Today we will delve into the issue of back pain. About 70% of the population at one time or another will experience back pain. I’m not certain about the percentages as to this next claim, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that of the aforementioned 70%, most of them will experience low-back pain. In many cases, it will be bad enough that many will miss work. In my life, I have found myself squarely in the midst of that statistic.
My first experience with non-specific low-back pain happened when I was 23. I was a professional firefighter at the time. We had just returned to the station after fighting a house fire. Among other duties, I’d spent some time shoveling heavy, wet debris while wearing the typical turnout gear and airpack. The airpack weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of 25-30 lbs. As you may know, shoveling often requires working in a relatively stooped-over position for extended periods. There may also be some amount of twisting involved as you sling whatever you are shoveling in the desired direction. To the best of my ability, it seemed that the shoveling was the cause of my back pain. Once we got back to the station and cooled off from the job, I began to notice what felt like a sharp pain in my low back. I reported this to my captain, and he followed protocol filing a report and sending me down to medical services. Once there, they shoved an icepack down the back of my pants and left me alone for the next 20 minutes. From there the doctor came in, asked me a few questions and proceeded to tell me I had a torn muscle in my low back. Not knowing better, I accepted his diagnosis and followed doctor’s orders by going to physical therapy for the next 6 weeks. All the while I was put on light duty, which involved lots of clerical work, some errands, and occasionally an assignment to perform some manner of heavy labor. You see, when you have low back pain, most of the time no one else can see it. It’s not obvious like a cast or a bandage, so a chief officer would forget why you were hanging around the administrative office and sometimes just randomly order you to go take down the fence or something. Thankfully, I had two other firefighters both with ankle casts who spoke up on my behalf, thus sparing me from further injury. So I know first-hand the debilitating and demoralizing nature of back pain.
I did all my physical therapy, plus adhered dutifully to my stretching routine at home as well. I followed my doctor’s advice and quit weightlifting. I was told it was terrible for my back – especially Olympic weightlifting – and that there was absolutely no reason under any circumstances I needed to do such things. After all, as one doctor put it, “You’re not making money with your body, so you don’t need to Oly lift”. But given that I had a physical job, I was making money with my body. Like so many others in the world, my ability to make a living depended on my body being strong and healthy. This stern advice left me to think I had been irresponsible in my workout regimen. I felt a sense of guilt for having brought this trouble on myself. I had begun weightlifting at the age of 12, and it had remained some part of my training for years. Just prior to my injury, I had regularly squatted and deadlifted. Now I was being told by the trusted doctors that If I wanted to help my fitness, I would eschew the weight training and do something far more productive like running, biking, swimming, or yoga. And I followed their advice.
For 8 years, I pursued these other activities. I would only do yoga on occasion, but would regularly incorporate the other three things into my workout regimen. As a result, my back pain would never go completely away. For 8 years, I got weaker and weaker. Don’t get me wrong — I became a pretty decent runner/cyclist/swimmer. I still did push-ups and pull ups and ab work, but this in no way could compare to the strength I had before from barbell training. For 8 years, I would show up to work at the fire station hoping I would be able to do the job if in fact we got dispatched on a structure fire. Some days my back hurt so bad, I hoped we wouldn’t get a fire at all, and that is a weird thing to wish for as a young firefighter. I remember being so confused as to why my back still hurt. I was avoiding what they said would hurt me and doing what they said would help me. I had visible abs, so I must have had a strong core – right? As I would learn later, not at all. Look for part two of this blog coming up where I cover the rest of this journey back to health and strength.