Saying your back hurts is like saying you have a cold. Who hasn’t experienced this common malady? But what if you have chronic back pain and nothing helps it? Pain to the point that it’s interfering with your daily life? We’ve all had a hard day and come home with tight muscles. If it was cured with a hot shower and a good night’s rest that would be fine, but when that annoying pain doesn’t go away, it can throw your life into turmoil.
Usually, back pain comes from misusing or abusing your body with the result being muscle pain. These aches are fairly minor and typically only last a a day or two. You can manage the pain with rest, hot and cold packs, or over-the-counter medication if needed. Unlike many other injuries, if you strain your back muscles, you won’t be helped as much if you rely on bed rest. While you shouldn’t keep doing whatever pulled the muscles, light activity will help to ease pain and speed healing.
If you have chronic back pain, it starts to affect all the areas of your life — your ability to function at work, play with your children, do sports, even to have sex. Whenever you sit, stand, lay down, you’re in some degree of pain. It’s easy to see how depression can set in and make things worse.
If your back pain is severe, it may be caused by a more serious problem. Conditions like herniated discs, spinal stenosis, fibromyalgia, and arthritis can cause chronic back pain. If your back pain is severe or constant, see a doctor to diagnose the problem and rule out more serious issues like cancer or infection.
Lately, a new aggressive form of physical rehabilitation — back bootcamps — are being offered at rehabilitation clinics around the country. These vigorous workouts are supervised by physicians and use Nautilus-type machines to target atrophied muscles in the butt, back, legs, and abdomen. The programs combine aerobic exercise and stretching with progressively more intense strength training on machines that simulate real-world activity. Typically a program requires one or two hour sessions two or three times a week for 8-10 weeks followed by a home program.
So far the evidence shows that intense exercise can help those with chronic back pain avoid surgery, reduce pain, and restore function. This philosophy is totally opposite of the advice usually given to chronic back pain sufferers. Nowadays, the school of thought is that if your back pain does not improve within three months or so, and you are not in need of surgery, you must commit to taking an active role in your own healing. Passive therapies such as heat and cold do little for chronic back pain. Keep trying various combinations of things until you find something that works–yoga, nutritional therapy, even psychological counseling–yes, psychological counseling.
It may seem counter intuitive to continue exercising through pain, but the prevalent thinking in back pain management is changing. In addition to back pain bootcamps, there is a growing school of thought that says all chronic back pain should be considered Tension Myositis Syndrom (TMS) until proven otherwise; therefore, all therapeutic efforts should be directed at your psyche. Specifically, you need counseling to change your way of thinking, feeling, and handling stress that lead the nervous system into an abnormal pattern of unbalanced muscular contraction and inflammation.
Dr. John Sarno, author of Mind Over Back Pain, is considered a pioneer in the area of TMS. He believes the brain manufactures chronic back pain as a distraction so as not to deal with emotional pain. Powerful emotions, such as fear, anxiety, depression, and even the memory of previous pain influence levels of neurochemicals which affect the whole body. Eventually, there may be actual changes in the nervous system that intensify the perception of pain by making the nerves more sensitive to it and less receptive to endorphins that can ease pain naturally. Sometimes there is no longer any physical cause for pain, but the learned response to it remains.
Resources: Mind Over Back Pain
Bootcamp For Bad Backs…
Lately, a new aggressive form of physical rehabilitation — back bootcamps — are being offered at rehabilitation clinics around the country….
at 9:53 amBootcamp for Bad Backs | Mind Mart…
Lately, a new aggressive form of physical rehabilitation — back bootcamps — are being offered at rehabilitation clinics around the country….
at 10:02 amAmazing as it sounds, it is correct that most people with chronic back pain not needing surgery have a normal back and can get better by understanding that pain is easily “learned” by the body. This situation is similar to that of phantom limb syndrome, where the pain is felt in an area that is not diseased (it is gone). The nerves get sensitized, signals in the brain get amplified (particularly by stress, worry, fear, frustration, etc.) and a vicious cycle of nerve connections can continue to create severe pain for decades. Fortunately, this cycle of pain can be interrupted. Read The Mindbody Prescription by Dr. John Sarno; check out my web site (www.yourpainisreal.com) or that of David Schechter, MD or Scott Brady, MD. There is hope!
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