10 Myths About Lower Back Pain (LBP)

Mr J

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Why not both ?
Gather all the info you can.
waxfoot, although I can't remember every message on this thread I have followed it from start to here and there are people on this thread who said they made their backs worse with squats/deadlifts. If the physio or specialist says its alright to go ahead and do them, then that's different.

PS how did you go with your visit to the specialist - reveal anything?
 
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Mr J

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I never get any DOMS in my back. I have soreness in my back all the time but not from exercise and very low grade. The barbell never made my back worse. Because of the DOMS (and lack of it in my back) I just have this impression that the back is not getting enough work.

I was doing barbell stuff (light- not Havoc and VM weight) twice a week. But I would have DOMS for 2-3 days afterwards only in hamstrings and glutes. I also did not feel any improvement in my surfing (back stability during pop ups) which is the only (main reason) I'm doing them. A friend told me it looked like I was popping up fast but that was on a mid length board. Whenever it was overhead and hollow and I tried riding my shortboard and it was not pretty.

I had replaced one barbell day with body weight day. I feel I need really dynamic stuff. Pushups, pull ups, planks, mountain climbers and especially burpees/pop ups. The burpees/pop ups still feel the worst. It's like in that second, in the air, as you go from extension to flexion, heaving with the shoulders, drawing in the legs, my spine is loose and subject to ....???

Any movement that requires pulling up my knee and bending over- putting on shoes, taking off the wetsuit, crouching for tubes, still hurts my back.

I'm wondering if I need to start doing some kind of back flexion stretches or exercises (VM is going to eviscerate me)....
llilibel, I seem to remember way back in this thread that it wasn't until you started listening to your physio (I think second one you had) that your back started to show significant progress i.e he told you to lay off the barbell and focus on the other things he gave you, planking, mountain climbers, flexion etc.

Reflexes and muscles don't always work properly when there is pain, you said you still have pain for certain movements/positions maybe that is interfering with your pop-up reflexes. My symptoms were a bit different to yours, but it did take a long time (more than a year) before I stopped getting random twinges when doing things such as putting a shoe on. Years to get to where I am today.
 

waxfoot

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waxfoot, although I can't remember every message on this thread I have followed it from start to here and there are people on this thread who said they made their backs worse with squats/deadlifts. If the physio or specialist says its alright to go ahead and do them, then that's different.

PS how did you go with your visit to the specialist - reveal anything?
Not sure if I elaborated in that other thread that we touched on the subject, but the TL;DR of it is, that there's nothing on the MRI that stands out as "whoaa, that's clearly the issue here", but given that I've had 6 years of pain, there must be something there, as I'm certainly not imagining it. I'm going for further scans to see if anything else shows up, as the aggressive treatment of fusing has a high failure rate in pain treatment.

The longer version.
I have;
Lost weight (not that I carried too much but im pretty low fat % right now, as low as whenI was in high school), been to physio, been to physiologist, been to chiro, osteo, seen an MD, do Yoga, work out correctly.

I'm a man of science and data, so even though some of the "experiments" above go against my natural inclination of dismissing anything that's not proven, I gave it all a go.

I did a bit of a "back pain diary" since November last year, where I rated every day's pain out of 10, 10 being the worst and 1 being the lowest. The count's been about 8 days where I'd rate it as 3 or 4 / 10. At the moment, I'm going through the worst patch yet, where the constant jabbing of knives into what feels like a raw . tender back is just not funny anymore.

The short of it, is that the specialist now wants to do a CT spectsomething scan, where they inject nuclear sh!t into my vein, so that they can get a high contrast pic of my lumbar spine. He thinks the cause is discogenic (disk related), between the L5 and S1 vertebrae. There's deterioration of the disk and fluid loss, but he says that it's quite normal, and most people are a-symptomatic.
As someone who has raced downhill bikes, I've fucked myself good and proper (broken bones, torn ligaments, dislocations etc), I can tell the difference between different types of pain. My back pain "feels" like it's "bone" pain.

At the moment, I'm just working up the courage to go for the next scan, as I'm a recovering needle-phobe ... so the prospect of a needle in my arm scares the sh!t out of me :D
 

grapedrink

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Anyone ever try a reverse hyperextension? Louie SImmons (super gnarly powerlifter, westside barbell) and some others swear by it for back pain.

I'd like to get one but I don't have the space. I do have traditional hyperextension in my garage and it seems to help somewhat.
 

