, we had so many great conversations in the first few seasons of Bendy Bodies, and we talked about stretching and overstretching and what to do as a dancer. But I feel like an updated conversation is desperately needed. I know your knowledge continues to evolve, and you continue to gain experience from working with all these hypermobile dancers. So let's start really broad. Can you tell me what you are most worried about in dance today?

[03:36] Jennifer Milner: Well, first I think that it's a really exciting time to be in the dance world, so I don't want to negate that. But at the same time, it's a really uncertain time in the dance world. I don't know that we ever really recovered from COVID and the pandemic having everything shut down. There was this backlog of dancers who were just about to move into the professional arena and then had to wait. And so we have these dancers who are still trying to find a job. And then of course with the pandemic, I don't think audiences have completely come back still. And I know for sure that especially these days, funding is a huge problem and there's a lot of job insecurity in the dance world right now. And that causes a lot of stress and emotions on top of what's already a pretty uncertain career anyway. So I think we're really facing that hurdle of uncertainty of how supported the arts are going to be by our society in general, as well as still trying to find jobs for all the dancers who are trying to get them.

[04:50] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, those are excellent points. And on the flip side, what are you most optimistic about?

[04:55] Jennifer Milner: Well, as I said, it's a really exciting time to be in the arts as far as the creativity and the direction that dance — and when I talk about dance, my expertise is ballet and sort of your Western European-based dance forms. So there is so much innovation going on. We're seeing a lot more opportunities for some really incredible young choreographers and young dancers who are bringing their cultural backgrounds into traditional ballet, jazz, and contemporary forms and really informing the works in incredibly new and exciting ways. So I think there's an opportunity to see a lot of artistic growth in the dance world, even as we're struggling to find the funding to make that happen. Women are being encouraged to take men's classes. Men are having some choreography set on them in pointe shoes, and it's amazing and strong and fierce. So we're really starting to challenge and push dancers and push their bodies in really exciting and different ways.

[05:56] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And I think some people think of art and dance as being unnecessary or superfluous, but to me, it's part of what makes being a human worthwhile. I never feel more alive really than when I'm sitting in the audience watching a fabulous performance. It just makes me feel things that I don't feel in another way. So to all the people who — because I get these messages sometimes on social media, you know, why are you so supportive of dancers — number one, they are incredibly hardworking athletes. I've also had people ask me this, they don't dance for the money. They dance despite the money. And they're incredibly hardworking, yet they don't often have the kind of support that most athletes have. And yet they provide something to us as those fortunate enough to watch that just brings out emotion, makes us feel human and alive, and brings us such incredible joy. Art is so important for life in general, all the different forms of art.
[07:24] So you have been working with hypermobile or bendy dancers for quite some time now, and I'm curious how your thinking about hypermobility has evolved over this period of time.

[07:39] Jennifer Milner: Well, I think my thinking about hypermobility has sort of been a part of the dance world in general's journey with hypermobility as well. I didn't realize that I had issues that all kind of tied up within the hypermobility spectrum as a dancer. And it wasn't until I started teaching on the other side of the table and working with hypermobile dancers — just because they came in. At first it was very few dancers who had hypermobility, I think largely because a lot of the younger hypermobile dancers didn't have the support they needed to succeed as a professional. So at first I was working with, oh, they've got a crazy back, their ankles are so wobbly, their knees — why do they keep dislocating? How can we make them stronger? That sort of thing.
[08:26] And then I had a dancer come to me when she was, I think, 14. It was about 2010. Her mom said, "She has this thing called EDS. Have you ever heard of it?" And I was like, no. And that was my first introduction to it. I started reading into it and diving deeper and was like, oh my gosh. And really trying to address the whole body with that. And of course, once you start seeing those things, you can't unsee them. And suddenly I'm seeing what looks to me like an epidemic of dancers with these issues. I think partly because I was starting to work with younger dancers, I was working with more pre-professionals. And so I was seeing more of them before they sort of self-selected out of the process because of injuries.
[09:06] So I started seeing a lot of them and it was for me this, oh my gosh, what do we have to do to stabilize them, to keep them healthy, to make them strong so that they can have a fighting chance to compete as a professional and to have the career that they want. And then as I started seeing the support coming in and being more accepted, teachers would send me notes saying, "Can you please help her? I've noticed she has weakness in this area." And it's perfect when the studios start working with the people outside the studio.
[09:39] As I started seeing that, now I feel a little more freedom to really try to encourage them to work through their whole range of motion. I don't feel like I have to single-handedly hold them back because if I don't, no one else will. I feel like as people understand it more and respect it more, I can start to strengthen their full end range and help them make the most of their instrument because they have more information. They know how to speak up for themselves, and the studios and choreographers do as well. So I think I've sort of come through that arc from "this is not a real thing" to "oh my gosh, it's everywhere, how do I triage it" to "hey, we've got a firm foundation — how can we help and make it even more amazing?"

[10:27] Dr. Linda Bluestein: It's so important that a dancer have multiple members of their team working on this. And I think another really common misconception is that there are no dancers who are dancing who have EDS or a connective tissue disorder of some sort. And that's absolutely untrue. I met with a professional dancer the other day who doesn't have a formal diagnosis yet, but I will be seeing her as a patient next week. And the things that she has been through — I was blown away. And she's dancing professionally.
[11:02] A lot of people think, oh, their life must be perfect. And while they're at a different functional capacity than somebody who is spending all day in bed because they have such incredibly serious complications, I don't mean any disrespect to those people. But at the same time, I think it is important to recognize that things might look better on the outside than they actually are. When she told me her story — the things that she was born with, the things that she has had to deal with, how she's almost died, in critical care, septic shock — these are very unique things that are red flags for sure. So I think it's just important for people to be aware of that, because that's a really common misconception that dancers who are dancing must be fine. And I think dancers are very good at adapting. They have to make it look easy, so they're used to making things look easy.
[12:11] And I wanted to share — you mentioned 2010 was when you first met this dancer. Is that right?

[12:18] Jennifer Milner: The first person who had the EDS diagnosis, yes, was 2010.

