Back pain is such a common condition that just about every person will experience it at one point or another. It is at the top of the list for causes of disability around the world, and it is also among the most prevalent reasons for missed work days and doctor’s visits. Your back is composed of bones, joints, and muscles that work in harmony together. Back pain is the common outcome of any disruptions in their functioning ability. Back pain can be straightforward and explainable when it is caused by a specific injury like a car accident, but sometimes there is more mystery involved, and finding an explanation is more complex when there are no obvious indicators for why back pain is happening.
Any time you experience back trouble, it can interrupt your performance in regular daily activities, impacting basic tasks. Tying your shoes, bending over, or driving a car can become challenging or nearly impossible. Fortunately, there are steps you can make that naturally help alleviate back pain and that allow you to avoid the use of pharmaceutical drugs.
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Ten Natural Ways to Reduce Back Pain
- Get outside – just being in the outdoors, allowing the sun to shine on your skin, and doing some moderate walking can benefit your back health. From recent research, doctors found that vitamin D deficiency is linked to chronic pain conditions when they are resistant to the regular relief care. Being outside will help get you moving (which helps with back pain as well as elevating vitamin D levels from sun exposure, so you experience less pain).
- Using essential oils – essential oils can bring some natural relief by applying them topically to areas where you are experiencing pain or using them for aromatherapy. A few oils that are helpful for back pain sufferers are peppermint (also known for helping headaches, but should be avoided by lactating mothers as it reduced milk flow), lavender, and rosemary.
- Soaking in a warm bath – immersing yourself in warm water can benefit back pain sufferers particularly with muscle pain, muscle spasms, and even some types of arthritis. Adding Epsom salts or essential oils to the tub can add some extra muscle-relaxing benefits. Another reason that this is a good strategy in combatting back pain is that it relaxes you. If you take one in the evening, it can set you up for a restful night’s sleep, a much-needed part of the healing process.
- Get a massage – to help alleviate muscle tightness or tenderness, try massage therapy, which can help get into specific problem areas within the soft tissues. This is a great way to address muscular imbalance and is also very relaxing, which helps with chronic back pain.
- Fight inflammation – there are so many different ways to fend off inflammation, a key player in most types of chronic pain and disease. By placing an ice pack in the area on your back where there is pain, you can reduce the inflammatory process and even dull pain signals. As a lifestyle change, it is a good idea to avoid known inflammatory foods like high-fructose corn syrup, trans fats, refined carbohydrates, and aspartame in order to keep back pain at bay.
- Practice yoga – there are two main reasons that yoga is great for back pain sufferers; one is physical and the other is mental. On the physical side of things, it helps by stretching or strengthening problem areas. It also benefits individuals mentally by increasing mental health and wellbeing. When it comes to balance in the body, strength, and flexibility, yoga positively develops all of these, and trained instructors will provide you with specific guidance for poses so you can access the areas of your back that tend to cause you pain and discomfort.
- Meditation – calming and intentionally guiding your thoughts is a powerful strategy to improve the way you feel in both mind and body. Classes are offered (both in person and online) to develop meditation skills. There are a variety of approaches towards meditation, so look for one that works for you and begin a routine that helps you cope with back pain naturally.
- Increase your endorphin flow – endorphins are hormones your body produces that are like natural pain relievers and are often considered your brain’s “feel good” chemicals. They literally bind to opiate receptors and hinder the transmission of pain signals. You can encourage an increase of endorphins by exercising, sniffing certain scents (I.e. vanilla or lavender), laughing, listening to music, and eating spicy foods.
- Stay hydrated – drinking plenty of water as a daily practice is one of the best ways to reduce back pain. Staying well hydrated reduces muscle stiffness, helps flush out toxins from cells and tissues, encourages healthy blood flow, nutrient, and oxygen exchange, and keeps your intervertebral discs spongy and functioning optimally. It is recommended by many experts that eight 8-ounce glasses of water daily is a good starting point, and it’s also easy to remember.
- Caring of your spine – the health of your spine directly affects your encounters with back pain. The spine acts as an anchor for your back, and issues that arise with the bones, joints, muscles, and ligaments can all be connected to problems that are linked to abnormal spinal alignment.
Upper Cervical Chiropractic Care Gets to the Root Cause of Back Pain
Consider the vertebrae of your spinal column, and you will notice that the bones are like links in a chain. It would be easy to understand that the positioning of each bone intimately impacts all of the others. Of all the bones in your spine, the most freely mobile vertebra is at the very top of the neck, forming a junction with the base of the head. This bone is called the atlas (C1), and any time it shifts out of alignment, this means your head is no longer in its neutral position. This requires the rest of the spine and back to compensate, causing back pain and discomfort that could manifest in any area.
Upper cervical chiropractic care focuses on restoring proper atlas alignment in order to help the entire back feel and function better. When the head is properly balanced in its normal, neutral position, this allows the rest of the spine to function normally as well. By adjusting the top of the spine, it can ease the back pain at its root instead of temporarily comforting the areas where the pain is. At Hejny Chiropractic, we provide free consultations to answer all your questions and to determine whether you would benefit from upper cervical care.
References:
https://www.acatoday.org/Patients/Health-Wellness-Information/Back-Pain-Facts-and-Statistics
https://www.spine-health.com/blog/14-natural-pain-relievers
To schedule a complimentary consultation with Dr. Hejny, call our Spring Lake Park office at 763-230-0116. You can also click the button below.
If you are outside of the local area, you can find an Upper Cervical Doctor near you at www.uppercervicalawareness.com.