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Low back stretches; don't do them

Low back stretches are regularly recommended for people with low back pain.  Often times with low back pain comes low back muscle spasm.  Intuitively it makes sense to want to stretch out the tight muscle.  The reasoning being that the pain is from the muscle spasm and if you stretch the muscle in spasm the pain will go away.  While muscle spasms do cause pain stretching them is not the answer.  When a muscle spasms in the low back it’s doing so for a reason, that reason is to stabilize the spine.  When the low back is injured or painful the body reacts by creating a natural immobilizer, the immobilizer is muscle.  The muscles basically tighten up and lock down the painful area so it doesn’t move.  This is the body’s way of protecting the area.  Admittedly, stretching does feel good.  The relieve is only temporary though and the previous pain returns.  Stretching feels good for reasons beyond the context of this article, but it does not actually address why the low back is painful, so the pain returns.

With low back pain the area that is causing pain usually moves TOO much.  Stretching the muscles around this area will increase mobility further.  This will NOT be beneficial in the long run.  The muscles that surround the spine, often referred to as the “core” muscles are designed to PREVENT excessive motion.  If the core musculature is working correctly it will check excessive low back motion during dynamic activity.  If the core musculature is not strong enough, doesn’t have enough endurance, or is not coordinated enough it will not check excessive motion during activity.  Eventually pain will result that is due to too much wear and tear of spinal joint and disc tissue.  The long-term fix is to train the core musculature to do it’s job  of preventing excessive motion during activity.  This is why you hear so much about “core stabilization” to treat low back pain.  The surgical answer is a lumbar fusion, all this entails is taking hardware and fixating the spinal level or levels that move too much.  The spine is stabilized through artificial means opposed to training the muscles to do their job of stabilizing or preventing TOO much movement.

This is why stretching the low back and trying to make it move more is a bad idea.  The entire point of the muscles that surround this area is to keep it stable so it doesn’t hurt.  Forget about stretching the low back, just don’t do it.

If you insist on stretching look at the hips.  Keeping the hips mobile will reduce the amount of movement through the low back.  It’s very common for people with low back pain to have “tight” hips and a “lose” low back.  So stretch the hips and leave the back alone.  This will do more to eliminate your low back pain stretching the low back.

What hip stretches should you do then?

Hip flexor stretch

Hamstring stretch

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