[12:21] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah. So I just wanted to quickly share for people who may not know — Jennifer and I first connected in 2017. Jennifer read an article that I wrote and she sent me this incredibly well-written email, and I was like, I definitely have to talk to this person. So we had a phone conversation that lasted for about 3 hours in the summer of 2017. And then we ended up presenting together at the IADMS conference — the International Association of Dance Medicine and Science — shortly thereafter, and then doing so many Bendy Bodies Podcast episodes together. We've also presented together since then at IADMS on neurodivergence in dancers. So we've gotten to do lots of great projects together. And of course, I've also helped on your platform — we have lots of great videos and programs and webinars. We'll have to be sure to talk about that a little bit later.
[13:12] So I just wanted to share that background for people who don't know how we met. And that's why I'm so excited to be talking to you today. I want to get your advice for dancers. What are the most essential things that you want pre-professional dancers to know?

[13:30] Jennifer Milner: All right — three things that I wish pre-professional dancers knew.
Number one: your tricks do not define you. You do not have to always be the person in the center doing the Bird of Paradise or the Scorpion or rolled up in a ball backwards to have worth for your company or your studio. Whatever tricks you have, if you can do them healthily and without danger to yourself, that's great, but they are not the full sum of who you are as a dancer. Do not feel like that is all of who you are.
[14:16] The second thing I always want pre-professional dancers to know is that your aches and pains are real. You may feel like you're a baby, or a prima donna or diva, or whatever other people might say if you're always talking about aches and pains. But if you have hypermobility, and especially if you have a hypermobility disorder or connective tissue disorder, there are going to be more aches and pains. You are going to experience more joint pain, and there is a different healing time for tendon and ligament issues. What you are feeling is real. I do not want you to feel gaslit about that. I don't want you to feel like everybody else in the room is fine, so I should be fine and I should just keep going. Your pain is real and don't let anybody convince you differently.
[15:02] And then the third thing I really want people to understand is you're going to have a different timeline than your peers for getting things into your body as you work as a dancer. I always talk about going slow and low when you're working with hypermobility. You're constantly going to be going back to the basics in your technique — your pliés and your tendus — and making sure you're doing them correctly and not just skipping through in order to get to the result people want. You can't push yourself as much. You can't run things as many times as everybody else does without perhaps getting injured. And nobody should be running things as many times as they probably do, but be patient with yourself.
[15:51] I've never met a dancer who regretted waiting a year to go on pointe. Of course, they regretted it at the time when all their peers were going on pointe, but if they had crazy banana feet and needed an extra year to get better proprioception and better strength in their feet, it served them so well later down the line. So I really encourage you to understand that your timeline is going to be your own, and not to feel that stress of, well, I'm not like everybody else — there must be something wrong with me.

[16:18] Dr. Linda Bluestein: I love all of that. And of course, you and I interviewed Moira McCormick in that fabulous very first episode of Bendy Bodies back in February of 2020. She talked about how with really talented dancers who have really flexible feet and ankles, she actually holds them back and puts them up on pointe later. And I believe Lisa Howell — I think that was episode 29 or something — told us basically the same thing. We talked about how it could be challenging as a studio owner because sometimes parents get so frustrated with that message that they might send their kid to a different studio. So what do you say to parents who — if a parent is listening and says, well, my kid really wants to go up on pointe, so I might take them to a different studio — what would you say to that parent?

[17:11] Jennifer Milner: I would say I completely understand. I work with a lot of dancers — from a few 8-year-olds all the way up through people in their 40s and 50s. And I understand how hard it is when you don't go on pointe with your peers. Or the flip side of it — the studio wants you to put your daughter on pointe when she's 8 or 9, and you think, well, I'm not sure she's ready yet. I don't know what I should do about that. Your daughter really wants to stay there and doesn't want you to move her, and the studio is putting all that pressure on you.
[17:50] There are some really great objective guidelines out there. I believe the Harkness Center for Dance Injuries put together a sort of pre-pointe assessment. I know Lisa Howell does something as well, and I think there's also something called Pointe Safe that Kendall does. There are some really objective resources out there and many of them are free. I put together a pre-pointe assessment based on the Harkness Center list as well. I'll take my dancers through it and say, "You can't do this. This isn't working. This isn't where it should be. This looks great," and so on.
[18:29] It's really helpful for studio owners to be able to say, "Here are objective reasons why your dancer is ready to go on pointe," or, "Here are the things we're still working on." It's really nice to have that objective list of yes or no. They have beautiful feet, but they can't do three single-leg relevés. Or, they have really strong feet — it may not be the highest arch, but they do pass this range of motion test, so we know it would be safe for them to be on pointe.
[18:59] So if parents feel like their daughters should be on pointe and they don't think the studio is putting them on at the right time, get that assessment and find someone to help you go through it. You can bring it to the studio and say, "Help me understand what's holding my daughter back." But it might be that after that assessment, you find a couple of things and you're like, oh okay, I see why. And I encourage studios to do it as well so they can give it to the parents and say, here's why we did or didn't, here are the things we can work on, and we're going to work on them in class. Having some sort of objective assessment is really going to help you at both ends of the spectrum to figure out if your child is ready to go en pointe — safely.

[19:39] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I also wanted to circle back to the comment you made about snow and how many repetitions of snow you're going to do. So as a pre-professional dancer, of course you're in a different position. If you're Skyler Brandt and you've got some little nagging injury, you can probably say, I'm going to mark this today, because you know you're Skyler Brandt, right?

[20:05] Jennifer Milner: Right.

[20:05] Dr. Linda Bluestein: But if you're a pre-professional dancer, do you have any suggestions for dancers who feel like, I can't really take that risk, I can't really say that I can't do Snow 10 times in a row or whatever the case might be?

