A Guide that Tells You What to Do to Relieve Lower Back Pain, and Highlights a Few Activities to Avoid that Can Free You from Your Nagging, Daily Pain, Leading to Better Overall Health.

Back pain can be quite painful and not only restricts your bending, sitting and walking movements, but also reduces your efficiency to work effectively. Back pain can happen due to many reasons including muscle or ligament strain (can be due to heavy lifting or jerk lifting), ruptured discs (situated between the vertebrae in spine), Osteoporosis (bones become porous due to old age or lack of vitamin D), Arthritis (when the spacing around the spinal cord narrows due to arthritis, it can lead to back pain) and skeletal irregularities like scoliosis (a condition in which spine curves to a side) which generally happens after middle age.

Few measures if followed properly and regularly can avoid you to be a victim of backache. There are simple self-help strategies like regular exercising, shedding the extra kilos, quitting smoking, checking your sleeping position, paying attention to your posture while sitting and standing, avoiding skinny jeans and high heels and carrying the laptop bag or sling bag properly which can help you to avoid back pain.

Don’t fret if you wake up in the morning and feel pain in the posterior side of your body. Check these easy remedies for back pain which can surely help to ease your back pain.

One would like to use their back as less as possible while suffering from back pain and will prefer taking bed rest. However, taking excessive rest can slow down the healing process and can make your muscles weaker and tighter which results in increased pain. So do not lie down and be active as much possible, take a walk, climb a few stairs and do your regular chores so that the strained muscles get some traction and the required heat. But if you have severe pain, then you can choose to rest for a day or two.

It’s hard to sleep with an aching back and you may have to change many positions before you find the most comfortable one and can go to sleep. Lying flat on your back with your knees and hips bent and a pillow under your knees is one position many people feel comfortable in. Another posture that works well for many is lying on your side with a pillow between the knees while they are bent. Similarly, you can experiment with different positions to find the most comfortable sleeping or sitting posture for you.

Alternate heat and ice therapy can work wonders for your backache as the cold can ease your pain while the heat is useful to loosen tight muscles. For ice therapy, take an ice pack and keep on the affected area for 15 – 20 minutes and after an hour or so, keep hot water bottle / bag on your back for 15 minutes. Do this several times a day and you’ll surely get relief in your back pain. Don’t lie down either on the ice pack or the hot bag as it may cause rashes or burns. Keep a thin towel as a barrier between your skin and the ice pack or hot bag while you lie down on your stomach while the objects are on your back.

It’s quite difficult to get a good night’s sleep with a backing ache, but not getting enough sleep can worsen the pain. So, try to sleep on a comfortable mattress and if required, take a painkiller to ease off the pain. Good sleep is also important as this is the time when our system repairs the broken tissues in the body.

Slouching or sitting in an incorrect posture can aggravate the back pain. If you have a job that requires you to sit for long hours in front of a computer, then choose a chair that supports your back, ensure to keep the neck and spine in a straight line and don’t slouch on the desk. Keep the shoulders relaxed, feet flat on the floor and if required keep a rolled towel or small pillow between the seat and your lower back.

Avail services of a good physiotherapist as they can come to your home and help you do few stretch exercises which will lighten the strain on your back; in addition, can teach you specific exercises that will strengthen your back muscles, thus reducing the chances of back pain in the future. Also, they would give you tips on how to stand, sit and move during the day to keep your spine in correct alignment.

Another therapy that has given amazing results to many people suffering from back pain is massage therapy. An experienced and trained masseur would know the correct points to press with the right pressure and in the right manner with hot massage oil to relax and loosen your muscles. The stressed muscles once relaxed, give you relief from the back pain. You can use massage therapy up to twice a week.

If you have tried all the methods mentioned above and still not getting any major relief from the back pain, then it’s time for medication. You can try over the counter medicines like Acetaminophen or anti-inflammatory, such as ibuprofen to relieve pain or prescription pain relievers to ease the backache, but in both the conditions do consult your doctor and tell him about all the symptoms, any allergies you may have and any other major or minor ailment you are suffering from. You can also talk to your doctor about nerve stimulation and spinal injections in cases of severe backache.

Certain Yoga Asanas can ward off back pain and also gives the necessary strength and flexibility to your core so that the recurrence of pain can be prevented. Many people start doing Yoga to get rid of their back pain and then they continue with it due to the other benefits associated. Few Yoga Asanas which are especially beneficial for back pain are Bharadvajasana I, Dhanurasana (Bow Pose), Ustrasana (Camel Pose) and Marjaryasana (Cat Pose).