Living with back pain can be debilitating and reduce your quality of life. Following these strategies can help you reduce that pain and help improve your quality of life.

The first thing I always recommend is having scans done to see if there is any injury or is it just muscular pain. If there is an injury, then follow your health practitioner’s advice on what to avoid and what they recommend. Before trying any of my tips below, if you do have an injury and it is not just muscular, then check with your health practitioner before trying any of my suggestions, to see if they are ok for you. If it is muscular then simply proceed with my recommendations.

• Supplement with Magnesium. It is an awesome mineral to help alleviate tightness and cramping in muscles.
• Invest in a sit to stand desk to help you stretch your body and activate your muscles throughout the day
• Avoid sitting for longer than an hour at any given time
• Place a lumbar support on our chair to help maintain the natural curve of the lumbar
• Park further away from your destination so you need to walk further. The walk will loosen up your muscles and activate your Glutes more (your buttocks) which will take the pressure off your back.
• Have your printer further away from your desk so you can walk more.
• Have regular massages.
• Participate in hydrotherapy, walking in deep water.
• Consult with a Chiro to help keep your spine and nerve endings in perfect alignment. If anything in your spine is out by even a millimetre it can cause all sorts of pain in your back and even refer pain down your leg and foot.
• Performing x10 Back Bends every hour after sitting for an hour. Stand up, place your hands on your hips, keep your legs straight and whilst tucking your chin in, arch your back backwards leaning back a little. Each time, try to lean back a tiny bit more.
  • Bending backwards in the opposite direction in which you have been sitting will stretch out your cramped muscles and activate the ones that become lazy from sitting.
• Get yourself a spiky ball and whilst sitting on the floor, place the spiky ball under one buttock. Look for the spot that is tight as painful. That is the area of your Glutes that are super tight and not activating, leading to a sore back. Apply as much pressure as you can handle whilst you move around a little so the spiky ball can loosen up the area. Once you have finished with one buttock, repeat with the other one.
• When we sit for prolonged periods of time, our Multifidus muscle (lumbar muscle) that joins the glutes to the upper back muscles, becomes very lazy and inactive. This leads to a weakness in your core and an extremely sore lower back. Here are some exercise you can perform each day to help keep that area active and prevent and reduce lower back pain.
  • Perform Single Leg Resistant Band Clams. Sitting on the floor, place the resistance band just under your knees, around both legs. Lay back on the floor, keeping your knees bent but feet flat on the floor. Tip your hips so that your back is flat against the floor and your belly button is drawn to your spine. Holding your right leg still, contract your leg Glute whilst moving your left knee outward, keeping your left foot where it is. This is a Single Leg Clam. Repeat for 15-20 repetitions, then repeat the same with the other leg. Doing this 3 times on each side, each day, will help activate your Glutes and release the pressure in your back.
  • Perform an exercise cause ‘Tail Wags’. Come down to the floor and go onto your hands and knees. Keeping your back straight, belly button drawn to your spine, move your pelvis backwards and forwards as though wagging your tail up and down. Be careful not to move from your waist. You want to be moving from your hips. Spend about 2-3 minutes on these each day.
  • Perform an exercise called ‘Pelvic Tilts’. Come down to the floor and lay on your back with your knees bent and your feet flat on the floor. Draw your belly button to your spine. As you do, tip your hips back so that your back flattens into the floor. Then tip the hips forward creating an arch in your back. Keep repeating this movement of forward and backward hip tips for 2 to 3 minutes each day, taking the movement as far as you can each way.
  • Even just 10 minutes of these exercises each day will help prevent back pain, or reduce it vastly, possibly even alleviate it completely.
• If you need help with any of these movements, you can contact us to book a Mobility Session with one of our coaches. This is a one-hour session where we run your through a full Structural Balance Assessment and Posture Analysis, so we can ascertain exactly what is going on with your muscles, then show you through the best exercises for you to do at home to help you reduce your back pain.

• Coach Terri