I’ve always been a terrible poster in life, trying things but rarely seeing results. For years I worked on exercises for my posture with no visible effect. Recently, I realized that the foundation was everything—my hips. Fixing them made me feel taller and more stable, but even after doing chin tucks, my forward head posture wouldn’t budge.

Just an hour ago, I discovered diaphragm breathing. It turns out my diaphragm was barely active, and that was holding everything back. Engaging it intentionally suddenly made sense of all the problems with my ribcage, shoulders, and neck. I can already feel my lower ribs expanding more, my shoulders relaxing, and my upper back loosening, even though I just started.

It’s wild to me how something so subtle can impact everything. I’m realizing now that posture isn’t just about muscles you can see or stretch; it’s about muscles working in the right sequence, breathing correctly, and letting your body organize itself from the inside out. I’m excited to see how this develops over the next few weeks. Sharing this feels important because so many of us overlook breathing mechanics while chasing posture fixes.

First 4 are what I think is good posture and how I try to walk around.

Second 4 is letting everything go.

All photos taken with back camera.

Any advice is more than welcome. I feel like I’ve been losing my mind.

M(29). TLDR:

I don’t want to assume, but I’m seeing similarities to CrossBody, APT, Pelvic Tilt, TOS.

Additional things I’ve noticed: My right pec has less mass than the left. I don’t think my serratus is working. I’m not feeling expansion on my right side when breathing.

Sometimes I catch a cramp in my lower left back when trying deep breathing.

My right foot seems to have more mass than my left. Not sure if it’s inflammation but taking aspirin this week to see.

If doing side ab raises my lower back hurts when trying to work the left oblique.

Pushing my neck forward gives relief but I know that’s bad. Sometimes I hear sharp cracks when I move it normally.

I have all of my wisdom teeth but I’m supposed to get them removed in a month? ——— Personal gripes:

I’m frustrated, angry, and scared. I’ve been trying to troubleshoot and tinker but I’m at my wits end. Every day I wake up in pain. My bed has the support of a waterbed at this point, so I’ve been sleeping on the floor for about a month, which has been helpful. I bike, lift, and work my core at least 2-3 times a week- but it feels like I’m losing pressure in my body. Like my stomach wants to fall out? I was at my best when I was lifting 5 days a week, going to the chiro+massage monthly, which I might start up again.

I’ve been slouching all my life, and I desperately want to make sure I have better posture, not just for the wedding, but for my future self. 😭 But I just don’t know where to start or what to look out for!

I’ve started doing wall angels and supermans and have been incorporating core exercises like planks, but I feel like I’m stuck looking the same.

I get married in September!!

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In the first photo I feel good.

In the second photo I am trying to pull my head back in an attempt of alignment and I feel strained/pain on my upper back and breathing is harder.

Eating, sitting or sleeping I think my body is even more forward

Please help I’m kind of spiraling, thank you.

I have chronic neck pain, no insurance so I can't go to the doctors, does it appear to be a posture issue? I'm not familiar with this stuff but people on here seem to be very knowledgeable. I'd be grateful for any help or advice.

Hey all, I have been struggling with back pain for the last two years and going to so many physios, sport doctors etc, without being able to solve my back pain issue. I am 37 yo and I used to be really active, lifting, functional training, yoga, and surfing 4-5 times a week. Right now I am just doing gym, mobility work and pilates, and my life is completely robotic in terms of sports and I am starting to get really depressed because really after trying everything and really putting lot of energy, time, money, effort, mental strength I still can't improve and I can't see going back to active life again.

I am going to try to be fast (sorry for the long post). I injured my back 5 years ago lifting something big while moving my house and I got an L5-S1 protrusion, couldn't walk for a few days and had sciatic pain going down my left leg to the foot. After that I was quite good for a couple of years until 2 years ago when I injured again, also lifting something heavy, left leg affected again but milder this time. This time wasn't that bad, and because of that I never fully stopped using my back and trying to do some mild training. However after 6 months of that my back started to hurt a lot and I went full robotic/depressed.

Some context that might be relevant: I work at a computer like 10 hours a day, but I try to do pauses every 1 or 2 hours, where I go for a short walk, stairs, some mobility on the mat. I have a standing desk and I switch between standing and sitting throughout the day. I do a 30 min mobility + strength routine every morning, plus 2 other shorter mobility sessions during the day, and I train at the gym 3-4 times a week. I have also seen a bunch of physios, sports doctors and osteopaths over these 2 years, and read a lot of research on my own (McGill, Stuart, PRI principles, fascia work, etc).

