Need guidance and help

[Infinite Unity]

Hey everyone. The past couple of months have been truly great! Everything seemed to be coming together, and great progress had been had! However last Monday I hurt my lower back. I suspect its a bulging or herniated disc. I am not in terrible pain, and actually seems to be healing just fine, and if I could continue to rest and take it easy. I believe I would come close to being normal. I don't have health insurance, and I have only been working at a new job for 4 months. It is a heavy industrial job, were I'm lifting, welding, and grinding on rims all day.

Im so lost and confused on what to do, I have no personal doctor, health insurance or anything of the sort. I live in south Carolina, and I don't believe workers comp can be payed before working somewhere for 6 months....Christmas is right around the corner, and I just feel so overwhelmed and truly don't know which direction to go.

The pain is not terrible, and is easily bearable at the moment, the problem is the heavy lifting at the job, and I believe it will become worse and worse. The reason I am so terrified is that when I was 10 years old my father injured his back irreparably, and spent the remainder of his life isolated, alone, and in terrible pain. I am very terrified of this happening to me. Its probably my only and worse fear in this life.

I have begun to search and put in applications for jobs that I believe would be more suitable.

I'm just asking for someone with considerable knowledge in these areas, from back pain, to work laws and so forth to help me.

Im also going to consult some chiropractors today, and see what they think.

[ada]

Yoga can be very good for back pain, any kind of relaxed streching really.

And perhaps getting some kind of massage if you haven't for a long time, and if you can afford it. Some masseuse can give you a proper treatment according to your back pain / injury.

Where I live you can ask any family doctor for a sick leave, you miss out the first two days of payment or so but get the rest. As you've also been hurt during work I think they must give you that. If such a thing exists in the US.

Wish you healing, be well.

[Patrick]

There is a type of stretching you can do with one leg pulled at a time while on your back that helps a lot.  A message therapist showed me how to do it myself and I have not needed professional services since.  Maybe something similar would work for your case as well.
 

[Infinite Unity]

There is a type of stretching you can do with one leg pulled at a time while on your back that helps a lot.  A message therapist showed me how to do it myself and I have not needed professional services since.  Maybe something similar would work for your case as well.
 

What injuries did you have?


Ive found a chiropratic that does his own x-rays, and does the first visit(including x-rays) for 20 bucks. Even if I don't use his services after the initial x-ray and diagnosis. I will at least know for sure what's going on.


At this point I believe its a small protrusion, from my pain/symptoms and intuition. However the main problem is keeping my family fed, and sheltered. I know that if I continue the job I am at now, It will lead to some serious injuries and pain. I am currently looking for a new job, and have put in several applications. I'm honestly just a little traumatized and fearful for my family.

I was thinking about starting a GoFundMe, to help pay for doctors visits and etc.. Anyone have any wisdom in this area? Is it a nice fit? Potential of working etc..???

The complexity or problem with the chiropratic is that he cant see me until wenesday.

My wife is pushing me to go to work, and I know it's from her fear, but I really don't feel like that's what I should do.....any suggestions?

[flofrog]

Many thoughts Infinite

just in case this is a sprained back, here is what chinese medicine says, just in case it would help :

Sprained back usually comes from depleted kidneys. Kidneys become depleted due to nutrients but mostly due to stress.
So one has to nourish the kidneys and foods nourishing the kidneys are as follows:

any black food : black beans, black berries, dark beets, black sesame seeds, black lentils, kombu and kelp, anything that you can think of as black food will nourish the kidneys. I am afraid, if you are a vegetarian, you can pass this, but a little bit of pork nourishes the kidneys too.

I hope it is not due to your lifting heavy things.. lol I just sprained my back saturday but I have been ingesting lots of black sesame seeds and it helps...

Best wishes Infinite, keep us posted if you can

[Infinite Unity]

Many thoughts Infinite

just in case this is a sprained back,  here is what chinese medicine says, just in case it would help :

Sprained back usually comes from depleted kidneys.  Kidneys become depleted due to nutrients but mostly due to stress.
So one has to nourish the kidneys and foods nourishing the kidneys are as follows:

any black food :  black beans, black berries,  dark beets,  black sesame seeds,  black lentils, kombu and kelp, anything that you can think of as black food will nourish the kidneys.  I am afraid, if you are a vegetarian, you can pass this, but a little bit of pork nourishes the kidneys too.

I hope it is not due to your lifting heavy things..  lol I just sprained my back saturday but I have been ingesting lots of black sesame seeds and it helps...

Best wishes Infinite, keep us posted if you can

which part of your back did you strain, and what are your symptoms? I find it very unsatisfying that so many people have back problems, sometime within there life. Very unhappy about that...