[20:23] Jennifer Milner: That's such a good question. And I think the silver bullet for most of the dance world is communication. I think we communicate poorly with our dancers. I think the dancers don't feel comfortable communicating with the staff. I think the parents feel uncomfortable communicating with the teachers, and the teachers don't communicate well either. On all sides of it, open communication would be so helpful.
[20:47] For me, if we can establish a layer of communication with the teachers even as a pre-professional — be honest and clear about what's going on when it's small things — and just say, "Just wanted to let you know I'm coming into class today. My ankle feels a little funky. I've been cleared to dance, I'm just going to go a little slow and warm it up." As you do those things, you're going to bank some goodwill with the studio and with the teachers so that they understand when you come to them and say, "Hey, I cannot do this run-through. I need to sit down, and I will be okay tomorrow. I'm trying to trade this off in order to do this." You will have built a little bit of goodwill with them.
[21:33] Obviously, with younger dancers, the parents are going to be involved in advocating for their child and teaching their child how to have those conversations as well as they get into the older teenage years. But I think there's a way to have that respectful conversation as long as it's not the first time they're hearing about it. If you've been hiding this injury and all of a sudden it's 2 days to the performance and they want you to run it 10 times — are you just being lazy? That's what sometimes people claim. Are you just trying to get home early to do your homework? Teachers are sometimes suspicious, not necessarily for good reason. But if you have already told them and already sort of laid it out for them — the type of worker you are, the way you handle small injuries and big injuries — I think there's room to have that conversation even as a pre-professional.

[22:22] Dr. Linda Bluestein: What about professional dancers? How would this advice change, if at all, for professional dancers?

[22:26] Jennifer Milner: For professional dancers, my advice is: get a warmup. Figure out your maintenance routine. I recently released an entire workshop for dancers that's all about everything outside of the studio — how do you plan your season? How do you plan your warmup? What's so important about a warmup? How do you figure out when you can push yourself and when you need to hold back?
[23:02] Figure that out. Get your schedule going, get your routine going. Prep your meals on Sunday so you can cruise through the week. Understand what works for your body — cold plunge, sauna, regular massages, whatever it is that helps your body on a regular basis with inflammation and aches. Build your pit crew. For me, it's all about doing the preparation and doing all the work that is not just the work in the studio. And I think that's the one thing that's not really taught in dance studios — how do you prepare your life? How do you live as a company dancer outside of the studio? So that's my biggest advice to dancers: figure out what you're going to do outside of it. Meals, sauna, everything. Figure out how to live outside the studio to support you as a healthier dancer inside the studio.

[23:53] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And if you figure that out when you're doing well, then you can adapt it if things are not going as well, but you've already figured out some baseline things that help you. So I think that's really good. And then what about especially younger dancers who believe that the bendier the better? You already kind of addressed this when you said your tricks don't define you, and I love that. And I tell people all the time, keep in mind that your tricks might not hurt now, but they might start hurting later. And if you just wait until it is painful to stop doing your trick, it might not be that the pain will go away. It's really, really important to be aware of tricks that can be really harmful in the long run. And so this modern trend towards more and more photos on Instagram — which of course I love Instagram, but it's tricky, right? So what do you say to this "the bendier the better" trend that we're seeing?

[24:50] Jennifer Milner: I don't think bendy is good or bad. I think it's just different. It's just one facet, one type of body. And the trend we see on social media exists because we're able to capture those lines and capture that one moment where people can just lean into their shoe, they can fall over, they can do it. But what's the next line? What happens after it?
[25:09] The struggle I see with my bendy dancers is that they can make a beautiful line, but can they hold it? Can they move to a jump? Can they pirouette? These more three-dimensional moves — they have a lot of trouble with those. And those Gumby bodies really, really struggle. You and I have shared some dancers that when they're 14 or 15, I'm like, I don't know if this is going to pull itself together. But they stick with it and they go really slow, and now they have these gorgeous lines with the strength to go with it.
[25:46] So I think: work with the body that you have. Trying to force hyperextension or get some sort of artificial hypermobility is not healthy. That's not the way your body is built, and I don't think it will serve you well moving forward. Learn to love the body you are in, and the body you are in will take care of you and serve you well. Some of our most amazing dancers — Tiler Peck and Marianela Núñez — they are not hypermobile. They are super strong and they've got beautiful feet and beautiful legs, but they're not crazy-extension, floppy people. And you can't take your eyes off of them. Pushing yourself into a different body is not going to make you a better dancer. Figure out your body and work with it in the healthiest way possible.

[26:42] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And I'm thinking as well of some of the people that you and I have shared in common and how that slow and low approach is so much more successful than burning out when you're young. I've worked also with dancers who are 15 years old and they're retired from dance. Of course it's always hard to predict exactly what could have happened if things had been done differently, but it just breaks your heart to see somebody who loves to dance and isn't dancing anymore at such a young age because they're in pain all the time. And they were the one getting all the Gumby Awards and up in the front.
So I think it's so important to sometimes really pull back and say, okay — like when we talked to Beck-Ann Sisk, remember when you and I interviewed Beck-Ann Sisk? I think that's a great example of somebody talking about working with Marilena Ruiz, who was her teacher, saying, "Lower your leg. You're going to be able to get your leg up there later. Just lower your leg and let's work on your strength." So, speaking of that, what are some of the biggest mistakes that you see dancers make?

[27:55] Jennifer Milner: First of all: know yourself. As we were just saying, you're not going to be Tiler Peck, you're not going to be Marianela — there are already those people out there, so don't try to be those people. Know who you are and what you have to offer, and you're going to be a much more interesting and authentic dancer when you walk in the room. I see a lot of dancers make the mistake of saying, "Well, they really love this, so I'm going to try to be this." They love that person being that way, but you will not be Skyler Brandt. She is very cool, she's very quirky, she is an amazing dancer, and she already does that. So first of all, know yourself.
[28:43] Second: believe yourself. Learn to trust yourself and your instincts. And I think this goes back to what I was saying about being injured — those aches and pains are real, so believe your instinct. If your instinct says, "Mm, I'm not sure I should do that. My shoulder feels wonky, but I'm sure they wouldn't give me that lift if it wasn't safe, right?" — believe yourself. Trust that, and start to develop that inner voice that says, hey, that's not okay, that's not healthy for me. Believe yourself when you're injured. The dance community absolutely does gaslight dancers and say, it's not too long, you don't need a break, you're fine dancing the day after you traveled. As much as can be gotten away with, it's going to happen. So you can say, "It is too long. I do need a break after I travel. I can't run it again." Finding respectful ways to speak up on that just comes from knowing yourself and knowing what feels right and what feels wrong.
[29:45] And then third: if you need help, ask for it. I think dance can be very isolating. I've talked to several dancers who have recovered from extreme eating disorders and said, "I had no idea there were other people like me out there." I feel like we talk about it in the dance medicine and dance science community all the time, but it still feels like something that's talked about but not discussed within the studios. So if you're struggling with an injury, if you're struggling with mental health, whatever it is — talk about it. Don't be afraid to get help. And that goes for fouetté turns. If you're struggling with your fouetté turns, ask someone for coaching on it. We don't have to be perfect and we don't have to present ourselves as perfect.
[30:41] If you are struggling with your hyperextended knees and can't figure out how to control them, it's okay to ask for help. You're not being ungrateful for these beautiful legs. You are trying to get stronger, and it doesn't make you look weaker. It doesn't make you look unteachable. It makes you look smart and it makes you look like you understand that you need help beyond what you yourself can do.

