Lower Back help needed

[AndyK5]

Guys I know the best option is go to a doctor and get an Xray etc.. but I can't do that right now. So I am looking for home remedies and routines you guys use to treat a sore back.

I was rolling about 3 weeks ago and I tried to bum really hard while I was mounted. I felt something on my lower back but it did not hurt. It was sore at home and stayed sore for the next 2 weeks. I did not stop training and kept on rolling with the help of Aleve. This week it got pretty bad and I thought to my self I should stop. So I did not grapple at all over the last 5 days but my back still hurts pretty bad. It feels like my spine is ok, but the left and right lower back muscles hurt like a bitch if I try to get out of my seat or try to get in my car.

So far I am using heat packs, bengay and ibuprofen.
I have a foam roller that I use to stretch the area. It does feel better after the stretching but I am not sure if it is the best thing to do to injured tissue.

Anything else I can do?

[Kent Bartley]

flotation tank. seems like that would take all the pressure off to help healing

[Andy Rigg]

there's a number of things it could be, if it's a sprain or a pulled muscle it shoudl right itself sooner or later. there's the possibility that you've done something more serious, my biggest concern would be that you've herniated one of your discs. there's a number of preconditions which increase the likelihood of this being the case: posture (while sitting and lifting), hamstring flexibility, excess weight and poor lower-abdominal strength. if any of those sound like you, that could be the problem. other symptoms include pain radiating down one side of your body, starting from the back pain (this will be through the hip and down the back/side of the leg).

on the flipside, you might have just pulled something and keep on aggravating the injury because you're not resting it. do you eat enough protein/vitamins? that has an enormous effect on your healing time.

like you say, going to a dr is the best bet, but do some reading and the answer might crop up.

[AndyK5]

I am eating pretty good, and thank you for the reply. I wonder if the herniated disk pain is similar to sprained muscle pain.
Mine does not radiate down to my leg, but goes to more like my kidney area.

[AJ Camacho]

When my back went out I actually went to the doctor because I was worried that I had a kidney stone.

I asked the same question here and took Louis Ho's advice only working lockdown to my top game and avoiding the closed guard and RG. Not only did it allow me to train through the injury but it drastically improved my top game.

Personally (and I can't speak for your situation) my back injury was related to poor hamstring flexibility. I now have a general routine of parallel squats (flat footed), solo omoplata drills, gramby rolls, and butterfly stretches. I actually don't even stretch my lower back, just every single other muscle that surrounds it. I modified all of my core exercises to not require lower back mobility.

Essentially, I trained around my injury and did not power through it. I was lucky, because I didn't have an MRI and had no real idea of what was going on. It was only the "kidney" like symptom that correlated with my doctor's advice, to be a muscle related issue and not a spinal issue. Oh, and ice and heat it like crazy, i used ibuprofin to help reduce inflammation and kava kava for pain management.

Put I am not posting this as a course of action for you. Just relating what I did. For the most part, if you can't afford an MRI and a doctor then just be diligent as hell in doing your online research.

[DCdoctr]

Hey Andy,

I can definitely help you or direct you where you can receive help. Just answer a few questions and I'll see what I can do for you. I know you may have answered some of these questions already, but I'll ask some of them again. I can aid you in determining if you have a disc herniation, skeletal-muscular, and/or vicerosomatic injury.

Have you seen any type of doctor yet?
If so, what medications have they prescribed?
If not, what home remedies have you tried?
Have you ever had this happen in the past?
Is your pain the same today as it was when the injury first occurred?
Where is the exact area of pain at present?
Is the pain currently sharp (piercing) or dull (aching)?
Is the pain in one location or is it traveling down your leg?
If the pain is traveling, where is it traveling to?
Have you lost any functions, e.g. strength, walking, sitting, standing, breathing, urination, defecation, sensations in your legs or feet...etc?
Is there anything that you're doing that is causing your pain to increase?
Anything, if at all, that makes it feel better?


Answer these few questions and feel free to add any additional information that you feel may be of importance. This is my field of expertise and I truly care about my fellow human beings' health. Oh, and I'm a licensed and board certified doctor in two states. Again, I'll help you in any way I can.

[AndyK5]

