Recovery done right: 5 key principles for women healing from injury.

Here are my 5 key principles of injury recovery, with a special focus on what really works for women’s bodies.

1. Get the Right Diagnosis First

Before you reach for the foam roller or hit Google, start by getting a proper diagnosis. That means booking in with a physiotherapist or sports injury specialist who can assess what’s actually going on. Too often, we try to self-treat something that needs clinical evaluation—especially when tendons, ligaments, or chronic inflammation are involved.

Women’s tip: Hormonal fluctuations (especially around our menstrual cycles or perimenopause) can affect things like ligament laxity and joint stability, making us more prone to certain injuries like ACL tears or tendon issues. The more precise your diagnosis, the better your recovery plan can be tailored to your needs.

Woman recovering from knee injury.

2. Don’t Skip the Release Work

Soft tissue work, like sports massage, trigger point therapy, or foam rolling, is an essential piece of the puzzle. When muscles around an injury become tight or overactive, they can actually delay healing or create compensation patterns elsewhere in the body.

That’s where I come in! Sports massage can:

• Help reduce muscle guarding

• Increase circulation for healing

• Release tension in overworked areas

When to book a massage: If you’ve been cleared by a physio, or your injury is muscular in nature, hands-on work can be a great support for your recovery. It's not a cure-all, but it's often the missing piece.

3. Strength is Your Best Long-Term Rehab Tool

Once pain begins to settle, the focus must shift to strength training. Especially with tendon injuries, research shows that slow, controlled loading of the injured area is crucial for long-term healing. Strength builds resilience, rebalances movement patterns, and helps prevent re-injury.

Women’s tip: We’re more prone to issues like glute inhibition or pelvic instability (especially post nata; or during perimenopause), which means we really benefit from progressive strength work that targets these areas.

Start slow. Use body weight. Then gradually load up with bands, weights, and tempo work. Your body will thank you.

4. Respect the Timeline, but Don’t Stay Stuck

There’s a difference between being patient and being passive. Healing takes time, but we also need to know when it’s time to progress. If you’re stuck in pain months later with no change, it’s a sign something’s missing from your plan.

This is especially true for women with:

• Recurring tendon pain

• Hip or lower back niggles

• Pelvic floor issues post-birth

It might be time to recheck your diagnosis, add strength training, or get soft tissue work to break the cycle.

5. Recovery Is Holistic—Look at the Whole You

Here’s a truth I wish more people talked about: Your hormones, stress levels, sleep, and nutrition all affect recovery. Women in particular face challenges that are rarely discussed, like how low energy availability (i.e. under-eating while training hard) can delay healing.

If you’re always tired, slow to recover, or stuck in an injury loop, take a step back and look at the bigger picture. Are you fueling enough? Sleeping enough? Taking real rest days?

Final thought:

It may seem a small consolation, but we can actually learn from injuries. It's an opportunity to learn about your body and any weaknesses or alignment issues, so that you can correct them and build yourself back even stronger.

If you're unsure where to start, please reach out, I’m here to help guide you, whether through tailored strength coaching, soft tissue work, or just helping you map out the next steps.

Contact me info@nicolapeaty.com