[31:04] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And what about choreography? If you're working with a choreographer — and again, it depends on the level, whether you're pre-professional versus professional — but you're working with a choreographer and we all want interesting choreography. But if they're giving you something and you're like, I think that's really going to cause damage to my body — I've been to some shows where the original cast is all hobbling around on crutches because they got so injured trying to do this new work. And I would imagine it's extremely challenging because you don't necessarily know how far the body can be pushed and what can be done safely, or safely in a certain number of repetitions versus what is outright dangerous. Do you think choreographers should be keeping more in mind the fact that a lot of dancers are hypermobile and might be at risk for dislocating their patellas and other injuries? Or do you think we're okay in that regard?

[32:08] Jennifer Milner: I think that as choreographers get to pick their dancers — if they're picking them for a certain look, they watch company class and say, "I want to work with these 10 dancers" — they should be able to tell from that. And I would hope choreographers would start to keep that in mind as they're choreographing.
[32:22] I also encourage choreographers to go around the room and say, "Hey everybody, tell me your stuff. What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? I picked you because I saw something in class — let's talk about it." And as you get more experienced, you start to know what's coming in and what to expect. I work with a dancer at a major ballet company who has some contemporary pieces coming up that are flamenco-based or tango-based, and she has super hypermobile shoulders. So we're having to start to strengthen her arms for the work that goes around the head and all of that. We know in advance, so we can do some work coming up to it.
[33:10] I think the dancers can also speak up and say, "I'm having trouble doing this step without feeling insecure in my shoulder socket. Can you help me out? Can you watch me and tell me what I'm doing wrong?" And then it doesn't sound like the choreographer has made a bad move — it sounds like, "I can't make this work, what am I doing wrong, can you help me?" I think you can also, if you're at a company, talk to the PTs. When I worked at New York City Ballet, I worked for their physical therapy department, and the PTs would come in and watch sometimes and just see what choreography was being put on the dancers.

[33:49] Jennifer Milner: I think it's okay to say to PTs, "I'm really struggling with this, it's not feeling good on my body. Can you please come in and watch?" Then the PTs can help you with it, but they can also go to the choreographer and say, "Hey, listen, this is causing a lot of stress on such-and-such a body part. Is there any way you can modify it?" And it's coming from a medical professional. That's the luxury of big companies that have that kind of support staff. But I think, again, it's all about communication. I do know dancers who will advocate for themselves and speak up and say, "Maybe you want to give this move to someone else," or, "Can you help me understand how to do it?" And then there are dancers that don't speak up and usually get injured because of it.

[34:33] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Love that answer. That's so important. Okay, this is such a great conversation. I think we're going to take a quick break here. When we come back, we are going to talk about stretching because that is such a hot topic, and how to optimize flexibility, and advice for parents and so much more. We will be right back.
[36:14] Okay, we are back with Jennifer Milner, and I am dying to ask you — when it comes to flexibility, of course something that every dancer wants, and they probably know what they think limits their flexibility, but what actually limits flexibility in most people? Of course there's going to be individual variation, but yeah.

[36:35] Jennifer Milner: Flexibility is a tricky subject because a lot of people equate flexibility with hypermobility, as you know. And just for the listeners, flexibility is not the same thing as hypermobility. You can be very flexible and not hypermobile. You can be hypermobile and not flexible, which astounds people sometimes. When we're talking about hypermobility, a lot of times it's joint-based — just a greater range of motion than usual in the joint. That's the base answer that I learned from Dr. Linda Bluestein, and so that's the one I use for everybody.
[37:01] And then when we're talking about flexibility, people are usually thinking muscles, but it's actually going to be so much more than that. It's going to be muscles, it's going to be nerve tension, it's going to be fascial tightness. And there's definitely a neurological component as well. The way that you will stretch as an unconscious person is very different than the way that you'll stretch when you are conscious. You can look at studies that have been done on people and how flexible they are when they're not conscious, and it's crazy. So we know that there is at least some sort of neurological and mental component that goes with it. I can't affect that, but what I can affect is all the other stuff.
[37:47] Usually when people say they're tight — and we're talking about passive range of motion here, like they want to go in the splits — they'll say, "I just can't get there, my hamstrings are so tight, my calves are so tight." And then if I start to look at them and look through their entire posterior chain — which starts on the forehead, comes up and over the head, all the way down the back of the body, all the way down the back of the leg, and onto the bottom of the foot — that is one long line of connected tissue that has muscles that overlap and connect to each other. So if they're having trouble getting to the splits, it might not be that their hamstrings are short. It might be that the tissue behind their neck is really, really tight, or their thoracolumbar fascia right around their low and mid back is really, really tight. Or they have a really stuck sciatic nerve, and we need to learn how to glide that sciatic nerve and not just try to stretch it, which will just make the nerve angry and make you feel even tighter.
[38:43] So I'll go through an assessment with the dancer to try to figure out where it is that's actually holding them back and whether we can start to release that. Sometimes just releasing the back of their neck and doing some release work with balls — all of a sudden they can get much deeper into their splits. So you can pick spots all the way down the body and see where we can release it. But it's definitely not always muscles, and often muscles are going to be the last thing that stretches. Once we clean up all the other stuff that's sticking and making it not smooth sailing, then we can start to get into muscle stretching.
[39:14] And when we talk about flexibility from an extension point of view — when dancers come to me and say, "I can hold my leg up with my hand, but as soon as I let go, it falls" — that's a strength issue. Does it mean I want them to just practice holding their leg up with their hand, let go, and try to hold it for 2 seconds longer before it falls? No. Usually the first place I'll look is their standing leg strength. There may be genuine weakness in the standing leg, or they may just not be using it well. But once they get their standing leg working really well — don't even pay attention to their gesture leg — all of a sudden it's easier to hold the gesture leg because they're not putting most of their attention into keeping from falling down. So when we're looking at active flexibility, it's going to be strength first and foremost — strength of that standing leg. And then when we address strength for the extension, it's probably not going to look like a dance move. It's going to be strengthening in different ways so that the dance move is easier.

