Pain in lower back

[Republic Of Zen]

I woke up two sundays ago with a pain in my lower back. The pain goes a little then comes back and I dont understand what I am doing that makes it better or worse. I am trying spinal cord breathing and I cant tell if that helps or not.

I also cant identify if it is my sacrum or coccyx.

It is this lumpy bone above the crack of ass. It hurts sitting or bending over.

Any advice?

Any video instructions to massage it myself?

Any meditations?

Tea?

Route I am thinking is taking nurofen and going for a medical massage tomorrow.

[joeblast]

make sure you stretch your hamstrings. taoist spine stretch. full lotus if you can do it. stretch a few times a day, every day.

[寒月 Hanyue]

To add to Joeblast's advice;

• Search 'piriformis stretch', there are plenty of videos online looking at this, be discerning and find one with an exercise that seems sensible and easy that makes sense to you.
• Work to release the tension in your pelvis floor/perineum. Use intent, breath, or whatever that helps you release it.
• Lie semi-supine for 10-20 minutes and deeply relax, allow the pelvis to open and the spine to decompress.

Take any and all of the advice given and play, find what helps and works for YOU

[JohnC]

Eucommia bark as well, dragon herbs has some good supplements on it.

 

John

[Republic Of Zen]

Thanks team. Will try tonight.

[Harmonious Emptiness]

What's helped me quite a bit (and I learned from an excellent RMT) is to grab a door-frame about waist high with one hand facing away from the body and lean back to stretch the sides and lower back, then do the same for the other side. This balances the tension in the lower back muscles so that one is not pulling you out of alignment.

 

Use caution though. Don't over stretch and injure yourself instead.

[PLB]

Republic of Zen,

What do you practice? I ask because it makes a difference if what you are feeling seems to come from out of nowhere or is a response to something that you are trying to do.

[Republic Of Zen]

Republic of Zen,

What do you practice? I ask because it makes a difference if what you are feeling seems to come from out of nowhere or is a response to something that you are trying to do.

 

 

When I do my iron shirt qigong with extra focus on my sore areas, only stretching it so I am only aware of the discomfort and staying in yin stance it feels better.

Going out about with fiends such as dancing in bars hurts. But yesterday I sat upright for 3 hours and my back was fine. I going keep super attention to my posture.

I was making long hard and vigourous loving making last night which seemed to hurt my back afterwards. I dotn know what possisitions are good for back pain. My taoist teacher told there was some but I am not seeign him for another 6 weeks.

[joeblast]

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/722975/top_8_low_back_exercises_without_any_equipment/

[Maddie]

 

I woke up two sundays ago with a pain in my lower back. The pain goes a little then comes back and I dont understand what I am doing that makes it better or worse. I am trying spinal cord breathing and I cant tell if that helps or not.

I also cant identify if it is my sacrum or coccyx.

It is this lumpy bone above the crack of ass. It hurts sitting or bending over.

Any advice?

Any video instructions to massage it myself?

Any meditations?

Tea?

Route I am thinking is taking nurofen and going for a medical massage tomorrow.

 

Usually in TCM if you have lower back pain that can not be explained by an injury its caused by Kidney deficency.

[Rara]

I had this and my GP blamed it on poor posture behind the computer. Totally muscular so when I sat for meditation, I could feel the pain straight away when straightening my back.

 

Yoga core exercises were advised and improved my condition!

 

[寒月 Hanyue]

Everytime I go to tai chi class with a low back ache, when we do the twisting warmup from the waist, it is immediately gone. It really opens up the lower back. If you do it right, the pain should alleviate for you.

 

I am going to use your post to highlight an important point, I mean no offense to you or anyone else who wants to help someone.

 

Be careful about assuming that whatever is causing you pain or discomfort is the same as what is going on in someone else, just because the location is approximately the same.

 

Movements that alleviate your pain will not always or automatically help someone else, and in fact may hurt them.

 

This goes both ways, so if you are in pain and hear that someone alleviated their pain a certain way, caveat emptor! At the least move forwards with caution.

 

I have had fun helping people fix themselves in my clinic who had tried to fix their pain/discomfort with friends/family and even IMA and yoga teachers saying "oh, I fixed that by doing..." or "ah, I know someone who fixed that by..."

 

Best,

[寒月 Hanyue]

The following should help alleviate tightness but it will safely allow you to find out more about what is going on.

 

Lie semi-supine, place your fingers on the front of your hip sockets. Feet hip width.

 

• Feel the support of the floor below you.
• Take some time to relax and allow your muscles to soften.
• Feel them release downwards like honey.
• Simply be patient and observe whatever you feel
• Where is tension?
• Where is pain?
• Feel the weight of the body, scan through body parts and check in with them.
• Feel the weight of the pelvis
• Feel the weight of the thigh bones pressing back into the hip sockets
• Relax and allow the body to let go into gravity.
• Ideally wait until you feel a shift in your breathing or the overall bodily tension.
• This tells you that the nervous system has begun to let go.

 

Once this has happened you can move to further release tension. If you move before this release, it is nowhere near as beneficial as the residual tension is still held in the tissues by the nervous system.

 

• Place one hand under the small of the back on the same side.
• Place the other hand across so it touches the front of the pelvis of the opposite side.
• You now have a hand contacting the front and back of the same side of your pelvis.
• You want to slowly release the leg of this side into gravity and to slowly extend
• Listen to the pelvis and lower back internally, as well as with your hands
• Only lower the leg as far as you can before the pelvis begins to tilt, lifting the lower back as they move with the leg (don't put the knee flat on the floor).
• Then slowly draw the leg back up to its starting place.
• Repeat.

