Top 3 Myths About Back Pain
Myth #1 Your pelvis is misaligned and causing your pain
Majority of people that have been treated by a physical therapist or a chiropractor for back pain, have been told that their pelvis is not in line and needs to be corrected.
First off, what is the SIJ (sacroiliac joint)? This is a joint located in your low back and is formed by the sacrum, 5 vertebrae bodies fused, and a ilium or pelvic bone on each side. This is a very stable joint due to its large amount of ligaments (4), thick fascial tissue , and 35 muscles that attach.
As you can tell there this joint is protected very well and only has approximately 2-4mm of movement available. The likelihood of even the most experienced clinician's hands to identify this small movement is highly unlikely and also isn’t likely to be the main source of your pain either.
Because it is so difficult to get movement in this joint, true SIJ pain is caused from major incidents such as:
A large traumatic fall
Motor vehicle accident
Vaginal birth
Myth #2 My back pain is caused by lifting wrong
Back pain is a complex issue that can be just as hard to manage if you misunderstand what tends to lead to these types of beliefs.
We’ve all heard the term “lift with your legs” or “don’t round your back while lifting.” These statements may not play as much of a role into your back pain as you’ve once thought.
The thing that tends to cause back pain while lifting is that the person is under-trained for that movement. Let's do a comparison: one person frequently performs weight training with squats and dead lifts while another person doesn’t. They both are required to perform lifting firewood from the ground and stacking it 10 yards away. Which person do you think would get a result of back pain from this job?
The person that hasn’t weight trained with squatting and dead lift would be more at risk for acquiring back pain, because they haven’t progressively strengthened the muscles that allow for them to prepare for this level of workload.
It may be more the person’s muscular strength and mobility throughout the movements they will be completing that prepares them to have less risk of pain with activity. Never weight training with squats or dead lifts (both movements required to lift and stack firewood), and then doing something this strenuous for an extended period of time would highly likely result in back pain.
Maybe instead of saying “my back hurts because I lifted wrong” we should say “my back hurts because I wasn’t prepared to lift.”
Myth #3 Tight feeling muscles don’t always need to be stretched
I’ve treated hundreds of back pain patients over my career and a common symptom people complain of is muscle stiffness/tightness, specifically in their low back and thighs.
Muscles can present with the stiffness/tightness sensation for multiple reasons:
The muscle is shortened
The muscle is weak
The joint around the muscle is too mobile
The joint near the muscle is lacking mobility
The nerve that controls this muscle is lacking mobility
Postural influences
Overcompensation
Or it can be a combination of more than one of the above.
If you have tried stretching and stretching with no lasting relief of the tightness, it may be time to try something different to get the results you're looking for.
Each reason you have a tight or stiff feeling muscle will change the treatment plan to improve your symptoms. This is why not all muscles need to be stretched that feel tight. This is why it is so important to establish yourself with YOUR physical therapist to identify the source of your problem.
If you’ve seen a physical therapist for this issue and they continue to stretch to relieve the tightness but you're not feeling significant relief, it may be time to switch up your treatment. Treating this symptom shouldn’t take 3x per week for 6 weeks if you're doing what you should be doing to address the underlying issue.