[40:27] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And that's why I love your Instagram account, which I'm sure we'll share later. You share all these fascinating exercises that are way harder than they look and are definitely for very specific purposes. A lot of times people just want to take more and more classes or do more and more of the same thing, but doing different things outside of class is really going to be the best way to accomplish those goals. Are there any other tips for stretching for both safety and long-term benefits?

[40:55] Jennifer Milner: For me, the first thing — early in the day and throughout the day, the stretching you do is going to be more dynamic or active stretching. I save passive stretching, which is just sitting in the splits for example, for the end of the day when the muscles are not only warmed up, but also not going to be called on to work again for a while.
[41:20] Passive stretching has been shown — I think it's 30 seconds — that if you hold a passive stretch for 30 seconds or longer, it can actually inhibit those muscles and shut them down for somewhere between 30 minutes to 3 hours, according to the studies. So if you're sitting in your à la seconde splits before dance class starts and hanging out there and you're like, "I'm stretching" — and then you stand up and have to do fast tendus and you need your inner thighs — your body is going to compensate with something. So we don't want to do that passive stretching before class.
We want to make sure we're doing active stretching. So if a split is passive stretching, an active stretch is a grand battement where you stretch the hamstring but then you also work to bring it back down. I would encourage people to get with their trainer, their coach, their Pilates teacher, whoever, to learn some active stretches. It's part of the warmup I have all my dancers learn and set up for themselves so that they can get those muscles active. And then as they go throughout the day, they keep going further. Do active strength training when you're not in dance class to increase your flexibility — I promise it will.
[42:22] And then save your passive stretches for the end of the day. And by passive stretches, I mean completely supported. I have never seen a reason to include oversplits or hypersplits or anything like that. If a leg is up on something, there better be something underneath it that is supporting that leg and supporting the pelvis as well. When we go into the hypersplits, we're really stretching that hip capsule and we're stretching out all the ligaments and some structures that we really need, especially the front of that other hip. I do have dancers who have such loose anterior capsules now from that, that they feel their femoral head — their leg bone — slipping forward as they're trying to dance. And they're looking at possibly needing surgery down the road. It decreases your proprioception, you can't access your muscles as fast — that overstretching and sitting in those kind of hung-in-the-air splits is not healthy. But bottom line: stretch the end of your range, but make sure it's supported and make sure you're actively stretching through it too.

[43:28] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, definitely. And then, of course, while we're focusing this episode on dancers, for humans who aren't dancers, or for people who were dancers before but are now post their dance career — there's been a lot of conversation about stretching and hypermobility, and there are some people who think that you should never ever stretch if you're hypermobile. And I disagree with that completely. I think it is important to stretch even if you're hypermobile, but it's all in how you do it and paying attention to your body. What advice would you give for people who are maybe not dancers — maybe they're older like me — but they want to keep being physically active for as long as possible?

[44:14] Jennifer Milner: Yeah, absolutely. Find someone to help you figure out stretches that are healthy and safe. And I do believe there's a difference between stretching and releasing muscles, and your body is probably craving both. Find someone who can help you with release techniques — using a ball, using a Theragun, or something to help release those muscles. But I also think that stretching is a really important component for anybody at any time of life.
[44:43] I no longer dance, of course, but I still stretch towards my splits. I don't really sit in my splits anymore, but I stretch towards them because it feels good on my muscles. Before I do that, though, I make sure I've done a lot of warmup and a lot of active release work to be in the right place for it.
[44:59] I think the thing that we get caught up on as a hypermobile population is that you go into yoga class and the teacher's like, "Oh, everybody watch her, she's amazing." And you're like, "I don't really feel anything," because you're not stretching your muscles, you're just hanging in your joints. And we don't want to hang more in our joints. We don't want to push further into that passive connective tissue. But we do have tight muscles — and often we have more tight muscles than people expect. Our calves can be like hard little rocks because we have such a long heel cord and so much loose connective tissue that our calves are working twice as hard. So you may have plantar fasciitis and do a calf stretch and feel nothing. Get with someone who can help you figure it out. They can help you set up a home program and figure out how to do that release technique. You absolutely have to keep moving, and that means trying to go through your full range of motion — whatever your range of motion currently is. To make your joints feel healthy, to get that synovial fluid to them, to be able to live your healthiest life, you definitely need safe and scientifically sound stretching.

[46:11] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Love it, love it. And let's move on to advice for parents and teachers. If you had just 3 minutes to talk to all the dance parents in the whole world, what would you say to them?

[46:26] Jennifer Milner: I would say two things. First of all, believe your child. And I know that when you have multiple children — I have two girls who were both in dance — and you're running and trying to get out the door and they're like, "I don't feel good," it's really easy to be like, faker, you don't want to go. And sometimes they are faking it, they don't want to go to dance. But then you have to ask yourself why, especially if it's a regular thing.
[46:54] I have one dancer who had panic attacks every time she went on a certain day to dance class, and it turned out that that day's dance teacher was very verbally abusive to the students. That was just her teaching style. And this dancer was the canary in the coal mine saying, this does not feel good. I trained my daughters to say to me, "I can't go, and here's why, and I need a mental health day." And I said, "That's fine, I trust you when you say that."
[47:25] So believe your student. Listen to them when they tell you it's hurting. Give them the tools to have conversations with you. What does it feel like? How does it hurt? How long has it been hurting? Where does it hurt? What are you doing when it hurts? So that you can help them figure out, "Oh, that's just a little muscle pain, I'm sore from working yesterday." Believe your child and enter into that dialogue — it takes a little longer, but is super helpful for them to grow up as autonomous dancers who can understand their body and listen to what it's telling them.
[47:57] My second thing is to trust your dance studio teacher. And that is a very loaded comment to make because we know there are a lot of dance teachers out there who are not great. For that, I say if you don't trust your dance studio teacher, you probably should find another studio. If you don't trust the teacher and the decisions that they make — the casting, the way they teach, how they put kids on pointe or don't, who they take to festivals — whatever it is, you're certainly welcome to enter into conversation with them. And if you feel dissatisfied with that, if you disagree strongly, or if you suspect they're not treating your child well, then set aside the awards the studio has won or how famous they are on Instagram, and find a safe place for your child to be. So: believe your child, and trust your studio — or find a studio you can trust.

