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Thread: Spin Sickness

  1. #1
    Registered User Dave Ellis's Avatar
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    Spin Sickness

    An essential component of my horrendously labyrinthine scheme to finally move out of the 'single' category on my facebook profile, I have been attempting to persuade a friend of mine to come to Ceroc lessons with me.

    She's managed to come to half of one, and to a Ball, but is ready to call it quits already due to feeling nauseous from "all that spinning." Instead of just getting dizzy, she apparently feels quite ill after dancing for more than a few songs.

    So, now that the exposition is out of the way, here are my questions:
    Have any of you (specifically the ladies) experienced this sort of spinning-induced motion sickness?
    If so, how did you combat it? Is it something that disappears with a little experience, or is there perhaps some special technique (or pill) to cure it?

    I'd appreciate any tips or advice you can give me. It's a matter of life and Dave.

    Cheers.

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    Re: Spin Sickness

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Ellis View Post
    An essential component of my horrendously labyrinthine scheme to finally move out of the 'single' category on my facebook profile, I have been attempting to persuade a friend of mine to come to Ceroc lessons with me.

    She's managed to come to half of one, and to a Ball, but is ready to call it quits already due to feeling nauseous from "all that spinning." Instead of just getting dizzy, she apparently feels quite ill after dancing for more than a few songs.

    So, now that the exposition is out of the way, here are my questions:
    Have any of you (specifically the ladies) experienced this sort of spinning-induced motion sickness?
    If so, how did you combat it? Is it something that disappears with a little experience, or is there perhaps some special technique (or pill) to cure it?

    I'd appreciate any tips or advice you can give me. It's a matter of life and Dave.

    Cheers.
    Was she spinning, pivoting, turning or walking round? The latter tends to make you feel sick.

  3. #3
    Commercial Operator StokeBloke's Avatar
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    Cool Re: Spin Sickness

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Ellis View Post
    I'd appreciate any tips or advice you can give me. It's a matter of life and Dave.

    Cheers.
    Hey Dave. Obviously you can try to avoid certain 'spinny' moves. But MJ is a pretty rotational dance. Maybe something more slotted would work better - like WCS for example. Far less spinning, more up and down.

  4. #4
    Registered User Dave Ellis's Avatar
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    Re: Spin Sickness

    A little bit of each. The beginner routine at the class she went to consisted of a wurlitzer, lady spin and a yoyo. I led a couple of other moves with her (just basic stuff), and obviously there were a few returns scattered about the place. Nothing out of the ordinary, but enough for her to feel a bit 'off' afterwards.

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    Re: Spin Sickness

    This could be due to a problem with her inner ear - she can get that checked out.
    Check she's not just looking at the floor when she spins either, as that won't help and could be assisting her giddiness.

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    Re: Spin Sickness

    Hi Dave
    I get this quite alot. I find that it happens more in the lesson section than the freestyle section as each move is obviously being repeated alot.
    I found that I was looking at the floor when dancing, but have found that looking at one point at eye level when spinning makes it easier. I found that quite hard at the beginning but had to stick with it and it eventually got slightly better, still get it from time to time but normally try and have as many breaks as I can and regular drinks of water and fresh air.
    I found it quite disheartening at the beginning as it was constricting what I could dance, but after a while I started to deal with it, so tell your friend that she should definitly stick with it.
    Totally agree though that dancing in a slot decreases this feeling aswell, although where I go there are not that many people that do that.
    Hope it gets better for her as I know how she feels.
    Ellen

  7. #7
    Registered User MarkW's Avatar
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    Re: Spin Sickness

    Hi Dave,

    There are things that a lead can do. There are probably many more than I can think of but here are a few suggestions:

    In and out moves (easiest in double hand hold) interspersed to cut down on rotation. These can look really good if you get the body rolls going (I can't do those very well but you and your lady could have fun learning them).

    Take extra beats on turns and returns. This looks good to some types of music, particularly slow music I find.

    Take extra beats in general e.g. in the step across instead of having changed places on '3' maybe take an extra beat on the crossing bit and be facing each other on '4'. '5' if you're really milking it. Yeah, baby!

    Turn/return her (maybe slowly) then slowly turn yourself in front of her as she wiggles and looks at you admiringly and well, hey, everyone's a winner (kind of a slow figure of 8).

    Travelling moves sometimes don't involve much turning e.g. a basket where you walk along side by side after wrapping in for a while before unwrapping, or a first move where you open out and end up with your right arm behind her back and you're set fair to walk along together. Some people really like travelling moves - I know I do - when there is enough space on the dance floor to do them.

    Leave fast music alone if that is worse for her. Time for a bit of gazing into her eyes?

    Rock steps, e.g. you've started the first move but just block gently and rock back rather than going into the turn. You can do this a few times and sometimes it fits the music well.

    Dance apart for short periods of time. What I mean by this is that you carefully let go and maybe take a small step back so you are facing but not in any hold. Then do whatever you feel like. (A bit daunting while she's a beginner as she may feel abandoned.)

