Hip sudden opening

Yoga Discussion General Yoga
#1

Hi Folks,

Believe I have stiff hips/hamstrings, from an office job and lack of use. When doing a forward sitting bend my knees require to be bent. When doing warrior 3, I cannot tilt my torso parallel with the ground. Yesterday near the end of a yoga class, I did one more final sitting forward bend. With my knees bent, I started to move my chest toward my thighs with a straight back. As I did this all of the sudden my left foots hip gave way. It suddenly moved further down, further then it in the past. But this was not a smooth stretch the hip moved rapidly and left me feeling a little uncomfortable. Though this may just be a new sensation which was never felt before. It almost felt as though something suddenly shifted in my hip, and the hip quickly opened a bit more. It then snapped back also rather quickly. I don’t know if I’m getting ahead of myself or is this the normal way of opening up the hips. There was no pain, but just some strange discomfort. And this strange feeling as though the hip joint is about to pop out of its socket. The entire movement was a little rushed, perhaps this is why this occurred. Put too much force with my torso on the hip. Andy advice is appreciated.

Cheers,
tido

#2

I’m not sure I completely understand your description… When you say “It suddenly moved further down” do you mean you felt the head of the femur move lower in the socket, or rather your torso was suddenly able to move further down? Also was there anything audible happening? Ie did you hear a click, pop, or crack? Also were your knee caps pointed up towards the ceiling, the entire time or did you rotate them externally and then feel the drop?
If it’s the head of the femur moving down towards the floor in a seated forward bend- this is not my experience with how hip opening feels at all. Rather hip opening feels like a slow progression of being able to rotate the femur externally in the socket, in conjuction with an increasing amount of hip flexion- think foot behind the head type of movement- the knee points away from the body and the thigh is able to be up by the torso. Hip opening isn’t usually sudden or fast, rather its a slow, one baby step at a time deal.
Sometimes a student will get a sensation of the femural head dropping when they unclench their psoas (hip flexor) Many people clench their hip flexors for various reason (emotional or postural if they spend alot of time sitting at a desk) and when they finally let go, it’s a very strange feeling. Letting go of the hip flexor can very much assist in hip opening and it can feel wonderful and a bit scary to let go of it. Many people have an emotional release when it happens too!
Not sure if what you experienced was a hip flexor release or not- I have about ten more questions to ask before I could get a grasp of what was happening anatomically speaking…