Has low back pain taken over your life? A message from Coral-Lei Jane and what she did and didn't do to prevent it in White Rock, BC

 
Are you sitting for a living these days? Perhaps it's due to the soreness of your low back. Is it because when you stand straight up it hurts too much? Or, is it because you work long hours at a desk without routine breaks, and/ or you're not able to find time for a quick stretch?

Are you familiar with the iliopsoas  group of muscles? They are located in your front body attached to your spine, and they are called the 'hip flexors’. When you sit for an extended period of time, either watching TV, driving, or working relentlessly at the computer trying to meet a deadline, hip flexors are shortened by this inactivity of the hips. As a result, the muscles tighten and leave the hip flexors at the mercy of oxygen depletion.

In this diagram to the left the iliopsoas shows three muscles that make up the hip flexor group: iliacus, psoas major, and the psoas minor. The iliacus is flush to the hip, and it only crosses the hip joint. Whereas the two psoas muscles work in unison and they both cross the lumbar spine, lumbosacral, sacroiliac, and the hip joints which leaves the back vulnerable. 


The compression on the iliacus and psoas leaves no breathing room, no pun intended, and it risks nasty blockages. These toxins are just sitting there, possibly being ignored completely! It is no wonder that the body is talking, or even screaming for that matter; “Hello out there! REMEMBER ME!”, hence, the nagging or sharp pain.

There may be a lot of pain that appears to be coming from the low back, but as we take a closer look at the attachments of the psoas (a major hip flexor), it becomes a no-brainer; the hips are attached to the front of the spine!

Trigger points in the illiopsoas, as seen above, can cause pain in the entire span of the low back when both sides are active. Active trigger points are symptomatic with respect to the actual pain complaint. For example, the low back pain may likely be coming from the hip flexor, but the pain is referred into the low back. Whereas, latent trigger points are inactive, or not showing in other areas of the body, and only exhibits pain when pressed on. Ultimately, it is a surprise for many to learn about pain in an area that has no known symptoms.


I had a crazy episode of low back pain last year, which I posted on facebook, my Healing Consciously Page. I seriously, like many of my clients do, assumed that my pain was due to something I did to my low back, like the early kundalini yoga and vacuuming I had done directly after. 

Also known as QLs

That week I had taught a class about the low back muscles (called the QLs - quadatrus lumborum) and thought for sure that this was where the pain was coming from. I was foolishly mistaken. As a therapist, one who usually goes to the front body first when someone says the words 'low back pain', I understood more about how easy it is to be fooled. It was NOT what I had done, but it was what I HAVE NOT done to prevent the inevitable.

This experience has only reminded me to be more proactive with my posture when sitting, standing, sleeping, and those little travel times I now do. Perhaps this includes becoming more conscious of taking nutrition more seriously, which I am pretty good at doing, typically speaking. (Yes, diet is everything too.) Or maybe, it's time to incorporate more stretching breaks during my computer time.

Then there is listening to your body and paying attention to the 'inevitable' pain messages. So, harness your thoughts, and listen deeper within to the profound messages that enter into your beautiful mind. The best message of them all is knowing what to do before it hurts. Preventative medicine is the best medicine of them all!

Since then, I have added another facebook page; Coral-Lei Yoga. Come and like my new page to discover new ways to relieve your pain with many styles of oldest medicine out there... Yoga!