First Al, thank you for the insight, I appreciate it.
Dcdoctr, here are the answers.
1- No doctor yet.
2- No medications
3- I am going in the chronological order.
a) Streching + Aleve
b) +Icy hot patches
c) dropped the icyhot patches for lots of bengay
d) dropped aleve and switched to ibuprofen, stopped rolling ( about 2 weeks in now)
e) dropped pain medications alltogether to determine what hurts how much and started using a dense foam roll to strech my lower back.
4- I always had very minor back pain when I woke up in the morning or sat in a chari studying for long periods of time, but nothing really stayed for this long
5- The pain is exactly the same as it was the first day. The severity of the pain changes depending on the time of the day. When I wake up my back is sore, but then the pain goes away during the day as the blood flow increases to the area. Also I am pretty pain free for about couple hours after using the foam roller stretcher. It felt like it was healing but one night it got really bad, I had trouble getting out of my chair and my back start to spasm. I went to bed, woke up in the morning and it was back to its original state and the intense pain was gone.
6- It is hard to say where they pain exactly is because i can't really point to it. If I turn my body left, my right lumbar muscle next to the spine hurts. If I turn the other way, nothing hurts. When I am standing or sitting with good posture nothing hurts. If I sit and pull my knees to my chest a thin flat horizontal strech of area that is about 12 inches higher than my butt crack hurts.
7-The pain is a mixture of both. It is sharp when I do something that my back does not like, but sometimes there is the dull ache. Overall, I do not have any pain that stays in spot constantly. It moves around with its severity changing depending on the position of my body.
8+9-The pain does not travel down my leg, but it does move to my lower kidney area sometimes.
10- No lost sensations or strength as far as I can tell.
11- A cat strech which you are on all fours and extend your lower back up, increases the pain if I have any at the time.
12- Foam roller makes it better, resting for a week doesn't look like it helped at all. Heat helps a lot, cold does not, bengay is bullshit.

I would appreciate all help, so tnx doc

Hey Andy,

I can definitely help you or direct you where you can receive help. Just answer a few questions and I'll see what I can do for you. I know you may have answered some of these questions already, but I'll ask some of them again. I can aid you in determining if you have a disc herniation, skeletal-muscular, and/or vicerosomatic injury.

Have you seen any type of doctor yet?
If so, what medications have they prescribed?
If not, what home remedies have you tried?
Have you ever had this happen in the past?
Is your pain the same today as it was when the injury first occurred?
Where is the exact area of pain at present?
Is the pain currently sharp (piercing) or dull (aching)?
Is the pain in one location or is it traveling down your leg?
If the pain is traveling, where is it traveling to?
Have you lost any functions, e.g. strength, walking, sitting, standing, breathing, urination, defecation, sensations in your legs or feet...etc?
Is there anything that you're doing that is causing your pain to increase?
Anything, if at all, that makes it feel better?


Answer these few questions and feel free to add any additional information that you feel may be of importance. This is my field of expertise and I truly care about my fellow human beings' health. Oh, and I'm a licensed and board certified doctor in two states. Again, I'll help you in any way I can.

[DCdoctr]

Okay. Sounds like you may have a severe sprain/strain injury of the lumbar region and possible compensatory or secondary dysfunction of the ilium/sacroiliac region. The strain aspect of the muscles will heal rather quickly due to the nature of the blood supply. However, where the muscles insert into the bone they become tendons and thus where the sprain is. Also in the area are supporting ligaments and cartilage that are also sprained. The major problem is that cartilage, ligaments, and tendons by protective design don't have the same quantity of blood supply that muscles and bones do, which lends itself to longer time required for healing.

Now the time for using ice was in your acute/onset of injury phase. Now is the time for moist heat. No dry heat! Dry heat will cause more problems than help. Now if you want to use a heating pad, layer two wet and wrung out hand towels over the area and then place the heating pad over that making sure the towels stay moist and not dry out during the process. Do this for 30 min. Also a hot bath or shower is beneficial. This is simply treatment for the soft tissue.

You can take all the pain pills and anti-inflammatory meds you want [sarcasm intended], but it's only treating the symptoms. A lack of symptoms doesn't equate to health. Symptoms are the last to show up and the first to leave in an injury. This means that before you showed symptoms you had a problem and after you begin to feel better the problem may still be present in a smaller form. Long story long, we need to treat the problem which is causing the symptoms.

Though you have significant soft tissue injuries most likely the primary problem is due to a combo of thoracic(upper, mid, and mid-lower back), lumbar (lower back) and sacroiliac (pelvic) segmental dysfunctions. This decrease the natural range of motion in these areas which severely aggravates proprioceptive nerves in the joints of these regions. That is part of the reason you hurt when you perform certain movements or postures. If this is allowed to go on too long, it can become a chronic, ongoing, yet to a lesser extent, problem.

Nerves aren't in their healthiest state when stressed. Some stressors are beneficial, however constant stress on nerves can cause significant deficiencies. Every organ in the body is controlled and maintained via the nervous system (visceral, sympathetic, and parasympathetic). Too much stress on these nerves can cause problems such as: sensory for sensations, motor for muscle strength and movement, deep tendon reflexes for speed and proper unconscious responses, metabolic pathways in organs that aid in immune response-process of nutrients and waste production-hormone balance just to name a few. This can inevitably allow for disease to set in where it wouldn't have otherwise.

During this healing time you don't want to perform strength exercises as this can exacerbate your injury. The soft tissue massage is great, but performing this solo may require some form of contortion which isn't too helpful.

