BasketballJoe
Newcomer
Hello,
I’m dealing with day 2 of a low back spasm, and I’m interested in any reminders or tips on how to get my muscles to relax and stop spasming. Yesterday I played pick up basketball pain free until the very end when I bent down and felt some pain and the my low back went into spasm. I’ve been icing and using Advil and today it’s a bit better.
6 years ago this happened A LOT! It caused me to miss work I would be flat on my back in pain and have to basically crawl into see my doctor to get prescription painkillers. I did physical therapy but it just kept coming back. I was so desperate that my doctor finally sent me to get spinal injections but that didn’t curate either. Finally after the second or third recommendation from my uncle I read Dr. Sarno‘s book and it was like it was speaking to me.
I was in my early 30s, the breadwinner, two young kids and a pretty stressful job. I was working super hard and doing well but not finding enough time for myself, my hobbies like exercise and also finding enough family time. The book made so much sense especially thinking about all the different x-rays I’ve looked out with the doctor and even how they sometimes said this bulge here could be nothing or this could be the cause of your pain and then I’d feel justified, like yeah that’s why I feel pain, this is all real.
Once I started reflecting and acknowledging my stressful job and thinking about things that I could change and really just focusing on relaxing my muscles and not tensing up so much I started to get immediately better. It probably took two weeks and I had to read the book a couple times but once the words sunk in my life really improved. I eventually got a much less stressful job and life has been really really good for the past six years. Almost pain-free.
There’s always this lingering pain in my right side of my lower back. I do yoga which includes meditation and all of that seems to help and it’s not even noticeable for long stretches of time. But sometimes it creeps in and I have to really focus so that I cannot let it flareup into anything.
But for whatever reason the last couple of times I have played pick up basketball it has ended with pain as in a low back muscle spasm that has me walking around like an elderly person and wanting to sit down or lay flat on my back. And this time it’s pretty annoying because it is affecting a long weekend and time with my family. What’s weird is that the pain doesn’t start from any sort of contact or fall or anything. Once I bent down to pick up a jersey from a bag and the other time I was just kind of lightly jogging and stopped and bent over and the pain started.
If I need to stop playing basketball in order to be pain-free I am completely fine with that. It will be a bummer because I like the guys in the community but I have other activities I really love to do especially being able to bike and ski and hike with my family. Yesterday’s episode did happen to occur while my inlaws were staying with us which added a ton of stress b/c my wife’s step mom is pretty unstable and they told us they were getting divorced but then showed up to stay for the night like no big deal. I have pretty successfully been able to not get involved in this drama and don’t feel like it is consciously affecting me or making me feel stressed out because it’s not really my problem but I certainly am open to this being a factor.
For now I am trying to remember back to the important points of the book and take ibuprofen and stretch and try to get the spasms to stop. Ice really seemed to feel good last night. Any other recommendations let me know!
I’m dealing with day 2 of a low back spasm, and I’m interested in any reminders or tips on how to get my muscles to relax and stop spasming. Yesterday I played pick up basketball pain free until the very end when I bent down and felt some pain and the my low back went into spasm. I’ve been icing and using Advil and today it’s a bit better.
6 years ago this happened A LOT! It caused me to miss work I would be flat on my back in pain and have to basically crawl into see my doctor to get prescription painkillers. I did physical therapy but it just kept coming back. I was so desperate that my doctor finally sent me to get spinal injections but that didn’t curate either. Finally after the second or third recommendation from my uncle I read Dr. Sarno‘s book and it was like it was speaking to me.
I was in my early 30s, the breadwinner, two young kids and a pretty stressful job. I was working super hard and doing well but not finding enough time for myself, my hobbies like exercise and also finding enough family time. The book made so much sense especially thinking about all the different x-rays I’ve looked out with the doctor and even how they sometimes said this bulge here could be nothing or this could be the cause of your pain and then I’d feel justified, like yeah that’s why I feel pain, this is all real.
Once I started reflecting and acknowledging my stressful job and thinking about things that I could change and really just focusing on relaxing my muscles and not tensing up so much I started to get immediately better. It probably took two weeks and I had to read the book a couple times but once the words sunk in my life really improved. I eventually got a much less stressful job and life has been really really good for the past six years. Almost pain-free.
There’s always this lingering pain in my right side of my lower back. I do yoga which includes meditation and all of that seems to help and it’s not even noticeable for long stretches of time. But sometimes it creeps in and I have to really focus so that I cannot let it flareup into anything.
But for whatever reason the last couple of times I have played pick up basketball it has ended with pain as in a low back muscle spasm that has me walking around like an elderly person and wanting to sit down or lay flat on my back. And this time it’s pretty annoying because it is affecting a long weekend and time with my family. What’s weird is that the pain doesn’t start from any sort of contact or fall or anything. Once I bent down to pick up a jersey from a bag and the other time I was just kind of lightly jogging and stopped and bent over and the pain started.
If I need to stop playing basketball in order to be pain-free I am completely fine with that. It will be a bummer because I like the guys in the community but I have other activities I really love to do especially being able to bike and ski and hike with my family. Yesterday’s episode did happen to occur while my inlaws were staying with us which added a ton of stress b/c my wife’s step mom is pretty unstable and they told us they were getting divorced but then showed up to stay for the night like no big deal. I have pretty successfully been able to not get involved in this drama and don’t feel like it is consciously affecting me or making me feel stressed out because it’s not really my problem but I certainly am open to this being a factor.
For now I am trying to remember back to the important points of the book and take ibuprofen and stretch and try to get the spasms to stop. Ice really seemed to feel good last night. Any other recommendations let me know!
.