[48:53] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, I think that's so important because it also depends on the person's goals. If your dancer is dancing for fun and not planning on having a professional career, that's going to look very different than if somebody really is hoping to turn this into their profession. I love those tips for parents. And then what about teachers? How can they best support hypermobile dancers without overemphasizing their hypermobility?

[49:21] Jennifer Milner: It's really hard because you have 20 people in a class and you can't just slow the class down and stop for one person. But I would encourage teachers to get to know dancers at the beginning of the year, especially if it's a new group, and say to them, "Hey, I notice your knees lock back a lot. Has anybody ever worked with you on that? Where have your other teachers told you to put your heel? I notice you struggle in center with your développé, but at the barre, your développé is totally fine. Let's talk about your standing leg and see what we need to do to help you."
I would encourage teachers to look at hypermobile dancers as just another facet of technique to be addressed, just like all the other dancers who are not hypermobile. Keep in mind that hypermobile dancers are exponentially more likely to be neurodivergent, so you will see more learning disabilities such as dyslexia, dyscalculia, autism, ADHD, and things like that. I actually encourage you to expand the way in which you teach — make sure you demonstrate the combination, talk through the combination, use lots of different ways to help dancers learn differently.
[50:38] And I also encourage you to keep learning and keep growing. I put together a whole workshop on how to work with a hypermobile dancer in the dance studio because I feel like there are a lot of dance teachers out there who don't know and wish that they did. Keep looking on YouTube, keep researching, find people you trust, and talk to the dancers and get their feedback. And if they say, "I don't feel it," don't say, "I've told you 10 times." That means I have to tell you 11 times, but I have to say it differently the 11th time in order for them to get it.

[51:17] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And that's such important information, because dance teachers see a lot of bodies. They may very well be the first person to notice that somebody is hypermobile. If it's a ballet class, they're seeing them in a leotard and tights. They have this really unique opportunity and a really important role — they can really make a difference in a dancer's life if they can help them get stronger and point them to resources like you. So that's really, really great information. What about this trend we're seeing towards more acro and even contortion in dance today? We talked about this a little bit at the beginning. What is your take on that trend?

[52:02] Jennifer Milner: I work with a lot of competition dancers and I understand that it's part of life. And I see the competition world say, "Hey, we don't need the tricks, we don't need the acro, you can cut back on it." And yet they still get rewarded for it in their scores when they do it.
[52:18] The trend I'm seeing right now is that there's more acro in the younger dancers — in the mini and the junior rooms — and there's less of it in the teen room, and even less of it in the senior room. So I feel like it's being used in the early years to sort of cover up, "We don't have a lot of technique to offer because we just started dancing, but we're going to do stuff that looks cool." And then it's being choreographed less as they get older, which is definitely a great place to start.
[52:47] I do see the need sometimes for acro or contortionism in professional pieces if it's a really necessary part of the story. And I hope that if it's being put in there, it's being put in there in a really healthy way. The contortionists with circuses and Cirque du Soleil spend hours every day working on their body and keeping it healthy and safe to be able to do these things, and they have a huge support staff behind them. So if you're going to put that sort of thing in your choreography, you want to make sure that the dancer is getting that much support as well, and that it's something they can do 8 shows a week — not just once, really cool in the dance studio.
I had a dancer — a 12-year-old with a vertebral stress fracture — because she had a crazy bendy back and just kept doing it because it looked so cool. They put it in her solo and her group dances many, many times. And now they understand: you can't just play with that. She was out for several months. So I do think I see it and I understand it, and I hope that it becomes one tool in telling the story rather than the thing that says, "Look at how cool this dancer is," because we want it to inform the dance but not necessarily be the dance.

[54:19] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, I think that's really good. And when it comes to that 12-year-old, that's something that is going to be with her forever. I mean, obviously there's healing that happens, but when we get really serious injuries like that, even after the healing has happened, there are potential ramifications down the road. So I think it's just so important for people to be really thoughtful about all those things.
[54:44] Okay, so let's talk now about career. I was dying to ask you this question, because I know you work with a ton of pre-professional dancers and some of them can be so incredibly talented. I'm dying to know — what do you think are the most common reasons why pre-professional dancers do not transition into professional careers?

[55:08] Jennifer Milner: In general, I think there are lots of reasons. I think burnout is a really big one. We see so many of the really young, amazing dancers get all the young dance awards — the "promising best artist," "soon to be a trailblazer," whatever the awards are called at 9, 10, 11 years old. And everybody's like, "Oh wow, that's going to be crazy." But instead of saying, "That will be amazing — let's nurture this," they say, "That is amazing — let's do more of it." And when I see those bodies, especially hypermobile dancers who are at that stage, I think, man, where are they going to be in 3 years?
[55:53] So sometimes it's a mental burnout. I've seen several really promising dancers drop out around age 14 or 15 because of mental burnout. And sometimes it's physical burnout. When a 10-year-old says, "Mom, it just hurts to walk down the stairs every day," I'm like — that's not normal. And we should not normalize that.
[56:12] So I think burnout is a big one. And to combat that, we just need to get more support in the dance studios for both physical and mental health. And we need to, as a community that consumes art, change our expectations and say, "Wow, that's a really beautiful dance done by a 10-year-old at a very age-appropriate developmental level," rather than, "Wow, that 10-year-old can do all the same tricks that Tiler Peck can do." Well, she shouldn't be able to, and something is being sacrificed in order to do those things.
[56:54] The second reason I see is sometimes it's just dumb luck — whether you get a job or you don't. You know somebody, not that you're not qualified. I remember a year or two ago, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre did open auditions for women and 800 women showed up. 800 women flew across the country to audition for Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre, and they had one contract. You could have been number 2 and been really talented, but number 2 didn't get a contract.