Mr J

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... At the moment, I'm just working up the courage to go for the next scan, as I'm a recovering needle-phobe ... so the prospect of a needle in my arm scares the sh!t out of me :D
I suppose grit your teeth and get that needle stuck in your arm and in the meantime enjoy whatever surfing you can manage
 

VonMeister

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waxfoot, although I can't remember every message on this thread I have followed it from start to here and there are people on this thread who said they made their backs worse with squats/deadlifts. If the physio or specialist says its alright to go ahead and do them, then that's different.
I think they were breathing back then also. Are we sure that wasn’t the cause?
 
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VonMeister

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Extremely high correlation between being alive and experiencing back pain. Makes you wonder.
:roflmao:

Some guy trips over a barbell and Mr J uses it as proof that barbells are no good for your back. How this level of being dense is compatible with life just proves the resiliency of the human body.
 

One-Off

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llilibel, I seem to remember way back in this thread that it wasn't until you started listening to your physio (I think second one you had) that your back started to show significant progress i.e he told you to lay off the barbell and focus on the other things he gave you, planking, mountain climbers, flexion etc.

Reflexes and muscles don't always work properly when there is pain, you said you still have pain for certain movements/positions maybe that is interfering with your pop-up reflexes. My symptoms were a bit different to yours, but it did take a long time (more than a year) before I stopped getting random twinges when doing things such as putting a shoe on. Years to get to where I am today.
Hey Mr J. My second PT was a she (and very easy on the eyes). Most of the work was by phone because the virus hit. After a couple months she gave the green light for barbell work, just said to go slow and incrementally. I've been doing it since. It has not caused any problems.

For Havoc and VM, another reason I'm trying to figure out what (lighter) weight works for me is because my cardiologist expressly forbade me from going heavy. Anything that shoots my heart rate up really high is considered a risk. I can manage that risk easily while running (I'm supposed to wear a heart rate monitor but have stopped because I kind of know what's going on now) and I'm willing to take the risk surfing o_O(if I die surfing I'll be one those people who died doing what they love) . I wore my heart rate monitor once doing my girly weight routine and was shocked to see how high my heart rate went up. And so quickly. Don't know why strength training is not considered cardio? Maybe it's just not sustained long enough?

My question was just trying to figure out how to target my back since I never get DOMS in the back and so I wonder if I'm doing anything, making any progress. I realize that even doing body weight stuff my glutes and hamstrings are involved, but that is not my target or goal.
 
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VonMeister

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Hey Mr J. My second PT was a she (and very easy on the eyes). Most of the work was by phone because the virus hit. After a couple months she gave the green light for barbell work, just said to go slow and incrementally. I've been doing it since. It has not caused any problems.

For Havoc and VM, another reason I'm trying to figure out what (lighter) weight work for me is because my cardiologist expressly forbade me from going heavy. Anything that shoots my heart rate up really high is considered a risk. I can manage that risk easily while running (I'm supposed to wear a heart rate monitor but have stopped because I kind of know what's going on now) and I'm willing to take the risk surfing o_O(if I die surfing I'll be one those people who died doing what they love) . I wore my heart rate monitor once doing my girly weight routine and was shocked to see how high my heart rate went up. And so quickly. Don't know why strength training is not considered cardio? Maybe it's just not sustained long enough?

My question was just trying to figure out how to target my back since I never get DOMS in the back and so I wonder if I'm doing anything, making any progress. I realize that even doing body weight stuff my glutes and hamstrings are involved, but that is not my target or goal.
Strength training will raise your systolic pressure during training, which will come down during rest and return to normal quickly after you're done. Your heart rate will increase but not as much as when you run.

With your condition I wouldn't advise you to do anything without explicitly laying out what you're planning on doing with your DR and see what he says.
 
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VonMeister

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:applause2:He's doing the same girly weight as I am!

Wouldn't he be better off doing a low back squat?
I'm sure he back squats and looking at the thickness of his back he for sure deadlifts. Light weight power cleans are good for anaerobic stress....anaerobic training by and large being the only land based training that correlates to surfing.
 

One-Off

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Strength training will raise your systolic pressure during training, which will come down during rest and return to normal quickly after you're done. Your heart rate will increase but not as much as when you run.

