In 2001 I attended San Diego State University in Southern California. It was fun there. The beach was beautiful, the weather was great, and there was so much fun to do.
Sometimes my friends and I would cross the border into Mexico and party in Tijuana. One day we decided to head to Rosarito. We got there without incident and started drinking, as many young, unscrupulous college kids do in places like this.
However, something very memorable happened on this trip that changed my life in a bad way.
Rosarito, like many other cities in Mexico, has restaurants and bars. I was at a bar at a well-known chain. There was a big sandbox inside the store, and people were dancing there. There was a large pyramid-like structure with a six-foot-wide platform leading to the top.
These pyramid platforms provided another place to dance by lifting you much higher than the sandbox.
At one point it seemed like a good idea to climb up the pyramid and do a running jump off the step of the fourth largest platform for a nice soft landing on the sand. You’ll have to jump about 24 feet to land your entire body on the sand.
I was an athlete in high school. I enjoyed sports. But when I was drinking, I was an Olympian! He could jump over tall buildings in one shot, lift a car off the ground, and run faster than a cheetah.
At that time, it was no surprise that I could jump big on the sand. So there I went, sailing through the sky like a beautiful condor, my hair blowing in the wind, in perfect shape.
And here I can confidently say that reality woke me up and jolted me back into the present moment. It’s not the aerial part, but the landing part.
My sacrum, coccyx, and left ankle landed squarely on the wooden platform with tremendous force. That behavior was compression. My lower spine was compressed and my ankle twisted badly. I was in excruciating pain.
I was in Mexico, it was midnight, and I could barely walk. My friends were extremely drunk and didn’t care what I was going to do.
The next 12 hours were probably the worst I’ve ever experienced in my life. I had to drive 90 minutes home from Rosarito in immense pain.
The moment we crossed the border, we headed straight to the emergency room. I took an x-ray and received the results immediately. I fractured my coccyx and compressed my lower spine.
Nothing was broken in my back, but there was a lot of inflammation in that area. My entire lower back and half of my butt turned purple due to internal bleeding.
I was young at the time, in my early 20s. Throughout my 20s, I didn’t have any major problems with my lower back because my body has an amazing ability to heal itself.
But everything changed when I hit my 30s. From ages 35 to 40, I would get out of bed, slouching, barely able to stand straight, and feel weak. My lower back was arthritic.
If you have back pain like this, you know how unsettling it can be. I feel like if I make a wrong move, it will break.
As I moved around, slowly but surely I became more flexible, less sore, and able to get on with my day. I finally got to the point where enough was enough. I was disgusted and disgusted.
I was about 39 years old and working as a nurse leader in a research clinic. So I started looking into what research was out there on lower back rehabilitation.
I spent hours researching different studies to understand what was going on under the skin and between the bones and vertebrae, and what could be done to heal this area. I tried various things.
Many exercise physiologists tell you to strengthen your core, and I agree that it’s important. Strengthening your core will allow these muscles to better support your back and reduce the pressure on your back, because stronger muscles can better support your body.Since your core is basically in your back, you can help these muscles better support your back and reduce pressure on your back. Masu.
Many studies mentioned taking medication, but I didn’t want to do that. NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) are commonly prescribed, but long-term use is not recommended. More powerful drugs, like narcotics, come with even more problems.
I was looking for something that I could control, something that would give me autonomy.
One day I came across a study on inflammation of the lower back, joints, and squats. I was intrigued. Intervertebral discs are located between the vertebrae and act as shock absorbers for the spine. Due to various mechanisms, it can become compressed, displaced, or even not even there, causing great pain.
Low back pain is endemic in the United States.spread of 13.1% of Americans aged 20-69 have chronic low back pain.in The prevalence in China is 4.2%. So why is there such a big difference?
As I said, it’s probably multifactorial, but I would argue that there’s one thing other than obesity that plays a big role in the prevalence and risk of low back pain. And that’s a squat.
I have a friend from China who can get in and out of a squat with almost no effort. It always amazes me when I see him do it. He’s very flexible. In many Asian countries, squats serve many purposes, one of which is proper defecation position.
Let’s think about mechanics. Not only do you use your core and leg muscles to get into and out of this position, but your lower spine also stretches. The more I learned and researched the squat position, the more excited I became about its potential to help me.
In my case, there wasn’t a lot of space between the vertebrae in my lower back because of the compression injury I experienced. The disk was compressed. This study discusses the importance of elongating the spine, which allows fluid to enter between the vertebrae and the discs, relieving spinal compression.
I set out on a mission. First, let’s look into the correct squat posture. My body wasn’t used to this position, so I wanted to see if I was setting myself up for success with regards to placing my feet the right way and how straight my back was.
To get into the correct squatting position, I first had to grab onto something. My body, bones, joints, ligaments, and muscles needed to learn this new position I put myself into.
I started with short squats for 1-2 minutes. Slowly I increased the time until I was able to squat comfortably for a total of 10 minutes without holding onto anything. The progress has been great.
I don’t remember exactly when the pain stopped. Within a few months, the pain was gone. That’s what’s important to me.
I didn’t do anything new in my daily life while my back pain healed, so I’m sure that stretching my spine in a squatting position helped me the most.
Additionally, the strength of various small muscles in the core, legs, and back improved. These muscles probably wouldn’t have worked much otherwise.
Now that all my back pain was gone, I grabbed a pull-up bar and added some hangs to it to decompress other parts of my back. I think this will also be helpful to others experiencing lower back pain due to pressure.
If you think about our evolution, humans have been living squat for a long time. We could work with our hands and squat close to the ground to do whatever we needed to do.
In the West, we rarely squat. There’s really no need for that. We lose most of our mobility from the moment we are born, but there is a big difference from most Asian countries where we continue to use squats intentionally.
I believe that I owe my life to squats. I was miserable before I learned about its benefits. So if you’re like me and feel the same way I do, I highly recommend you give it a try. And don’t give up. It may take some time to feel better, but don’t give up.
it works. For me it was.
christopher kane The CEO of Kain Health Communications is a registered nurse with a master’s degree and a focus on health and nutrition research.
All views expressed in this article are the author’s own.
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