[57:23] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Oh my gosh.

[57:30] Jennifer Milner: So sometimes it's dumb luck. And when we get into those situations, what's going to help you is what we talked about earlier — knowing yourself. The dancers that succeed and thrive may not be in the fanciest and flashiest companies, but they know what they love to do, they know what they're good at, and they pursue that. They say, "Yeah, I could go after this, and it would be more prestigious, but I wouldn't be doing the choreography I love, and it would kind of hurt my body, and that's not really who I am. So I'm going to pursue this because what I have to say matches with what that company is trying to say."
[58:10] The best thing you can do to combat dumb luck is to know who you are and know what you have to offer when you walk in the room. There are companies that I would have auditioned for as a young ballet dancer that there's no way they would have hired me — I just wasn't right for them. I would have done better to say, what are the 10 companies that I could really see myself at? And put my time and effort into that. So I think luck and not having a strong sense of who you are and what you have to offer is going to be another thing that keeps people from jobs.

[58:50] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, 800 people for one contract. I mean, we all know that it's really, really tough out there. But yeah, that's a sobering statistic for sure. What about people who are dancing for fun or not pursuing a professional career? I had a patient once who was in her 30s and she already had foot pain and she was taking adult ballet and she said she was going to go on pointe. And I'm like, why? You're an adult dancer, you're just doing it for fun. She said, well, because everyone else is going to do it. We talked about what her goals were, and she ultimately decided not to go on pointe, and I think that was definitely the right call. But in terms of younger dancers who may or may not be thinking of pursuing a professional career, do you think they should still go on pointe? Do you think they should be pushing for things like the splits?

[59:40] Jennifer Milner: I think it depends on what their goals are. I'm never going to tell a dancer not to strive to go on pointe, and I'm never going to tell them, don't work on your flexibility. If the splits are hugely uncomfortable and you don't have anywhere near the range of motion to accomplish it, it's going to take a lot of work. Are you willing to put all of that work into it to accomplish something you don't really need? Now, if you really want it, that's fine. It's great to have goals.
[1:00:09] And the same thing is going to be true of pointe. If you are a recreational dancer and you're only dancing through high school, or you're only really dancing in a studio until you can audition for your drill team, and then you're going to do drill — do you need to go on pointe? If you want to, go for it, as long as you have the strength and the range of motion with your foot. Otherwise, I don't see a reason to push it, especially if you don't want to.
[1:00:33] If you're an adult dancer and you have the strength and the training and the technique, that's great. Do it. Make sure you're working with a really good teacher and working really healthily. It's hard to find an adult who takes up dance later in life who doesn't have foot issues. So dance can be a really great way to force you to confront those foot issues — perhaps you can get stronger and deal with all of that stuff, and then you'll be ready to go en pointe.
[1:01:01] But I think the most important question is: why? And if you're not really sure, but you feel that FOMO, or you feel like, "Well, they told me I had to," then let's talk about that, and maybe find a different studio.

[1:01:09] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And what about competitions? How do you think those shape dancers — their artistry and their training? How much of that is positive and how much is negative?

[1:01:23] Jennifer Milner: These are all very deep questions.

[1:01:27] Dr. Linda Bluestein: I saved the best for you, Jenn.

[1:01:27] Jennifer Milner: I think you did. Thanks for saving the hard ones.

[1:01:35] Dr. Linda Bluestein: You're welcome.

[1:01:36] Jennifer Milner: I think competitions are both helpful and a challenge in a dancer's life. At a young age, many of my competition dancers have been on stage more by the time they're 10 than I was by the time I was 20. So they have gotten a lot more comfortable being on stage. They don't have that fear they would have to face later in life.
[1:02:03] Competitions are also really great for younger dancers because most of them love it — it's an excuse to hang out in a hotel for a weekend, eat junk food with their friends, stay up super late, wear really cool makeup. It's like sleepaway camp, but for dancers. They have this great bonding, they have a lot of fun, they go on stage and do these really hard, amazing dance numbers, and they get this great energy from the crowd.
And then there's also more one-on-one time with the teacher. We didn't do private lessons in my day. You got your training from your group classes, and if you had to have a private, it was because something really needed to be fixed. But these days people get privates regularly to work on their variations or solos for competitions. So it's wonderful to have that one-on-one time, to take a variation and work on it for 8 months and get really good at it and get into the nuance of it.
[1:03:04] The flip side of that is some of that time could be spent in technique class. I see competition studios that end up having to cancel a lot of group technique classes to make room for more rehearsals. I have dancers who are in 12, 13, 15 different pieces in one year. So they're going to a lot of rehearsals and doing a lot of stuff that gets them ready for that specific choreography, but isn't necessarily giving them the technique they need to be able to adapt to slightly different choreography or to do something a little harder or to understand the why behind what they're doing.
[1:03:44] And I also think — not just because of competitions — we're losing some of the artistry that gets handed down in dance class. The only way I learned a variation was from someone who had performed it. There was no YouTube, no way to just go watch something quickly. There were no competitions really, except for Varna. And if I learned a variation, I knew that variation. I understood it. I knew the story behind it. Whoever was explaining it to me was explaining why the hands went this way, what the reasoning was behind it, all of that. So there was a degree of artistry being taught in class just because it was being handed from one person to the next.
[1:04:36] Now my dance students know so many more variations than I did, but they're learning them straight from YouTube and they're not being taught the artistry that goes with it. And if they're learning it in class, maybe they're learning it from a teacher who learned it from YouTube. So I feel like the artistry that gets handed down is, "Smile here, work in anguish here if it's a contemporary," rather than letting the dancer find for themselves what that artistry is going to be and what they're trying to say.
[1:05:12] When dancers ask me to clean up their solos, they'll do a contemporary piece and I'm like, "What's it about?" And they're like, "I don't know." And I'm like, "Well, then why are you on stage? What are you trying to say?" And so I feel like we lose a little bit of that because we're working so much in the competitions. But I do think there is value from the group experience and from the self-confidence they gain at an earlier age in front of a large group of people.

[1:05:47] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yeah, those are such great points. And this has been such a great conversation. I could talk to you for 2 more hours, but I am cognizant of the time. So I just have a couple of quick closing questions here. If you could go back in time, what would you tell your younger self?