With your condition I wouldn't advise you to do anything without explicitly laying out what you're planning on doing with your DR and see what he says.
My cardiologist knows I'm lifting. He just said don't go really heavy (although that is pretty subjective) and to watch the heart rate. I just had a phone appt with him this week and he gave me green light to use creatine, Autoprax's miracle drug. I guess as long as I go slow and incrementally I could conceivably increase weight over time without stressing the heart too much...
 
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Mr J

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...
My question was just trying to figure out how to target my back since I never get DOMS in the back and so I wonder if I'm doing anything, making any progress. I realize that even doing body weight stuff my glutes and hamstrings are involved, but that is not my target or goal.
if your specialists say its ok for you to lift, then that is good. Good mornings, bent rows and deadlifts all put some load on the lower back from my experience.

What's the problem with working other bits, is it because DOMS in hamstring or glutes would interfere with your running hobby? As I mentioned before a massage therapist told me strong glutes helps protect the lower back. Going light, getting used to them and a day of rest should sort you out for a run I would think.

A bit of a digression is that order of doing different training seems to produce differing recovery needs. I've been in the habit of going for a surf, then swapping the surfboard for my skimboard and finishing the session with a skim. I'm doing up to 4 sessions in 2 days of this and I have been sometimes getting DOMS in the hip flexors requiring 2 or even 3 days rest. However I have discovered that if I skim first, then surf its no problem. I think the "run and drop" onto the skimboard is acting as a warm up for surfing. I use a lot of leg kick to get into waves because I have always been better at kicking than paddling even when swimming, so doing things in the other order the short range of motion flutter kick was not setting me up well for the longer range of motion run and drop. So maybe you could experiment with different orders of weights/running.
 

Mr J

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:roflmao:

Some guy trips over a barbell and Mr J uses it as proof that barbells are no good for your back. How this level of being dense is compatible with life just proves the resiliency of the human body.
no no, you misunderstand me (or was deliberately misquoting). I think weight training is great, I was just suggesting check with the specialists first before trying it. Some of the people here are reporting quite severe symptoms.
 

VonMeister

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My cardiologist knows I'm lifting. He just said don't go really heavy (although that is pretty subjective) and to watch the heart rate. I just had a phone appt with him this week and he gave me green light to use creatine, Autoprax's miracle drug. I guess as long as I go slow and incrementally I could conceivably increase weight over time without stressing the heart too much...
You can certainly get stronger with lighter weights. Strength is the result when you recover from accumulated stress. At some point very soon you will be at a point where it's going to take a whole lot of time for you to accumulate enough stress to drive a strength adaptation...so the resistance needs to go up.
 

VonMeister

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no no, you misunderstand me (or was deliberately misquoting). I think weight training is great, I was just suggesting check with the specialists first before trying it. Some of the people here are reporting quite severe symptoms.
I would never suggest that strength training is a method to blindly apply to someone who is in real pain. Strength training is a means to protect yourself from injury and a valuable tool during the rehab phase to 1. help with recovery by using managed activity, and 2. to get a person stronger so their bodies are better equipped to resist the forces that cause injury to begin with.

Consulting with your doctor is always the first and best step when appropriate....but so many people are afraid to have a two way conversation with their doctor and just accept blindly what he has to say. 15 years ago my neurosurgeon told me to never pick up anything heavy again and to find different physical activities that were more appropriate for my "condition". I walked out of that office with the thought that one false move and I was a cripple and back surgery was inevitable. My family doctor said that was crazy and that, while I was in pain there was nothing out of the ordinary and to plan on doing whatever I felt like as the pain resolved. Which one was the specialist?

If physical therapists were good at what they do, why is recovery from non specific back pain just about non existent? Not all...but most of these "specialists" have decided that it should be a lifelong ailment that needs to be endured...treated by nonsense and behavior modification. By and large the "specialists" are dogshit herd animals who punch clocks for 20 bucks an hour while knowing jack sh!t about pain and recovery. Sure they can recite physical anatomy, point to which muscle insertions are where and understand the difference between distal and proximal or extension or flexion...but when it comes to pain, they are more likely to pull the alarm and yell fire than get a person back to health.

When a person is hurt they don't need to run off to a doctor. Sensible recovery starts at home. Rest up for a couple days during the acute phase and add activity as needed. Once able...see a strength and conditioning "specialist" and be better than you ever were before. It's really as simple as...Life happens..would you rather be hurt and weak or hurt and strong.
 
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