The most common complaint people come to see me for in my Rolfing practice is Low Back Pain. Funnily enough, I have found that one of the best “exercises” you can do to reduce your exposure to future low back pain is to NOT use your hands when getting in and out of a chair.  Go “hands free” – seems easy enough, right?

Yet we all do it without thinking. We’ll put our hands on the dinner table to help us get up from eating a meal.  We’ll put our hands on our thighs to help us get up from the couch.  We’ll put our hands on the bench or chair by the front door to squat or to sit when putting on our shoes.

Here’s the thing: Using your hands to get in and out of a seated position can create problems, like:

• Decrease your sense of balance
• Create muscular imbalances by overusing limbs that feel strong while underusing limbs that feel weak
• De-emphasize using your core muscles and hips to lift or lower in a controlled motion

That last one can lead to teaching your body to use muscles that are not designed to take you through particular movements, which can lead to over-stressing joints or muscles down the road more than they were designed to take.

Reduce Hand Use, Improve Stability

To be clear, I’m not saying that the occasional use of your hands for balance is going to cause catastrophic back pain.  What I am saying is that by not using your hands 5, 10, 15 times per day as you get in and out of various seated positions, you are giving your body the opportunity to:

• Improve your balance
• Improve your core strength
• Engage and maintain leg and hip muscles
• Encourage use of the correct muscles when hinging at the hips, which translates to picking things up off the floor without pain.

The biggest trick is to remain committed to paying attention. Because as I said, most of the time you don’t realize you’re doing it in the first place.  Support your awareness by placing reminders at your work desk or dinner table to help ensure you create this new healthy habit and stick with it.  Another option would be to have your spouse or partner let you know when you’re using your hands.

If you find that you struggle to get in and out of a seated position without pain in your low back, you may have a structural issue that we can resolve in my Rolfing office.  Feel free to schedule here through my website.

Did you know that the NIH says ~80% of us experience back pain? In fact, it’s the top reason that people contact my Tacoma Rolfing® practice. The good news for you is that whether it’s debilitating or an ongoing discomfort, generally back pain is fixable, and often without surgery.

The trick to treating back pain effectively is in knowing how to find the pain before just diving in. Knowing “Where’s does it hurt?” doesn’t necessarily mean knowing the source, but it’s always a clue. Did you know that even a simple stubbed toe can throw off your gait enough to cause your lower back to hurt? That’s why it’s important to know where the back pain originates, and there are lots of possibilities. To name a few:

• Sedentary lifestyle, aka sitting too much
• Pinched nerves from a herniated disk
• Lack of core strength
• Off-balance gait or walk, a limp
• Injury from a workplace or car accident

Luckily, all of the above (and more) causes of back pain typically respond really well to Rolfing.

What’s different about how I, as a Certified Rolfer©, treat back pain?

To begin with, I look at the whole you. Like I mention above, the thing that’s making your back hurt may not originate where you think it does. That’s where the initial assessment comes in. I’ll take you through a short process that lets me examine your alignment, how you move and how you stand.

Each client is unique, so how we move forward will be unique, too. Say that I determine part of your back pain comes from lack of core strength. Part of your treatment regimen may include simple core exercises. But if it looks like your case is more complex or severe, you may need to see a physical therapist, too. I know several practitioners in the greater Tacoma area (Seattle metro, too) and can refer you.

Back pain doesn’t just hurt, which is bad enough, it also limits your movement. That’s packs a double whammy to any lifestyle. Because I’ve been a Certified Rolfer for more than a decade, I know just how all the muscles, fascia tissue and nerves need to work together.

Using Rolfing and corresponding deep touch body work, I can help free spasming nerves, loosening the tissue that locks you up movement-wise. I’ll get to the root of the pain and help correct what’s causing it. Because ultimately, the goal is to get you moving well again, free from back pain.  

Christopher Horan is a Certified Rolfer practicing in the greater Tacoma, Washington area. His Puget Sound Rolfing clients come from Tacoma, Puyallup, Newcastle, Gig Harbor, Fircrest and University Place, as well as the Seattle metropolitan and Bellevue areas. You can schedule your appointment here.