Back Pain Therapy Exercises
“You need to lose weight, and you need to do some exercise to strengthen your back.”
How many millions of back pain sufferers have been told to do this?
Yet, how many have been given virtually no helpful advice on HOW TO?
It might sound glib to say, but if I was asked to assemble a motor cycle, or to connect a DVD player, or to cook a gourmet meal, wouldn’t I need some very explicit instructions HOW TO do so, if I wanted the end result to not only work, BUT TO WORK THE WAY IT WAS INTENDED?
Countless back pain sufferers around the world have been given such advice, yet when asked HOW TO, they have simply been told, “Take up swimming, or join a gym”
Have you ever been given that sort of advice yourself?
The truth is, that if you had been given such advice, then by itself, YOU’VE JUST BEEN GIVEN SOME VERY DANGEROUS ADVICE.
WHY is this so?
Back pain therapy exercises MUST contain the foundational element of respecting BODY SYMMETRY if it is to be effective, yet for the most part, swimmers rarely swim with symmetry.
Why?
Either the swimmer swims with his/her face in the water, and breathes to ONE SIDE ONLY, and he/she compounds the problem by swimming using mostly the muscles on the front of the body [particularly the torso] far more than the back. [Freestyle swimming predominantly uses the muscles on the front of the chest and abdomen as well as the front of the shoulders].
Also, with the person swimming face down, unless the swimmer swims very quickly, his/her body hyperextends at the lumbar/hip region, thereby contravening the foundational need to respect body symmetry, and further pain generally results.
None of this activity, on its own, can help a back pain sufferer, unless other activities are added to address the all-important body symmetry issue. [If however, the swimmer elects to balance the swimming activity on the front of the body with swimming while on the back, the issue is vastly reduced, however few people actually do]
If the sufferer happens to swim with his/her head OUT of the water, the potential problem is even worse for all of the reasons listed above, PLUS the swimmer then most probably also hyperextends the neck, generally adding potential neck pain to his already growing list of concerns.
So, does that mean that swimming is bad for a back pain sufferer?
No, it doesn’t, provided the 3 rules of: 1) body symmetry, 2) restoration of elasticity in the muscles that create and facilitate spinal movement, and 3) the restoration of specific spinal support strength, are followed appropriately.
If they are not, then the sufferer is in line for more pain, particularly if the swimmer also fails to include appropriate stretching before AND after the swimming exercise[s].
For a non-back pain sufferer, that person may fortuitously get by without appropriate stretching however for the vast majority of people, especially as they become older, the absence of an effective stretching program is NOT AN OPTION.
Now, let’s look at the issue of joining a gym.
Can joining a gym help?
Yes, it can, but similarly to the issue of swimming, unless the 3 rules are followed, the person almost inevitably will suffer.
The severity of the potential suffering is compounded in the gym simply due to the fact that the person invariably is encouraged or expected to bear weight in the gym, whereas in the pool, the body weight is largely being supported by the buoyancy of the water, coupled with the important factor of having far less jarring happening while in the water.
Spinal de-compression is one of the crucial factors necessary to recover from back pain, so when we consider that many gyms do not teach effective spinal de-compression, yet encourage or expect the person to bear weight, thereby actually COMPRESSING the spine in most cases, you’ve got a double whammy going on that results, so often, in the OPPOSITE of what is intended.
The doctor often advises not to lift, yet there in the gym, the instructor tells you that lifting is necessary to regain strength.
So, who is right, and who is it that’s dishing out dangerous advice?
The body actually needs to bear weight…osteoporosis sufferers are wisely advised of the need to bear weight to limit further acceleration of bone density loss, HOWEVER, this is also true of all humans.
We do need to bear weight, but we need to do so in an appropriate manner to avoid very nasty adverse reactions.
In Back For Life, I teach sufferers the critical truth that weight bearing MUST be a gradual and controlled sequence.
If you take the process too quickly, you can not only end up back where you started, but potentially far worse.
I know that sounds like not good news, but when the process is done properly, IT IS OUTSTANDING NEWS.
And for the record, after enduring TEN years of almost intolerable back pain myself, and being eventually told I was a lost cause and a hopeless case, I have since assembled and enjoyed 25 years of back pain therapy exercises that allow me to lead a perfectly normal life, including going for a swim AND working out in the gym, even with inoperable incurable spinal conditions.
You see, when done properly, IT IS OUTSTANDING NEWS.
My Back For Life program has not only enabled me to recover, but tens of thousands of others, sufferers much like you, who mostly had tried everything from doctors to drugs, hospitals to hypnosis, and professionals to potions, all without success.
Now, they all follow a simple, yet astonishingly powerful program that they can do for themselves, wherever they go, and whatever they do, for the rest of their lives, and all it takes is 15 mins a day, half of which you do in bed.
As I said, when done properly, IT IS OUTSTANDING NEWS.
Back pain therapy exercises need not be complicated, BUT THEY MUST BE DONE CORRECTLY.
For more of the answers, go to www.backforlife.net