My Lower Back Injury, Progress & Rehab

Training Injuries
21

Glad to hear your pain has subsided. I’ve had 2 surgeries on my L-spine, and just thought I would chime in. What caused my disc herniations was weak glutes, and so after the second surgery, I was totally pain free, but I started off bridging/hipthrusting, and then when sets of 20 got easy I started loading it with a barbell and just kept progressing. Strengthen the crap out of your glutes even after you’re done with rehab.

My second surgery was 13 months ago, I have no limitations(can dead/squat/OHP), while I know it’s not a huge number, I squatted 270 a couple of weeks ago, I’m hoping for 300 in a couple of months.

Good luck with your return to lifting.

22

[quote]Sean.Butler wrote:
Glad to hear your pain has subsided. I’ve had 2 surgeries on my L-spine, and just thought I would chime in. What caused my disc herniations was weak glutes, and so after the second surgery, I was totally pain free, but I started off bridging/hipthrusting, and then when sets of 20 got easy I started loading it with a barbell and just kept progressing. Strengthen the crap out of your glutes even after you’re done with rehab.

My second surgery was 13 months ago, I have no limitations(can dead/squat/OHP), while I know it’s not a huge number, I squatted 270 a couple of weeks ago, I’m hoping for 300 in a couple of months.

Good luck with your return to lifting.[/quote]

Thanks man, Glad to hear you are working out without any pain or restrictions now. Did you have a fusion or a discectomy? My issue was rated 2.5-3 on a scale of 10 by most doctors that i saw & surgery wasn’t required. I can squat & OP but just being cautious since its only been a week since i resumed.

23

A piece of L4-L5 actually broke away and was essentially ‘floating around’ in the space it had to, and was causing severe pain. The doctor didn’t think L3-L4 was contributing to pain, so he only did a microdisc and “cleaned up” L4-L5 in July of 2012. Recovery was extremely slow and painful. The only thing that helped was A.R.T along with a ton of glute strengthening.

About 8 months later I was feeling great, and resumed deadlifting, and it was probably July/August of 2013 that I felt something go while I was deadlifting. L3-L4 got pushed out a little further, it was bareable, I was doing the conservative treatment but it got progressively worse. By the time September came around, I was hardly able to walk, I remember going to a therapists office, who had to tie my shoes when I got there because I couldn’t reach down to tie them myself.

Same surgeon did the same surgery on L3-L4 at the end of last September. I remeber waking up from the surgery and them trying to get me to sit up, and I was refusing because prior to the surgery I couldn’t sit, because trying to stand from a sitting position caused this spike of pain, I actually collapsed walking into the surgery center. But they finally got me to sit up, and then stand up, and the pain was completely gone. They let me go home the same day, I was able to walk a mile or so around my neighborhood that same night. Glute strengthening started a week or two after surgery. In hindsight, I probably should of waited a little longer to resume activity.

The pain has never come back, I’m very thankful for that.

It’s my opinion that the reason there are so many “failed back surgeries” - is that the surgery fixes the symptoms and gets you out of pain, it doesn’t fix the reason your injury came on in the first place.

I’m more than happy to answer more specific questions about the surgery, for anybody who may be considering it. OP; doesn’t sound like you’ll need it, which is great news.

24

[quote]Sean.Butler wrote:
A piece of L4-L5 actually broke away and was essentially ‘floating around’ in the space it had to, and was causing severe pain. The doctor didn’t think L3-L4 was contributing to pain, so he only did a microdisc and “cleaned up” L4-L5 in July of 2012. Recovery was extremely slow and painful. The only thing that helped was A.R.T along with a ton of glute strengthening.

About 8 months later I was feeling great, and resumed deadlifting, and it was probably July/August of 2013 that I felt something go while I was deadlifting. L3-L4 got pushed out a little further, it was bareable, I was doing the conservative treatment but it got progressively worse. By the time September came around, I was hardly able to walk, I remember going to a therapists office, who had to tie my shoes when I got there because I couldn’t reach down to tie them myself.