    A bit like dancing apart but keep hold. This is good when there's a break or slow down in the music. You bring your leading hand gently to a halt and let her play. (Again, a bit daunting for a beginner.)

    I hope this is of some use and I haven't gone off on too much of a tangent.

    There is the danger that if you solve the problem by the way you lead that she will only enjoy dancing with you. But I'm guessing that may fit your purposes anyway you cunning devil.

    Have fun and I hope it all resolves itself well for you.

    Mark

  8. #8
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    Re: Spin Sickness

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Ellis View Post
    An essential component of my horrendously labyrinthine scheme to finally move out of the 'single' category on my facebook profile, I have been attempting to persuade a friend of mine to come to Ceroc lessons with me.

    She's managed to come to half of one, and to a Ball, but is ready to call it quits already due to feeling nauseous from "all that spinning." Instead of just getting dizzy, she apparently feels quite ill after dancing for more than a few songs.

    So, now that the exposition is out of the way, here are my questions:
    Have any of you (specifically the ladies) experienced this sort of spinning-induced motion sickness?
    If so, how did you combat it? Is it something that disappears with a little experience, or is there perhaps some special technique (or pill) to cure it?

    I'd appreciate any tips or advice you can give me. It's a matter of life and Dave.

    Cheers.
    By far the most common reason for dizzyness is looking down or looking up.

    A friend of mine tried motion sickness pills and also wrist bands - but what cured it was her was focusing at eye level and not looking down or up.

    As you are in Perth Australia, you have 2 very good instructors at Ceroc Perth | Club Jive - Perth Social Dance Classes - Kate and Craig.
    I would suggest you grab Kate or Craig (or both) on a lesson night and explain the situation and get them to help out.

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    Re: Spin Sickness

    I am the queen of motion sickness and vomiting! But there are definitely techniques that help:

    Normally, if I feel travel sick I find an object at a far enough horizon that it doesn’t appear to be moving, and this fools my brain into thinking there is less motion. If I started to feel sick in a car and focused on the person next to me, I would vomit quite quickly because they would appear to be moving (relatively speaking) against their background. When I linedance I always choose to be on the outside of the floor because I will be able to see the walls clearly – I know I can do several fast turns and achieve a clean return to the same direction in a straight line without getting dizzy because I can spot and return my focus to the same wall. If I'm in the middle of a row I'm a pale shade of green after a couple of dances.

    When I started to jive I assumed that this technique would work, but it absolutely does not work for me. In fact I find that the opposite technique applies in jive – if I tried to see the unmoving walls against my partner then I would start to feel sick, probably because of the need to keep looking back at my partner in order to follow. What I have found does work is focusing exclusively on my partner and trying not to see the walls at all – starting and finishing on his face.

    I have found only one exception to my ‘focus on your partner’ rule, and that is when I dance with this bloke mentioned elsewhere who has this weird rotationy thing going on, and in that instance only, I find that looking at the wall DOES help. (And having followed the advice given on the forum I have found that I can influence his rotation a bit, so it’s better now anyway). Your partner could try both techniques and see if one works for her. Mind you, if she is spinning too slowly, she may be half-seeing things on the way round when it would be better to have a quick unfocused blur and back to what she is choosing to focus on.

    Focusing on my partner I find that now the only times I have any problems with dizziness is if I am spun faster than I can control myself. This doesn’t happen very often at all, but if it does then my self awareness of where I am in relation to the floor, the walls and my lead vanishes, and I just have to hope I'm going to be caught at the end of it....always been ok so far, though once I 'came to' about two inches off the floor in a death-defying drop!

    I would suggest that your partner might find it easier when she feels more in control, can see the spins coming and get her focus right first, and has gained a better body consciousness of where she is. The body awareness of where it is in its surrounding space is apparently one of the (many more than five) senses that people have in varying degrees, but from my own experience I'm sure it can be developed.

    I don't know what the lighting is like where you are, but dancing where there are flashing lights makes me want to throw up before I even start to dance, plus if it is too dark I find it harder to keep my centre of gravity, follow, etc. So I would suggest that if either of those circumstances apply that you try altering whereabouts in the class you dance.

    I seem to remember being told when I first started linedancing that if you aren't used to turning (as opposed to spinning) and your technique isn't right, then tight turns and loose turns feel quite different - one type feels vastly sickier than the other. I can't recall which ones, sorry, I think it might have been big loose ones because your head moves about more(??) but she could experiment.

    Final suggestion - have you tried building her ‘resistance’ up by doing less than the 360? I know it would be a bad habit to get into, but maybe she could cope with a bit of a turn with you compensating and then could increase the amount of the turn gradually - I’m suggesting away from class rather than in the throes of it, and not expecting other jivers to do the same.

    Good luck, I'm sure she can crack it eventually.

  10. #10
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    Re: Spin Sickness

    Or you could ask her, not to look up and not to look down...

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