Athletes in Overalls: 18 Months of Movement Health and Wellness Coaching with Five Maine Farms

Farming is a labor of love with a neverending list of things to do. The physical and mental hurdles that farmers and farmworkers experience can be joyful accomplishments or struggles that are survived. Farming is known to be back-breaking work, with a farmer’s primary tool being their body. Often, a farmer’s physical well-being is not a consideration until there is a problem: an ache, a pain, a limitation to ability or capacity. It is not uncommon for farmers and farmworkers to barrel through work with an injury given a cultural tendency to “get the job done.”

Labor-Movement LLC, founded in 2020, trains farmers in body mechanics and movement patterns, focusing on increasing an individual’s understanding of how to utilize their athletic capacity to decrease injury potential. Framing farmers as “athletes in overalls” encourages individuals to consider their well-being as a priority to continue to do the work they love and increase their longevity.

From April 2023 through September 2024, five Maine farms participated in a Movement Health + Wellness Coaching Project funded through Northeast Extension Risk Management Education (ERME). The project was centered at each farm’s location, with involvement of farm owners and the entire crew. This project included movement workshops at the beginning of each season to set a framework of movement well-being. Additionally, five total coaching days were dispersed through each season, at two to three month intervals. These days allowed for individual or small group interaction to address real-time individual concerns. Winter access to mobility and strength training was included, and, for the entire 18-month project, Labor-Movement was available as a resource to address pre-injury concerns via multiple communication channels. Labor-Movement worked with each farm in creating up to three standard operating procedures (SOPs) related to movement health and wellness specific to their farm. Some SOPs developed and implemented included harvest weight limitations, hot workday management, injury reporting, and use of medical history forms.

Health + Wellness SOPs
The SOPs were implemented during the 2024 season. Below are summaries from participating farms. 

Harvest Weight Management SOP:
At Whatley Farm in Topsham, Maine, storage crops (e.g., carrots, beets, radish, winter squash) were weighed to determine which of three different-sized containers would be the most appropriate to keep max weights at 40 to 45 pounds. This weight was agreed upon as a manageable and sustainable weight for any of the crew to manage comfortably on their own with appropriate lifting techniques. This information is part of a harvest manual that will serve for years to come as standard practice at the farm.

Hot Work Day SOPs:
Broadturn Farm (Scarborough), Bumbleroot Organic Farm (Windham), and Calyx Farm (Morrill) each implemented a hot work day SOP during 2024, with variations that worked for the farm operation and general practices.
Common threads included:

• Earlier start times/earlier end times.
• Predetermined group rest breaks. One farm noted that initially, self-management showed some individuals were not willing to stop working for rest or hydration.
• Availability of water, ice, salt tablets, and some snacks.
• Frequent check-ins.
• Encouraged autonomy to recognize self needs, including taking additional breaks, if needed.

SOPs include factors used to determine what weather constitutes use of the procedure, as well as Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) information regarding signs and symptoms of heat-related injuries and illness. On-farm responses and responses potentially requiring emergency medical services are also addressed.

Injury Reporting SOP:
Included in this procedure are guidelines for “pre-injury” musculoskeletal concerns, as well as general injuries (e.g.,. Cuts and falls), that, left unattended, could lead to a situation requiring medical interactions and/or multiple days off to rest and recover. 
The SOP also includes recommendations for self-care without seeking medical attention, as well as procedures of seeking immediate non-emergent medical attention. Farms included which facility individuals should make efforts to visit in the case of a worker's comp injury.

A further step that could be considered is a “return to  to work” process. This step may require gradual re-entry or alteration of tasks, with conversation between the injured person and farm management/owners to determine the best plan for well-being of both parties. If medical attention was sought, information from that visit would be pertinent for both the injured person and the farm owner/management to include in that discussion.

Farmer Reflections
Over the 18-month project, Labor-Movement developed a rapport with the farm owners, managers, and crew members. By having a coach tiered outside the farm structure, there is an added advantage from outside perspective and the ability to share useful information between farm crews and owners/management that otherwise might not be known, acknowledged, or addressed. 

In cross-sharing information across hierarchy levels, or between farms, identities were not disclosed unless information shared involved injury potential, or farm safety or viability. Maintaining confidentiality is of utmost importance in developing coaching relationships across multiple levels.

Ben Whatley, co-owner of Whatley Farm, said, “Working with Cynthia has been good for our farmers' health and a boost to morale. It's been so cool to have a coach operating outside of our management structure, who is just focused on wellbeing, injury prevention, and process improvement. Cynthia helped us to develop SOPs for basic things like what crops to put in what size containers (to control weight) and how to safely move heavy carts of seedlings up and down the ramp of our box truck. She has become another member of our farm team who we look forward to continuing to work with after this project ends.”

Colleen, a farmworker at Calyx Farm, said, “I learned how to use my body in a more sustainable and thoughtful way. It reminded me that my health and well-being is important while on the job.” 
End-of-Project Survey Results
In total, approximately 55 farmers participated in this 18-month Movement Health + Wellness Coaching Project. A survey administered at the end of the project revealed that 83% of participants strongly agree that having access to coaching improved their movement health and wellness, with 100% indicating that they had modified their movement strategies or self-care management to decrease injury.

When participants were asked if they would have pursued movement training as an injury prevention tool, 50% said “possibly,” while 42% said “no.” Only 8% responded that they would have sought movement training as a means to prevent injury on their own. Whether these responses are a factor of economics, time investment, knowledge or access to resources, and/or perceived acceptance within farm culture was not asked. Whatever the reasons, this is worth further exploration.

The practice of injury prevention in agriculture lags in adequate training focused on the individual. While farm practices and ergonomic set-up is a vital piece in farmworker safety and well-being, addressing individual health — both physical and mental — and the potential accumulated stress involved in farming are beginning to be topics of interest for farmers.

Original article written for Maine Organic Farmer & Gardener, Winter 2024-2025 Issue. This work was supported by USDA/NIFA under Award Number 2021-70027-34693. Details of the entire 2023 grant can be found at Northeast ERME. 

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