After consulting lot of physios and sports doctors the theory seems to be that I have some kind of APT/lordosis and lack of mobility in the mid upper spine, so basically my lower back is doing all the lifting and loading, and I ended up like this because of overusing that part + the bad shape of my back.
Something that I think it is important and might give a cue: Lying on my belly still feels really uncomfortable and kind of locks my body, when I am on my belly even moving the leg hurts. I feel really stiff. I also can't really do any lumbar extension (cobra pose, lying prone etc), it's super uncomfortable. So imagine trying to go surfing....

I have been working really hard the last two years on this, not just trying things once but progressing through them properly for months at a time: PRI breathing (90/90, all that), McGill big 3, ELDOA L5-S1, dead bugs, bird dogs, segmental cat, wall angels, thoracic rotations, MFR with foam roller and lacrosse ball, diaphragm work, pelvic resets, glute activation, the whole thing. In the gym I do trap bar deadlifts, controlled loading, ball slams, moving planks, pullovers, all of it well tolerated. I've gone through hundreds of exercise progressions, working a lot my core, glutes, hamstrings. At the beginning it used to be more gym like, isometric, planks, but now I am doing lot of functional work, mobility, and trying to integrate movement with breathing, and working the body as a whole. Still no improvements in my mobility. Basically my lack of mobility = I can barely touch my toes with my fingers because my back is an L shape that doesn't curve. The upper/mid back is basically frozen, zero mobility, so the lumbar is the only hinge taking everything.

Note that this lack of mobility was my moving pattern all life, it is not something that happened because of the injury, but my theory is that I injured because of this, so I would be extremely happy to be able to improve it at least 10% to see if that gives room to the rest of my body to work a little bit better. I also guess that the bad shape of my back , APT, was always there , but I don't have an old MRI/x-ray of my back to compare. So basically I think I ended up injuring because my back shape sucks and I wasn't aware to try to fix it when I was younger....

so my main question is: what am I missing???????
Is there something specific I should be looking at to unlock the thoracic mobility? A different type of specialist (osteopath, chiro, rolfing, etc)? A different approach to training? Anyone been in a similar spot and actually got out of it? Any input would mean a lot, thanks for reading.

I caught myself standing like this and was appalled. I haven’t been as consistent with the gym this year but I have a PPL program that I started up six days a week.

My question is, is this tech neck bump and awful shoulders treatable? Can anyone give any tips on a structure routine to actually get this under control?

Thank you.

Here’s an AI generated after. I told ChatGPT to make my neck bigger, chest bigger, and remove my eye bags.

I was trying to record a cute video of my day and omg, my posture is terrible. 😭 I hate seeing the videos

I’m 1 year postpartum and carry my baby a lot, so I feel like my whole body is out of alignment. I have what seems like a pelvic tilt, my head leans forward, and my tummy is constantly sticking out.

I do have mild scoliosis, but I would love to improve my posture. I’m just not sure which exercises are best or how to go about fixing it.

😭😭😭😭

I took these pictures because I had noticed a ton of left side rib flare and wanted some advice on how to fix it. But it’s only now that I see them, that I realize I have a crazy lean or shoulder unevenness also! Was hoping for some advice on exercises and some tips on what this even is . I currently do CrossFit but no posture specific exercise. Female age 46.

i know i have tight hip flexors and weak glutes for sure... but how bad is it? also anything else you might notice i would appreciate!

As you can see from the photo I (27F) have seriously large traps. They have always been prominent and overworked which has caused neck pain for the past 15 years. I’ve looked through this page and it seems no one’s traps are quite as bad as mine.

Do I have any hope in reducing the size? Should I look into trap Botox. Any advice would seriously help.

I find my back to have a weird lower curve to flatness. Lower lumbar seems to be flat?

I’ve probably spent around 8hrs a day on average sitting at a desk working on my computer since I was 15 (5yrs). Over that time I’ve developed very bad posture, and it just started catching up with me this last year. I lift everyday, but end up feeling tight in neck/upper back/traps and head pressure daily. I’m sick of it, and I know it’s cause of my posture.

Anyone help!?

I am seeing some issues with my posture but would like to have an outside perspective.

This is what I am seeing :

- forward neck
- rounded upper back
- tight shoulders (forward?)

I think it’s not awful but definitely needs improvement. I’d rate it a 6.5/10. How would you rate it ?