 

Then repeat on the other side.

 

Once you can distinguish the movement of the leg extending and the pelvis and lower back.

• Stay in semi-supine, feet flat, knees up
• Gently lift the lower back, and feel the pressing of the sacrum into the floor
• Then press the lower back into the floor and feel the lifting of the coccyx
• Move slowly, smoothly and with ease, do not try to stretch, move within a comfortable range.
• Move back and forth, make it easier each time.
• Listen to the lower back
• Listen to the pelvis
• Listen to the legs and feet
• Listen to the whole spine

 

• Then stop and relax, stay semi-supine for a few minutes.
• Then get up and stand, feel the spine-pelvis-legs
• Then slowly walk a bit and feel the spine-pelvis-legs.

 

This will begin to release the deep tissues through the pelvis and along the spine. It will also allow you to become more directly aware of the tension and its relationship to your lower back and pelvis.

 

This is NOT about stretching, it is about allowing the nervous system releasing and elongating the tissues.

 

Any twisting on an already compacted lumbar spine is potentially dangerous, especially if not done under supervision . Always decompress and work on getting space and length back before adding rotation and twisting movement.

 

Best,

Edited June 10, 2013 by snowmonki

[joeblast]

I am going to use your post to highlight an important point, I mean no offense to you or anyone else who wants to help someone.

 

Be careful about assuming that whatever is causing you pain or discomfort is the same as what is going on in someone else, just because the location is approximately the same.

 

Movements that alleviate your pain will not always or automatically help someone else, and in fact may hurt them.

 

This goes both ways, so if you are in pain and hear that someone alleviated their pain a certain way, caveat emptor! At the least move forwards with caution.

 

I have had fun helping people fix themselves in my clinic who had tried to fix their pain/discomfort with friends/family and even IMA and yoga teachers saying "oh, I fixed that by doing..." or "ah, I know someone who fixed that by..."

 

Best,

quite true, my younger brother pissed his back off and I mentioned things that help my back - his issues basically wound up needing just about the opposite stretching movement even though it was lower lumbar.

[rain]

often trouble in the lower back is a response to or corresponds to immobilized torso or shoulder area. in addition to circulatory movements of the hips and the regime you already thought of and Joes advice, I would look into tummo breath or just pull/suck in your tummy on both inand outbreath as you bend over and straighten up. to stretch and elongate the inner fascias around your ribcage, especially in the back around your shoulders.

Edited June 10, 2013 by rain

[寒月 Hanyue]

quite true, my younger brother pissed his back off and I mentioned things that help my back - his issues basically wound up needing just about the opposite stretching movement even though it was lower lumbar.

 

We are complex creatures! and can hurt ourselves in endless ways

 

Best,

[寒月 Hanyue]

Double post

Edited June 10, 2013 by snowmonki

[joeblast]

We are complex creatures! and can hurt ourselves in endless ways

 

Best,

if only I had a video camera for the first 25 or so I could have made a pretty entertaining compilation!

[Andrei]

I have lower back pain for almost one year, inexplicably appeared suddenly. It took me a while to figure out the cause. There is no exercise that "alleviate" the pain, but they are good and I will explain why. The pain is due to an auto-immune reaction to some bacteria in the intestines, called Klebsiella. When this bacteria overgrowths, the immune system reacts causing an inflammation of the colon that produces the pain in the sacrum, spine and iliac bones. This condition in western medicine is called Akylosing Spondilitys or AS, and many people in the modern civilization suffers of it. This is due to our modern day alimentation which contains starches that remains undigested in the gut and feeds the bacteria. Thee are people that developed AS on a chronic IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) condition like me. I have IBS for more than 10 years but I never had backpains until recently when I had a "flare". The only thing that removes the pain is elimination of the starch in the diet. People that developped chronic AS after years of constant inflammation of the bones articulations the spine will fusion which is called "bamboo spine", which is a calcification of the vertebral bones and joints. So this is why exercises are good, to maintain spine flexibility, but will not remove the cause which is much more deep than only exercises.

[Republic Of Zen]

Been 18 days. May take tomorrow off to see the doctor. Does anyone know if i go see a GP or straight to a physio?

[Mal]

Good luck ROZ

I'm sitting in my doctors waiting room with new x rays to see if we can work out what it's going on :-) Been a few months :-(

 

My physio taught me the lying down and scanning exercise outlined above and it can help (as long as it's not so painful that I can't relax)

[寒月 Hanyue]

Mal,

 

You can try using the yiquan concept of feeling as though you are under water and being gently rocked by a 'current'. It does of course depend on where and why you have pain/discomfort. Some find a side-side rocking helpful, some a 'vertical' rocking of the pelvis sending undulations up the spine.

 

I'm talking small movements here, no I mean small movements

 

The slight motion throughout the body can be easier on the system rather than a completely static one, but not always.

 

The other alternative is to use pillows/cushions and literally pad and prop everything in place. Then go through what you've been taught, release and relax into the floor/cushions as much as you can. And don't stay there too long. Over time reduce the amount of support needed from the pads/cushions.

 

You also don't have to stay in the strict horizontal position. As long as you allow a gentle traction on the spine, you get creative. Anything that helps the bracing begin to release and the tissues to unwind.

 

While engaging and elongating tissues is the yang, this is the yin which is allowing the nervous system to let go. But for that to carry over, at some point you need to work on the same within movement.

 

Best,

[Republic Of Zen]

I've started taking Panadol, which makes the pain go away. Taking extra time out this evening to do qigong and taichi, going to keep my attention on the pain while doing it.

I intend on spening the weekend making love so i am going to look up possitions.