[flofrog]

Infinite I sprained the lower back on the right side. Definitely linked to the sciatica nerve, but it’s a small sprain, I am sure lighter than your issue, it’s diffused pain and just needs some attention if for example I get out of my car. I sprained it Saturday doing just some cleaning on a burnt hillside of a ranch of a friend whose house burnt in the Woolsey fire. I was not doing heavy lifting, just bending slightly, which is why I think your issue is worrisome. Mine will go fast away, black food is what I do each time. If you can have a good chiropractor as everyone mentioned here, I think this is the best.

I do think that so many people have back ache because everyone is really stressed by somewhat chaotic times... I really buy into the Chinese medicine that kidneys get depleted through stress.

[Infinite Unity]

Infinite I sprained the lower back on the right side. Definitely linked to the sciatica nerve, but it’s a small sprain, I am sure lighter than your issue, it’s diffused pain and just needs some attention if for example I get out of my car.  I sprained it Saturday doing just some cleaning on a burnt hillside of a ranch of a friend whose house burnt in the Woolsey fire. I was not doing heavy lifting, just bending slightly, which is why I think your issue is worrisome. Mine will go fast away, black food is what I do each time. If you can have a good chiropractor as everyone mentioned here, I think this is the best.

I do think that so many people have back ache because everyone is really stressed by somewhat chaotic times... I really buy into the Chinese medicine  that kidneys get depleted through stress.

Well mine may be a strain. I pray to the high one that it is. I am somewhat of a hypochondriac when it comes to my back.

I have soreness in the lower left back. I had some sciatic for a few days, that was basically in my buttocks. What I am concerned about the most is going to work till wenseday before I can see a doctor and get x rays and etc....

Should I just go in and tell my boss whats going on, and that I have an appointment for wenseday and ask for leave? or should I call out?

There are so many variables.

Also another large red flag is the extensive build up of stress, and forseable injuries if I keep this job going. Which I want to avoid almost at all costs.

Could you go into further details on how your back feels? symptoms how the soreness progressed? Where and to what extent does the pain and soreness go? Is the soreness in the sacrum area? or is it a little higher near L5-S1? how do you know its only a strain? Are you getting any muscle spasming, where and to what extent if so? how close your spine does the pain go?

I would agree that stress is one of the leading factors for physical disfunction. I would also suggest that peoples body mechanics, such as posture, moving, and lifting are very very bad. I have been more and more focused on my own posture and lifting techniques. I have witnessed tons of other-selves doing very bad body mechanics techniques. Its no wonder we have terrible back problems. So my main advice is to pay attention to your posture, lifting techniques and just in general good sound body mechanics.

[Patrick]

There is a type of stretching you can do with one leg pulled at a time while on your back that helps a lot.  A message therapist showed me how to do it myself and I have not needed professional services since.  Maybe something similar would work for your case as well.
 

What injuries did you have?
...

I don't know exactly what started it.  Maybe just age related.  But the point is that some health care providers might basically subscribe you to their services.  I prefer seeing someone no more then three times where they show us how to take care of it ourselves.  For me it was an orthopedic massage therapist that provided the best care and support while Chiropractors only wanted to subscribe me to their services for a good while and I found the care to be less effective.  Also an orthopedic massage therapist usually cost much less.  But in the end, just follow your intuition and you can't go wrong...

EDIT: I am not a doctor so this is just my opinion, but maybe a medicine like Vimovo (or Naproxen) would help speed up the healing.
 

[Infinite Unity]

Honestly I don't know which way I'm going to go. I'm only going to the chiropratic initially for x-ray and diagnoses. I don't like how conventional medicine treats back injuries. I practically plan on healing on my own, I just need to know the true parameters I am in.

The chiropratic is going to xray and diagnose for 20. The closest I can find to that is like 60 dollars, and more for each additional shot or angle.

[AnthroHeart]

I recommend looking into Metlife Disability in case you become disabled. It came with my medical insurance and pays out till 2020, and then they will determine if I am eligible till I'm 65.

[flofrog]

Infinite the pain is exactly at the level of the sciatic nerve on the right side, if I push into it, it exactly hits the top of the back buttock just where the sacrum ends, definitely the sciatic nerve.

But it is just a small pain opposite to total sciatica I have had when I was in my teens,. I have no pain in the leg and no pain anywhere else, so I know that if I am a bit careful it’s gonna go with the food I mentioned.

I had a major back problem when I was eighteen I was working in a stable cleaning stalls for horses and lifting manure. I was very lucky to meet a chiropractor who treated athletes after bone surgery so he knew every bone, every muscle, every ligament, he had even done dissection. He was most of the time against the usual practice of chiropractors cracking bones. He would do massage instead and then have you sit done on the table and take your arms and reset your spine bumpy simply holding your arms a certain way. So he explained to me how to protect my back when lifting anything.