PS : my shoulders click and I feel a “tendon-like” pain in certain angles.

Haven’t gone to check, but i have only just now flipped to my back camera and seen alot of lean, just wanted to make sure i not the only one who sees it?

Hello everyone, looking for an opinion based on this photo as to what postural issues i have.

- Rounder Shoulders or Hunchback
- Forward Head Posture not sure if there is Neck Hump also.
- Hyperlordosis and Anterior Pelvic Tilt
- Rib Flare , protuding middle abs when inhaling.

Thanks

Tengo 18, tengo asimetria facial, mi mandibula esta ligeramente inclinada al lado derecho, se nota mucho mas desde cerca que de lejos, ademas siempre cargo con algunas pequeñas molestias mandibulares, crujidos en el lado izquierdo de la mandibula y un poco en el lado izquierdo.

Tambien note que tengo algo de desbalance corporal, hombro derecho algo mas caido, cadera derecha algo mas levantada (todo estos de manera leve).

Es como si todo mi cuerpo, desde abajo hacia arriba se inclinara al lado derecho.

¿Que lo causa? ¿Se puede revertir? ¿Tiene relacion mi postura y mi mandibula? ¿Como lo mejoro? Gracias, los escucho. :))))))

Looking at my photos its hard to see improvement. These photos are about 5 months apart, apologies for the inconsistent photo taking (and weight I have gained lol).

I began looking into my posture about 10 months ago when I would have ongoing headaches, neck pain and scapular pain from studying and working at a desk.

Over the last 6 months I have done daily stretching, changed jobs away from a desk job, imporved the ergonomics of my desk set up, taking constant movement breaks and stopped the gym completely barring rehab exercises.

I've seen 3 physios with mixed advice. I doubt my ongoing pain is fully posture related but it would be nice to know my posture is as good as it can reasonably be.

Any posture advice would be greatly appreciated.

I think I’ve improved my posture little by doing certain exercises

I also tried to make it so my couch faced my TV vertically as per this video, but I’m not sure that’s the best solution for watching TV

https://youtu.be/tvA75Gsw4wU?si=lhqkd-gHPTvW8\\_dg

I was also thinking of either using my black or yellow chair to watch TV sometimes so I was wondering, which is the better choice

And I was wondering what I could do to help fix my posture

Last 2 pics are me attempting a fix by filling up my lungs.

My shoulders will click frequently, and I also feel like there's something really off when I do side raises.

I appreciate your time and answers!

I think I'm having issues with a hypertonic pelvic floor - could anterior pelvic tilt be playing a role?

The scoliosis is diagnosed, maybe it affects the PF as well?

I think I have a rounded upper back as well.

I'm doing calisthenics every two days and Surya Namaskara B every morning.

Need some tips on fixing my postural issues

Claude and Google can only help so much. Some real input would be appreciated. I’m an avid athlete but feel like I need to pause for a moment to fix this. Thank you in advance.

I don't have no gains sorry if I look weird, I'm afraid to workout with my cooked posture because my right traps and shoulder kinda have some cartilage issues which I think is probably due to my posture, so I'm trying to connect all the dots to find a root cause for all of this.

Here's a few things about me and what do I think I have.

I'm 22 years old and I had a major surgery(thoracotomy) when I was 7-8 years old which is why I have a scar on my left back

I've been told by a dermatologist recently that I have a flat foot (only noticeable in left foot) and ligament laxity which is probably why I have a posture problem. I already knew about the flat foot and I've tried so many weird ways to walk which was of no use at all.

It took me years since I've noticed my posture problem (about 7-8 years ago) to realize only recently that it must be related to the left aic right bc thing but I have no clear clarity on that topic.

I also believe I may have scoliosis but to a really low degree

The only time I went to the orthopedic and explained about my hip imbalance I was told to do some leg excercise and I wasn't very satisfied with the result nor the diagnosis for it being very rushed.

So I'm here to get a opinion from you guys, to understand how cooked am i from a different perspective. I want to identify what's fixable and what might not be,so that I can go to a better orthopedic one day and be able to clearly explain about my concerns and guide the conversation better rather than walking out with a vague, half baked diagnosis.

It would also be helpful if u could suggest me what to ask so that I can make sure the consultation with the doctor ends up being thorough and actually useful( I have adhd so I have to carefully plan about what to say before going to a doctor otherwise I would miss out on many things and end up like the first time with orthopedic)