[1:06:02] Jennifer Milner: If I could go back in time, I would tell myself that it is okay to fail. As a dancer, I was very afraid of failure. I wouldn't practice my fouetté turns because I didn't want other people to see me doing fouetté turns because I couldn't do them. And so I never got really good at fouetté turns because I wouldn't practice them.
[1:06:21] I think it's really important for dancers to understand that no one's going to be perfect, no one's going to dance anything perfectly. And it's okay to not understand something, to need to ask a question, to say, "This is what it feels like in my body — is that right?" or "This doesn't feel good — is that right?" To put myself out there as who I am rather than who I thought they wanted me to be. And if they didn't like who I was, it would have felt like a failure — but that would have been okay, because I was presenting myself. So I always encourage dancers to know, and I wish I had known, that it's really okay to fail, and that that's part of it. When you're failing, you're just learning another way not to do it, and you'll find one that works.

[1:07:12] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And is there anything else that you've done in the past that you would do differently now?

[1:07:19] Jennifer Milner: I would warm up. I have such a distinct memory from being 13 years old and the director walking into the studio and saying, "All right, have you warmed up?" And I was like, "Why? We're about to start dancing. I'll warm up while I'm dancing." And of course now I'm like, don't do it. I would have warmed up. Taken care of my body preemptively.

[1:07:43] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Yep. I made that exact same mistake when I was at UC Irvine. I would just race into class, and that's how I had some bad hamstring injuries when I was in college. No proper warmup for sure. And then what about experiences from your own career as a dancer that most shaped your current work with hypermobile dancers? Can you identify any specific experiences?

[1:08:09] Jennifer Milner: I think my experiences were not knowing that I was hypermobile and thinking, well, I'm just a person who sprains her ankles all the time, and my shoulders go in and out of the socket — it's a cool party trick. Sure, my back hurts all the time, but I go to the chiropractor and he fixes it and I feel better. And not really being able to connect all of those dots together and understand that there was a bigger piece of it — and then not being able to connect the other dots, which were the other connective tissue parts.
[1:08:40] So I think that has really shaped me as a practitioner in wanting to see what other stars are in the sky and try to put together the whole constellation rather than just going, "This is the one thing." I want to say, "Okay, but let's look — let me get a telescope and see what else is out there and link it all together." When they say, "My knee hurts," I'm like, "Well, how's your ankle? Oh, it's really loose? Oh wow, what a coincidence." So that has definitely informed my work and made me more generous in trying to teach them to be generous with themselves. Because I was not generous with myself when these things would happen. I'd be like, come on, suck it up, it's fine.

[1:09:19] Dr. Linda Bluestein: And if you have a final message to leave with our listeners about this topic and/or a hypermobility hack to share with us, that would be a great thing to end on. And then of course we'll talk about where people can find you online as well.

[1:09:37] Jennifer Milner: Hypermobility hack, final thought. For me, it's all about strength. And the hack is: be gentle with yourself emotionally, be patient with yourself, trust yourself, and build your strength. Your strength is not going to take away your flexibility. Your strength is going to make you able to access your flexibility more. So be kind to yourself and let yourself get stronger. You 100% deserve it.

[1:10:03] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me today. I know that you're super busy. Can you, before you go, let us know if you have any special projects you're working on and where people can find you online?

[1:10:10] Jennifer Milner: You can find me online at jennifer-milner.com, and within that I also have an entire online learning platform. I have several on-demand workshops, including the workshop I mentioned earlier that's about Pilates and hypermobility in the dance studio — that's specific for dance teachers — and a workshop on thriving outside of the dance studio for dancers, covering nutrition, mental health, strength training, planning the season, and all of those things. And Dr. Bluestein, as always, is a valuable contributor to more than one of those workshops. You can find me at Jennifer.Milner also on Instagram. Those are the two best ways to find me.

[1:11:13] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Okay, great. And I love doing those workshops with you. I know you always put in so much time crafting exactly what you want to cover and really looking at all these different perspectives. It's so great because you often have dancers come in as models so you can actually demonstrate things on them — hypermobile dancers. I think it's just really great that you have this platform where people can go and purchase things on demand. I'm honored to be a part of some of those programs and always love to do projects with you. Thank you so much for including me in some of those. I just loved our conversation today so very much. And I know that this is going to air after the IADMS conference, but I look forward to seeing you there for sure.

[1:12:04] Jennifer Milner: Me too. I can't wait.

[1:13:02] Dr. Linda Bluestein: Well, I always love having Jennifer Milner back on Bendy Bodies. And thank you, thank you, thank you to Jen for taking the time to chat with me. I really, really love this conversation, and I think it's going to be so helpful to so many dancers, dance teachers, and everyone who cares about the health of dancers.
[1:13:20] Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of the Bendy Bodies with the Hypermobility MD Podcast. I have lots of other resources, including my newsletter, the Bendy Bulletin. Check that out on Substack at hypermobilitymd.substack.com. You can help us spread the word about joint hypermobility and related disorders by leaving a review and sharing the podcast. This really helps raise awareness about these complex conditions.
[1:13:43] Did you know that I also offer one-on-one support for both clients and healthcare professionals? Whether you're living with hypermobility or caring for people who are, I've got your back. Check out my coaching and mentorship options on the services page of my website at hypermobilitymd.com. You can also find me, Dr. Linda Bluestein, on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, or LinkedIn at hypermobilitymd. You can find Human Content, my producing team, at humancontentpods on TikTok and Instagram. You can also find full video episodes up every week on YouTube at Bendy Bodies Podcast.
[1:14:13] As you know, I love bringing guests on the show with unique perspectives to share. However, these unscripted discussions do not reflect views or opinions held by me or the Bendy Bodies Podcast team. Although we may share healthcare professionals on the podcast, no statement shared on Bendy Bodies should be considered medical advice. Please always consult a qualified healthcare professional for your own care. To learn about the Bendy Bodies Program disclaimer and ethics policy, submission verification licensing terms, and HIPAA release terms, or to reach out with any questions, please visit bendybodiespodcast.com. Bendy Bodies Podcast is a Human Content production. Thank you for being a part of our community, and we'll catch you next time on the Bendy Bodies Podcast.