What is the Hypermobility Syndrome?

Well ‘hyper’ means ‘more’ and ‘mobility’ means ‘movement’. So ‘hypermobility’ means ‘more movement’. This word describes the fact that you can move your joints further than many of your friends can. Hypermobile people can put themselves in strange positions very easily without any special training because their bodies are slightly different. Other people, for example ballet dancers or gymnasts, have to train very hard to be able to do this.

The human body is made up of all sorts of things for example, bones, muscles and blood. It also has something called ‘connective tissue’. Connective tissue is the stuff that holds all the other bits of your body together. For example, ligaments hold bones together, tendons attach muscles to bones, veins and arteries carry blood around your body and skin stops your insides from falling out! If you were born with hypermobile joints then you probably have connective tissue which is more stretchy than most of your friends. This means that you can move your joints into funny positions because your ligaments are stretchy. Your skin may be stretchy too and you may bruise easily.

Hypermobility is something you are born with, and just as you may have got your blue eyes from your mum and your brown hair from dad, your stretchy joints also came from one of your parents. It is possible that you may be the first person in your family to have hypermobile joints - but this is unusual, most people get it from their mums or dads!