Most Americans at one point in their life will experience some form of back pain. Especially these days, as we sit at our devices more than usual or as we spend more time on soft couches, or both, fighting the COVID doldrums. Some of us face chronic pain, which means it’s ongoing. Some endure acute back pain, which means a relatively shorter time of pain, but more intense, and usually the result of a sports-related injury or an accident. I’m in both categories, I suffered from acute pain from several breaks along my spine and I also suffer from chronic pain that has evolved over time as a result of these breaks. I have to be careful to distinguish the two because they ask for somewhat different viewpoints, though similar remedies.
In a recent car accident, I broke my C2 and T11. These are vertebrae in the spine, the former in the neck (called the Axis) and the latter in the thoracic region, where the ribs attach to the spine. They also thought I broke my L4 in the lumbar region, but they decided it was simply stressed. I did break, however, several transverse processes all along all these three areas. These are the tinier bone protrusions that border the spine to which the smaller spinal muscles attach. They line the entire length of your spine. These spinal breaks in turn caused problems with surrounding joints, muscle and tissue, eventually leading to arthritis. So acute pain that has eventually turned into chronic pain. And this is what puts me in both categories.
Yoga has helped me with both types of pain and through time, patience and careful acknowledgment of my limitations yet my possibilities, I have worked to build a healthier, stronger, yet calmer back, no matter the pain’s underlying cause. If acute back pain generally stems from injury or accident, chronic back pain generally stems from bad posture habits, as well as holding stress and negative feelings in the back, or perhaps from a weak torso that relies too heavily on the back, or all of the above. When we get upset, stressed, or mad, we tend to store those feelings in the largest of our musculoskeletal structure, the back. We literally hold the past in our backs. Injury is acute and stressful, so add that to existing chronic pain, or vice versa, or both, and you end up with multi-layered pain. And while the back is usually the first place we send that stress, for many, it’s in the lower region, for others, it’s in the middle back or even higher up, in the neck, which is technically a mere extension of your back, as the spine runs from your bum to the base of your skull.
Weak abdominal muscles can compound the problem. Strengthen your abdominal muscles and hone your ability to calmly handle the stressors in your life, all while developing better postural habits throughout the day, and you may be on the road to a healthier, quieter and yes, calmer back. Yoga can help with all of these goals.
So let’s back up a bit (no pun intended). First, knowing the structure of your back means that you are more wisely approaching its potential and its limitations. Yoga will give you ample opportunity to explore its path in your back. The spine consists of five sections, beginning with the tail bone, aka the coccyx, located in the bum, and then higher up between the hips, a fused and wide section called the sacrum, aka the sacred bone. Next comes the lumbar spine, the low back, then higher up is the thoracic spine to which the ribs attach, and finally, the cervical spine, the neck. The higher up you go, the more mobility. This fact is why we tend to feel back pain more in the lumbar spine, the lower section where there is less mobility, because we ask too much of it. We move it more than we should and many times does so without stabilizing it. We bear weight on it as we twist and turn or lean forward, creating more work for it and hence more wear and tear. If you understand the lower back is meant to uphold the higher sections that have more mobility and more range of motion, you may be more likely to have realistic expectations of your back and more likely to thus protect it and develop better postural and movement habits.
Time on the mat will undoubtedly give you plenty of opportunity to better educate yourself about your back and understand how it responds to challenge and stress. You can learn what works well for you to keep it stable and, ultimately, more comfortable and even pain free. It’s these lessons on the mat that have allowed me to understand what I do when I am NOT on that mat that undoubtedly add to my back problems. And what I can do to combat them, soothe them and even prevent them.
For instance, when I sit in Easy or Lotus Pose, I draw the belly in, lift my head and heart and root my seat into the earth, I strengthen my legs and I ask my whole body to play a role in sitting up tall. I don’t hang my head in despair, I hold it up, alert and ready to really experience the experience. Hanging the head adds weight to the back, asks the back to do more than it should. The average head weighs 10-15 pounds and for every inch you hold your head forward, you are adding 10-15 pounds more weight to your back. In other words, if your head weighs 10 pounds and you hang it down and forward 6 inches, you have added 60 pounds of weight to your back. And you’ve taken some of the torso muscles out of the chore of holding the head up, and who and what pays the price? Yes, you and your back.
When I sit and type this post, I do my best to apply those same building blocks to my posture. I put my laptop not on my lap, but a higher surface that ensures I am not looking down, I am looking up and looking ahead. So not only am I adopting better postural habits, I am seeing more around me, I am more aware of my surroundings and what’s happening. Opening my heart and my head to what’s going on around me and that makes me relax my shoulders and that feeling trickles down the spine from my neck to my lower back and further down to the tailbone. More awareness means less mystery, more attentiveness. Less mystery means less worry. Less worry, less pain.
When I am more active and running about, handling my many daily chores, on the mat I have learned that before I reach my arms up in Warrior 1, I root my feet, I engage my leg muscles and draw my belly in, I lift my head and heart, THEN I reach up. Do that in the kitchen when I am putting away dishes, I have already started treating my back better during daily movement. I’ve asked the whole body to participate in reaching up, not just my back.
Cultivating better postural habits as we sit around or as we move about in daily life, like time on the mat, takes practice, attention, dedication, and repetition. Not to mention, breath. Breathe when you move, breathe when you reach up, and if you braced your body before doing so, the breath will send oxygen all up and down the exerted muscles, giving them what they need as they work for you. Would you not feed your dog? No! Feed your muscles, too! Then they won’t bite as much.
Did someone say dog? My favorite pose to lengthen, strengthen, stretch, widen and relax, to find its expansion and the space it needs to properly function, is Downward Facing Dog. I can do this pose on the mat in practice or I can do a more casual but equally satisfying version anywhere I am by simply putting my hands on a wall or table and hinging at the hips and lengthen, widen, and BREATHE!! Oh, it feels oh, so nice. My back begs for Dogs. In turn my Dogs beg for careful attention to the structure, the support, the challenge and goals, the needs, the possible overwork, the breath, and everything in between. When I let my dogs out, life gets quieter. Less barking, more purring.
If I am tired and don’t have any more dogs to let out, I get into my second favorite pose to pamper my back: legs up the chair. I lie down on my back, bend my knees and hinge my hips and put my lower legs up on the seat of a sturdy chair, relieving weight and stress from the back, and then I breathe and breathe and breathe. And relax. And give my back a break and some nutrients (oxygen) and a little TLC. Try it, you’ll like it! There’s no guarantee, but I’ve yet to meet anyone who doesn’t fancy this pose!