He made me stand back against the wall and moving my feet away from it like about less than a foot. Then from that position where your back was against the wall, he made you bend very little but KEEPING your back straight. And then he would make you oscillate by just a few inches you back up and down, asking you to keep back straight as a table. This was an exercice I did for a few minutes for like a year everyday. Then he explained that whenever you lift anything your back has to be locked this way straight. The thing is when you first do the exercice you can have someone checking your back is straight like a table, or try to see your back in a mirror.

Once you do the exercice even like twice, you feel what your straight back is and then it’s like your body memorized it, and then you can start to lift anything heavy without injuring your back.its pretty awesome. To this day I apply it, and friends are sometimes amazed at what I can lift, lol

I don’t know if this will help...

[xise]

I've had a great experience with a sports-oriented chiropractor as well. Good luck, and try not to give into fear. Your body is a feedback mechanism and it's important to listen to it.

[Glow]

Hi I.U. sorry to hear you are injured.

I can relate to the fear as I also have a physical job. (shoe horses) and my back/body is my paycheque basically.

So before you panic. I have hurt myself so many times and been fixed so many times. If you can find a practitioner of Active Release Therapy I can 100% vouch for their specialized knowledge of the body.

All the people who do my job are usually sore and broken down after a few years with permanent pain, they just keep going excepting that is life as a farrier but 6 of us go to the same therapist and he has fixed everything from herniated discs to meniscus tears in knees and it is always quick and cheap. I am no worse for wear after over a decade doing this and it is 100% because of the ART treatment when I get hurt and learning how to balance my muscle groups so everything works together.
Used to be people were just crippled the rest of their life like your Dad was thankfully we know more about the body these days.

Just 2 months ago I was diagnosed with compressed disks, I did the stretch to fix it a bit to aggressive and it released all at once. I was completely crippled for 3 days till my A.R.T appointment and within a few more days was back to work being pushed around by 1400lb animals. I could have gone back right after the appointment but the risk of ligament sprain was to high when all a 1400lb horse has to do is sneeze to knock a horse shoer off balance .

Ideally you do not over do the excersizes and then you don't end up broken. I am a bit to enthusiastic.

Anyways for the time put your dads fate out of your head. We know so much more about the body now. If you can find an ART person I would highly recommend but my ART is also a chiro so it's likely there is some crossover.

The main thing is once they get you realigned you do the stretches and excersizes that will balance your body so the injury does not reoccur.

It sound super counter intuitive but when I was totally broken all my weight just resting on ligaments, because my muscles were in spasm(sciatic issues too) they had me do a ten minute brisk walk straight as I can go avoiding turns as much as possible.(I did 5 minutes straight, turn around and back) Apparently at the 10 minute mark there is a body-mind reset that helps relax the muscles supporting the lower back/butt.

They also had me do a stretch where I layed on my stomach and lifted my upper body with my arms, sort of back bending but that is how my compressed disk decompressed all at once so if you are looking at exercises online please be cautious with that one. If I had been more cautious it likely would have healed slowly and I wouldn't have endured so much pain.

Also a caution on doing random stretches or exercises before you know what is wrong.
If it's gentle you are likely fine but caution till someone takes a look

PS Magnesium is amazing for muscle cramps

[Tae]

I recommend getting a foam roller, so you can work on your own muscle tension. It's a very low-tech piece of equipment you can use your own body weight to work out muscle knots by rolling yourself over. You can use something like a tennis ball to work on your glutes. Other products I use for pain include a purple hook with a rounded pokey bit on the end, "Mountain Magic Liniment", and Naproxen, a superior over-the-counter anti-inflammatory.

Now given the crowd...

Since I "woke up" one of the things I've been able to do is just sort of jostle my spine back into alignment. At first this was "done" to me and now I understand how to do it and can just sort of jiggle myself back into place. If you're tapped into your higher self you can ask for techniques to help heal yourself. If we just don't bother asking then we don't get access to the tools we could have had all along.

PS Magnesium is amazing for muscle cramps

But mind you don't get the laxative type, Magnesium Citrate... mistakes were made...

[Infinite Unity]

ok awesome news, I do not have a herniation, and my disc actually look really good for a 30 year old. I just had an acute lower back strain, which also misaligned my lower back a fair bit. Should be A-OK! I also appreciate the lessons on posture, lifting, and in-general good body mechanics. That this has made me ever so more aware of.

I actually never go to the doctor unless absolutely needed. I have many modalities and techniques, handed down from the higher-self, since I was a young child and throughout my life.

This back problem was a little different. I just wanted to make extra-sure on this one.

I have two areas in my spine, where I have had pretty bad trauma, I expected to be able to tell or see something on the x-ray. Seems we've healed those up nicely! The doctor nor myself could see anything in those areas. I was very happy!