The Back Pain Blog

Archive for November, 2008

As you may have gathered from my previous posts I am a big fan of Steve Lockhart and his SLM Bodywork technique and self-help books. What I failed to mention is that Steve has available for free download ‘The Bad Back Book’ which does a great job of explaining why we have back pain and what we can do about it.

I got my ‘Bad Back Book’ quite a few months back when he was only offering the physical version of it and it was my first exposure to his methods of treating back pain. Steve’s philosophies if you like centre around back pain being caused by muscle imbalances and from reading his books this makes perfect sense. Even sciatica and bulging disc pain can be treated by dealing with these imbalances and reducing the pressure and inflammation of these areas.

Steve works with a number of high profile athletes here in Australia and runs his own SLM Bodywork practice, as well as teaching other people that are interested in learning his ‘craft’. He also has a very interesting story on how he came upon this method of treating pain, almost like a Karate Kid type story with the all-knowing old man and the young ‘grasshopper’!

I urge you to grab a copy of the book, it’s a totally free, no obligation download and if it helps you understand your pain as much as it has done for me it will be well worth the time taken to read it.

The Bad Back Book can be downloaded HERE.

The Healthy Back Institute is currently offering a Free Trial of Heal N Soothe, all you pay is the postage and handling charges and recieve a 90-count bottle (One Month Supply). For more details please CLICK HERE.

The arrival today of my first bottle of Heal N Soothe has coincided with one of the worst pain episodes that I have ever experienced.

To begin with I was ‘weening’ myself off the Panadeine Forte and to make matters worse here in Brisbane we have been experiencing some really ordinary weather. On Sunday we had what they are calling our most severe thunderstorm in ten years and from then on it has been raining constantly.

Normally I would welcome this long-overdue rain but I just can’t believe the aches and pains that I get around my lower back area and legs when it is cold or raining. I have no idea why my pain increases when the wet weather is here or approaching and coupled with reduced intake of my ‘regular’ pain killers I’m just about ready to jump off a bridge! No, not really, I’m just in a lot of pain!

Anyway, back to the point of this post. Although too early to tell if the Heal N Soothe is going to be the all-natural answer to my prayers I am happy to say that I have only felt the need to take two Panadeine Forte’s today, down from the usual eight or more and given the increased pain that I am feeling I think that is not too bad.

I’ve had a total of eight of the Heal N Soothe tablets today and I’m so tired from not sleeping for the last two nights that I decided to have the two Panadeine Forte to help me get off to sleep when I finish this post.

Tomorrow is a new day and I am hoping that for the first time in three years I can survive without having to rely on a medicine that I know isn’t doing me any good. What I would really love is four or five hours of deep sleep and not waking up with that ‘downed a case of Jimmy Walker Black Label last night’ feeling that comes with the Panadeine!

I am probably hinging a bit too much hope on this Heal N Soothe stuff but I am really excited about the prospect of coming out of my daily cloud and not putting my body at risk and also getting enough pain relief from it.

I’ll keep you updated as the trial continues, in the meantime check out these time-lapse shots from the storm we had on Sunday. Thankfully these were taken quite a few kilometres from where we live!

The Healthy Back Institute is currently offering a Free Trial of Heal N Soothe, all you pay is the postage and handling charges and recieve a 90-count bottle (One Month Supply). For more details please CLICK HERE.

I know I’m not alone when I say that trying to sleep with back pain is another frustratingly hard thing we have to deal with.

Heck, I can’t even remember the last time I laid down and got a full night’s sleep. The most I can manage at one time is 2-3 hours and no matter how hard I try there seems to be a ‘witching hour’ anywhere from 1am to 4 am where getting any amount of sleep is impossible. Usually by the time everyone else in the household is waking up I’m having the deepest sleep of the night.. er morning. Doesn’t that go down well when there is three children to get off to school!

Anyway, enough of my whining, the point of this post is to put together some of the sleeping tips that I have found over the last couple of years in the hope that they might help our sleepless readers. You know it’s probably a good thing that I enjoy writing these articles, I’d hate to have nothing to do in the wee hours of the morning!

• Avoid using the bedroom for anything other than sleep, and of course the occasional romantic encounter! If your mind is tuned into the fact that when you go to bed you are going there to sleep you will be more likely to get off to sleep easier. The practice of watching t.v., doing paperwork etc should be kept outside of the bedroom.
• Try different pillows and mattresses. This is one that helped me in the beginning. I kept persisting with the mattress that we have had for many years and it wasn’t until I slept in one of the kids beds one night that I realized how much the mattress and pillow choice can help. For the last twelve months or more I have found sleeping on a thin mattress on the lounge room floor (wooden floorboards) has been the best. I guess your body (and your pain) changes over time and it doesn’t hurt (pun intended) to experiment with different bedding combinations.
• Meditation and/or Relaxing – There are some really good relaxation and meditation programs available on the net for not a lot of money and I have read that many people find them helpful.
• Acupuncture – I love acupuncture! I challenge anyone to go and have a session of acupuncture and not fall asleep after the needles are put in! Schedule your visit for late in the day and I’m confident that you will find getting to sleep that night a piece of cake. If I had the money I would hire a acupuncturist to come in each night and do their thing, heaven!
• The dreaded Coffee – It has been reported that even a small amount of caffeine taken 10-12 hours before sleep can cause problems. Try eliminating coffee, tea, soda and even chocolate from your diet and see if your sleep improves.
• Try mind-body techniques. After an action-packed day, your brain and body need to unwind and slow down before sleep can occur. Create a “ritual” for bedtime – take a bath, meditate, do some easy stretches or yoga. Try to do your “ritual” in the same way, in the same place, at the same time each night. The repetition will trigger your mind and body that it is time to relax and sleep. This reminds me of when I did a pain management course last year. They taught us a technique called Mindfulness where you basically had to rid your mind of all thoughts and simply become aware of your surroundings. They would turn the lights off and once again if you didn’t nod off for a minute or two it was a dead-set miracle! Very powerful stuff and I have since tried this technique at home without too much success, I think at home you are always listening for things, like a child crying or the phone ringing and this makes it hard to do. But if you have a place where you can be in almost isolation it can work very well. A Google search of ‘Mindfulness’ would help explain it further.

If all else fails you could always do what I did and start a website and be up all night and a zombie all day! Not fun, not fun at all.