What you need to restore your body's health and function is to find a good Osteopathic or old fashioned/non-screwy/non-quacky Doctor of Chiropractic. I know this may sound a bit off, but I can't stress how important it would be for you to find one of these practitioners. If this is an option let me know as I may be able to assist you in finding professional help. I wouldn't mind telling another colleague that you're a family member without insurance and see if they wouldn't do me a favor and cut you an affordable deal. If this is out of the question we can figure out something else.

Without being able to physically examine and assess you this is the best diagnosis I can render. Do you live in the states? If so, where generally?

Sorry for the long drawn out explanation, but we'll get you figured it out and get you some help.

First Al, thank you for the insight, I appreciate it.
Dcdoctr, here are the answers.
1- No doctor yet.
2- No medications
3- I am going in the chronological order.
a) Streching + Aleve
b) +Icy hot patches
c) dropped the icyhot patches for lots of bengay
d) dropped aleve and switched to ibuprofen, stopped rolling ( about 2 weeks in now)
e) dropped pain medications alltogether to determine what hurts how much and started using a dense foam roll to strech my lower back.
4- I always had very minor back pain when I woke up in the morning or sat in a chari studying for long periods of time, but nothing really stayed for this long
5- The pain is exactly the same as it was the first day. The severity of the pain changes depending on the time of the day. When I wake up my back is sore, but then the pain goes away during the day as the blood flow increases to the area. Also I am pretty pain free for about couple hours after using the foam roller stretcher. It felt like it was healing but one night it got really bad, I had trouble getting out of my chair and my back start to spasm. I went to bed, woke up in the morning and it was back to its original state and the intense pain was gone.
6- It is hard to say where they pain exactly is because i can't really point to it. If I turn my body left, my right lumbar muscle next to the spine hurts. If I turn the other way, nothing hurts. When I am standing or sitting with good posture nothing hurts. If I sit and pull my knees to my chest a thin flat horizontal strech of area that is about 12 inches higher than my butt crack hurts.
7-The pain is a mixture of both. It is sharp when I do something that my back does not like, but sometimes there is the dull ache. Overall, I do not have any pain that stays in spot constantly. It moves around with its severity changing depending on the position of my body.
8+9-The pain does not travel down my leg, but it does move to my lower kidney area sometimes.
10- No lost sensations or strength as far as I can tell.
11- A cat strech which you are on all fours and extend your lower back up, increases the pain if I have any at the time.
12- Foam roller makes it better, resting for a week doesn't look like it helped at all. Heat helps a lot, cold does not, bengay is bullshit.

I would appreciate all help, so tnx doc

[AndyK5]

Doc, I am not gonna quote your whole post because it is very long but I'd like to say, damn..
You are good, if you got all of that from a forum post.
Well I agree with you on the pain pill part which is why I stopped taking them. I felt like the artificial loss of pain could lead me to more injury or may have prevent me from finding what is hurt how bad.
Now I am going to use the moist heat with the heating pad as you suggested, but out of curiosity, how does dry heat differ from moist heat. I am wondering how one is better or worse than the other.

As far as the chiropractor situation, I can not afford to go see a chiropractor but if you know someone who could figure something out for me, I could spare some money to pay him. I am a poor college student lol

I live and train in Los Angeles by the way.

[DCdoctr]

Dry heat draws out moisture leaving the area dehydrated. This is not as conducive to healing as moist heat. Moist heat penetrates deeper into the soft tissue than dry heat. Also, with dry heat you're more at risk of superficial soft tissue damage, e.g. mild burns. Lastly, water conducts heat better than air. I should add that there are some contraindications to heat treatment. If you have: diabetes, problems with clotting, open wounds, or some other vascular defects then one might want to abstain from heat treatment.

Again, you can utilize this therapy anywhere between 30 minutes to an hour 3-4 times a day for the remainder of the week with an hour rest in between treatments. Just be careful not to burn yourself and maintain the moisture. I'll see what I can do as far as finding you a doctor who will treat you and not break the bank. I may be able to find you a quality Chiropractor in L.A. and see if I can talk them down to a reasonable price per treatment.

In the meanwhile, ask around and see if anyone knows of any good, local Chiropractors in the area. Word of mouth is more of a good sign of quality than those that advertise like crazy. I'll see what I can find and if you hear of anything get their info and let me know so I can contact them. Also, I'll prepare some home treatments that will aid in improving your function.

Doc, I am not gonna quote your whole post because it is very long but I'd like to say, damn..
You are good, if you got all of that from a forum post.
Well I agree with you on the pain pill part which is why I stopped taking them. I felt like the artificial loss of pain could lead me to more injury or may have prevent me from finding what is hurt how bad.
Now I am going to use the moist heat with the heating pad as you suggested, but out of curiosity, how does dry heat differ from moist heat. I am wondering how one is better or worse than the other.

As far as the chiropractor situation, I can not afford to go see a chiropractor but if you know someone who could figure something out for me, I could spare some money to pay him. I am a poor college student lol

I live and train in Los Angeles by the way.