You’ve probably felt it at one time or another… And lower back pain is now the number one cause of disability across the world.1
Depending on what’s causing your pain, you may be able to do more than you think to help keep it under control. Here are five ways to help ease lower back pain:
1. Cut Inflammatory Foods: Eating the right foods can help decrease inflammation… But eating the wrong foods can have an even more powerful—and negative—effect on your body. Processed foods, sugars, grain, alcohol, MSG, and other inflammatory edibles may be keeping your back from healing itself properly. And it’s most likely your overall diet—not just one particular food—causing problems.2 Try a simple elimination diet for two weeks by removing some of the worst offenders. See if it improves your pain. If that’s the case, it may be a change worth sticking to.
2. Exercise: It may be the last thing you think of doing when you have lower back pain. But if you do it right, exercise can actually help heal your back. Exercise puts your bones under direct stress. This stress helps make bones stronger. It may even make them bigger and less likely to deteriorate. Exercise also strengthens back muscles. Think of it as adding a solid foundation of support to your back. One study found that people who exercise four or more times per week have nearly 30% less back pain. This reduction in back pain also led to a significant improvement in quality of life.3
3. Add Krill Oil: One study found krill oil can reduce inflammation by up to 20%. In just one week. If you have lower back pain that just won’t go away, it may help give you relief. Krill oil also gives you a dose of astaxanthin. This potent antioxidant—65 times more powerful than vitamin C—also helps fight inflammation.
4. Take a Stand: Sitting down for too long puts stress on your piriformis muscle. Too much of this stress can lead to piriformis syndrome. It shares a lot of common—and painful—symptoms with a slipped disk. It can even cause nerve damage if you don’t treat it. But there’s a simple solution: Stand up every hour or so for just five minutes. Standing actually takes stress off your back—and your piriformis muscle. One study found that people who stayed standing in the morning had 23% less lower back pain.4
5. Eat More Tart Cherries: You may already know that tart cherries are a strong anti-inflammatory. They may even help you get gout attacks under control. But the anthocyanin that turns cherries red may be more effective than aspirin at treating pain. Eating about 20 tart cherries had a similar—or better—effect to taking an NSAID for fighting inflammatory pain. You may be able to decrease C-reactive protein levels—a major marker of inflammation—by as much as 25% after one month of eating them.5 Even if you can’t find organic tart cherries to enjoy, you can buy their extract online and in most health food stores.
Let’s face it, these alternatives sure beat mainstream solutions like drugs and surgery. And although you may never be completely free of back pain, following these steps can help you prevent it from controlling your life.
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References:
1http://consumer.healthday.com/bone-and-joint-information-4/backache-news-53/low-back-pain-leading-cause-of-disability-worldwide-study-686113.html
2http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/21/inflammatory-foods-worst-inflammation_n_2838643.html#slide=2131351
3http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090602133559.htm
4http://www.menshealth.com/mhlists/manage_pain/Stand_Up_to_the_Ache.php
5http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leo-galland-md/cherry-season-fight-pain-_b_844654.html
