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Comment by treeman79 | Hacker News Reader

I hear you. Blew a disk in high school. Set me back decades. A few years ago I got serous on stretching videos, finally found the ones that “fix” it. Doctors and chiropractors were helpful, but it never lasted

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I find that well-executed strength training (i.e. with proper form) eliminates all kinds of back-related issues for me. This talk has been really eye opening for me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9poXGU11ms

+1 on this, for me deadlifting has single-handedly fixed my back. I tried PT for it, with mixed results, but once I started lifting it completely went away. YMMV, but it's worth considering for sure.

I'm clearly doing something wrong, but lifting has driven every time I've injured my back in the past 5 years. I've had trainers coach me on form, and _most_ of the time I'm fine. But if I have bad form p% of the time (e.g. 0.5-3%), and working out becomes a ~daily thing, then I have a handful of opportunities per year to injure myself.

You kind of provide recipe how to avoid it yourself. One suggestion that might or might not be relevant - don't do weightlifting at your proper max, and don't push your limits that way. Its a way to grow fast but also sure way to injury. There is no way to be at your limit and keep the proper perfect form, every time. You can always add more repetitions to workout.

For me weightlifting is about staying in shape for things like mountain adventures, feeling great, looking good. But Arnold-look is a silly goal for long term wellness, and so are the methods to get there. Once I stopped pushing the numbers and focused on more repetitions, I never had any injury. That's worth much more than some momentary number of kilos/pounds you did today - nobody will care about that tomorrow, but injuries remain, sometimes forever.

YMMV, but I found the following articles quite useful to 1) help self-manage symptoms brought on during strength training, and 2) to stop obsessing about my using "bad" form during training:

https://www.barbellmedicine.com/blog/pain-in-training-what-d...

https://www.barbellmedicine.com/blog/movement-variability-sh...

Would you mind sharing the videos?

https://youtu.be/ntUXh7qiyr0 And

https://youtu.be/PJJO9PmXm90

These are the two stretches that help me the most.

Highly recommend going through bob and Brad, and Dr Jo on YouTube. I try stuff all the time and have regained much of my mobility.

Thank you for sharing these.

Not sure about the original poster specifically, but when I had a herniated disk the two movements that helped the most (and I still perform along with others to this day) were:

- Prone Press Up (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sws_GwrlYO0): Relieves tension in lower back, pressing discs back towards their natural position.

- Banded Hamstring Stretches (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msxQR56U7sI): You can use a belt for this if you don't have the bands, but properly and consistently stretching my hamstrings was the biggest thing I did to relieve (and 'cure') my back pain after the herniation.

This one has been wonderful for me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BOTvaRaDjI

He runs through them pretty fast, but someone in the comments recommended playing it at 0.75x speed and that works great.

I used this to get rid of my back pain from sitting all day. Now I prevent it altogether, by getting up once per hour, and walking around for five minutes, so I haven't had to do these stretches in a while.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNN3K2qj-L0

My anecdote: I tweaked my back 3 times in 18 months (like bedridden/WFH/swearing like a sailor for a week). Then I started going to a 1hour yoga class 1-2 times a week, and it's now been another 18 months without any issues. (Since covid I've been using DownDog app and doing 10-15 min sessions)

any series you like or do you just mean ones specific to your purpose?

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