Wall climb (finger walk up the wall)

How to move

1. Stand close to a wall and facing it, feet apart, and put both hands on the wall at shoulder height.
2. Looking straight ahead, walk your fingers (or slide your hands) up the wall as far as you can, until you feel a stretch but not pain.
3. Hold there and count to 10, then slide your hands back down to shoulder height. Try to get a little higher each time.
4. Side-on: stand with the side of your operation nearest the wall and your hand on it, elbow bent and shoulders relaxed. Creep your hand up as far as you can, letting the elbow straighten, hold for a count of 10, then lower.
5. If your arm won't go up the wall yet, stand side-on to a worktop with your hand flat on it and walk your body slowly backwards, keeping your hand still (Cancer Research UK's easier version).

Form cues

• Shoulders down and relaxed, away from your ears.
• A stretch is fine; pain isn't.
• Resting your forehead on the wall can help you relax.

Practice and cautions

5 times, holding the top for a count of 10, 3 times a day for the first 3 months: Breast Cancer Now's leaflet. Hull's DIEP leaflet holds for 10 seconds, 5 to 10 times.

Breast Cancer Now starts it from the second week after breast surgery, once any removable stitches and drains are out. Hull's leaflet after lymph node clearance starts it from day 8; after implants or a back flap reconstruction Cancer Research UK adds it from 3 to 4 weeks, and Hull's DIEP leaflet from week 4. Follow your own team's leaflet. Stop and contact your breast care nurse or surgeon if you have a fluid swelling (seroma), a wound problem, or pain that gets worse during the exercise or carries on afterwards. This is movement education, not an assessment or treatment prescription. Stop for sharp or increasing pain, dizziness, numbness or tingling; seek individual guidance for symptoms, injury or restrictions.