How to Safely Get up and Down From the Floor

Find Your Strong Leg

The first step of getting down to the floor is to stand on your strong leg, step back with your weaker leg. Follow these steps:

1. Determine your strongest leg, often our dominant side, and put all your weight on that leg.
2. Step the other foot back about 1-3 feet, so that you're in a staggered stance. Hold onto a chair if you need to, but try to work your way up so that you don't need the chair.
3. Rest your hands on the upper thigh of the front leg in preparation for the next step.
4. This is the first balance challenge, so brace your core to give your body more stability.
5. Once you feel stable, move on to the next step.

There are some exercises that can improve your balance and strength at this stage. View these exercises in this lower body strength, stability, and flexibility workout.

• Knee Lifts with med ball: Alternate sides for 16 reps
• Modified one-legged squats: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps
• Straight leg lift: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps
• Wall sits: Hold for 10-30 seconds

Kneel on the Floor

During this step you will bring both legs down and kneel on the floor. Follow these steps:

1. With your strong leg forward, other leg back, use your hands on the upper thigh of front leg as support as you bend the back knee and lower it to the floor.
2. Engage your abs and use the strength of your arms and thigh to brace the body, allowing the knee to come to the floor gently, instead of falling too hard.
3. Again, you can use a chair if you need to, but try to work your way up to using just your own body.
4. This is the second balance challenge, so continue to brace your core to give your body more stability.
5. Once you feel stable, move on to the next step.

There are some exercises that can improve your balance and strength at this stage:

• Assisted lunges: 1-2 sets o f 8-10 reps each side
• Chair squats: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps
• Quadriceps stretch: 2 times on each side, hold for 30 seconds
• Seated hamstring stretch: 2 times on each side, hold for 30 seconds
• Wall pushups: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps

Use Your Hand for Support

During this step, you'll take one hand to the floor for support. Follow these steps:

1. From the kneeling position, keep the hand braced on the upper thigh while you take the other hand to the floor, next to the front foot.
2. This is where you need hip and back flexibility. If you're tight, you may need to adjust the front foot, taking it further out to the sides for example, to make this more comfortable.
3. Use your abs here as a support for your spine as you get ready for the next step.

There are some exercises that can improve your balance and strength at this stage:

• Lower back extensions: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps
• Seated hip stretch: 2 times on each side, hold for 30 seconds
• Spine stretch:1-2 sets of 10-12 reps

Find Tabletop Position

During this step, you'll get on your hands and knees in tabletop position. Follow these steps:

1. From the last position, with one hand down, your next step is to take the front knee back so that you're in an all-fours position.
2. If you have flexibility issues, you may need to 'help' that front leg by grabbing onto your ankle or calf and moving the leg back into position. As you practice, this move should get easier.
3. When you're in position, both hands should be directly under the shoulders, both knees directly under the hips.
4. Make sure to keep your core engaged here as well. It will help you with your balance and stability.

There are some exercises that can improve your balance and strength at this stage:

• Standing cat and cow : 5 breaths
• Bird dog: 1-2 sets of 10-12 reps
• Cat and cow on the floor: 5 breaths

Settle on the Floor

During this last step on your way down to the floor, you'll lean onto the hip and settle on the floor. Follow these steps:

1. From the previous all-fours position, you can now rotate the body to one side, whichever side is comfortable for you, taking the side of the hip to the floor and settle down.
2. You can bend the knees and rest on the hip if that's comfortable, or you can keep going until you're sitting flat on your backside.
3. Now you're ready for whatever you want to do on the floor.
4. Whenever you're ready to stand back up, you can reverse the procedure.

Practice these movements on a regular basis, as well as the suggested exercises, to get stronger and more fluid at getting up and down from the floor. You'll find that being able to do this easily will make other daily activities easier as well.

Get Back Up

To get back up from the floor, reverse the procedure:

1. Get onto all fours
2. Bring the strong leg forward, knee bent, opposite hand on the floor for balance.
3. Lift up, placing both hands on the front quad.
4. Turn the back toes under and push your hands into the quad, using the strength of the thigh and upper body to push back to a standing position.
5. Bring back foot in, stand tall and repeat as many times as you can.