Same surgeon did the same surgery on L3-L4 at the end of last September. I remeber waking up from the surgery and them trying to get me to sit up, and I was refusing because prior to the surgery I couldn’t sit, because trying to stand from a sitting position caused this spike of pain, I actually collapsed walking into the surgery center. But they finally got me to sit up, and then stand up, and the pain was completely gone. They let me go home the same day, I was able to walk a mile or so around my neighborhood that same night. Glute strengthening started a week or two after surgery. In hindsight, I probably should of waited a little longer to resume activity.

The pain has never come back, I’m very thankful for that.

It’s my opinion that the reason there are so many “failed back surgeries” - is that the surgery fixes the symptoms and gets you out of pain, it doesn’t fix the reason your injury came on in the first place.

I’m more than happy to answer more specific questions about the surgery, for anybody who may be considering it. OP; doesn’t sound like you’ll need it, which is great news.
[/quote]

Did you have a weak/heavy leg during those 2 herniation cycles that you went through? Although most of my symptoms have subsided, I still have a heavy leg that is 1.5 or 2 on a scale of 10. My orthopedic doc & physio tell me i need to give it 2 to 3 more months and it will go away completely like other symptoms did. Its been 3.5 months since i first became symptomatic.

25

Besides physical therapy work…how was your guys dieting? Specifically, I’ve injured my back a couple weeks ago and while not as severe as some of your described injuries, this is the second time in a few months. Symptoms are similar - can’t sit for extended periods, trouble getting up/down, pain in legs, pain/odd feeling in tailbone area etc. And I’m wondering if diet should just be at maintenance to allow proper nutrients to heal - I’m afraid of putting on weight if not being able to lift/be active so I was thinking of eating under maintenance but don’t want to slow recovery by not eating enough.

26

Good thread. Any words of wisdom prevention wise?

27

[quote]Massthetics wrote:
Good thread. Any words of wisdom prevention wise?[/quote]

Thanks, Yes this is something i preach everywhere now:

Maintaining & practicing a NEUTRAL SPINE position is what will make sure an injury relapse doesn’t happen. Practice doing it for 2 weeks everywhere forcefully…Home, work, movies, restaurants, Everywhere. By 3rd week your body/sub-conscious mind will start adapting to the neutral spine position itself without having to be reminded to sit that way.

Also, Work on your core atleast 2x or 3x a week. Strengthen it as much as you can specially if you’re really into the big 3, Bench//Squats/Deads. Dont wait for the injury to happen first. Core & Glute strengthening is the fastest remedy to any such injury. I learnt it the hard way.

28

[quote]uv_deth wrote:
Besides physical therapy work…how was your guys dieting? Specifically, I’ve injured my back a couple weeks ago and while not as severe as some of your described injuries, this is the second time in a few months. Symptoms are similar - can’t sit for extended periods, trouble getting up/down, pain in legs, pain/odd feeling in tailbone area etc. And I’m wondering if diet should just be at maintenance to allow proper nutrients to heal - I’m afraid of putting on weight if not being able to lift/be active so I was thinking of eating under maintenance but don’t want to slow recovery by not eating enough.[/quote]

The body needs nutrients to heal & ample eating will somewhat speed up the recovery process i believe. You should eat alot (Eat clean) in the injury & rehab phase. Once you’re done with it you can bring the caloric intake down to maintenance level. Eat & let your body heal. Even if you do manage to put on some weight you will lose it when u resume training.

29

Update:

So guys, Almost 1 month since i resumed weight-training & 4 months into the symptomatic/rehab phase. I’m glad to announce i am now 100% symptom free since last week. The final two symptoms (Weak/Heavy Quadricep & burning foot) disappeared last week. For the first time in the past 6 months i feel totally 100%. As it turns out again, My physiotherapist was right, The disc injuries require 4-6 months to heal & it did. I credit my heavy weight lifting & indirect core development (squats/deads) for saving me from true Sciatic pain (Remember, Throughout my journey i never had sciatica PAIN in my leg).

As far as training goes, I have been sticking to seated/machined workouts for now, More isolation work & less compounds. Will be switching back to more compounds & free weights by 1st January 2015. I noticed i haven’t lost much strength in the 6 month layoff, I can still lift heavy but not gonna take any risks for atleast 2 more months. Giving my body more time to heal & get into the groove.

Point to be noted, I included brisk walking on an open air track to my routine and i believe it has something to do with me becoming 100% symptom free last week.