Do you suffer from chronic low back pain?
Have you tried every modality out there with no relief? (Chiropractic, Physical Therapy, Acupuncture, Massage, hot, cold etc)
Is your chronic low back pain worse some days than others?
Are your bowel movements inconsistent? (Meaning you should have 2-3 movements daily six inchesor longer)
Are your stools difficult to pass or pebble-like?
If you answered yes to any of the above questions, then there is a very good chance that your chronic low back pain is coming from constipation, not because of something structural. Let me explain.
When you do not have proper elimination of your bowels, the contents within your intestines can build up leading to bad bacterial overgrowth, inflammation, and pain. When the intestines become inflamed or swollen, they inhibit (stop) the abdominals from working. The abdominals are important stabilizing muscles for the back and when they stop working do to inflammation your back has no support and now you are suffering from back pain.
Think of it this way you have a long garden hose that you tie off at one end. You keep pushing water through it but it has no way out, overtime the hose tries to compensate by expanding, getting bigger and bigger, this is the inflammation in your body. The majority of you out there that are currently suffering from chronic pain and inflammation are because of what you are putting into your body. The American diet consists of C.R.A.P. (Caffeine, refined sugars, alcohol, and processed foods). These foods offer no nutritional value and instead cause constipation. Constipation overtime will lead chronic inflammation and chronic back pain and that is why many of you out there get no relief no matter what you do.
There is good news to all of this and that is that you can reverse inflammation. It will take some hard work on your end by changing your lifestyle but you need to ask yourself what’s more difficult, suffering from back pain or making lifestyle changes that overtime will make you pain free, have more energy and possibly loose weight along the way.
Below is a list of tips that will help get you started to a healthier GI system:
- A great place to start is your diet. Take a look at what you are eating day after day, writing it down will help immensely in helping you become aware of what non-foods you are putting into your body on a daily basis.
- Drink more water: general rule of thumb is taking 1/2 of your weight and drink that many ounces of water. Dehydration alone will slow the bowels down and cause constipation.
- Drink water upon rising. This helps to awaken the GI system and get things moving.
- Replace foods that have a shelf life with real foods like fruits and veggies. These foods offer fiber that shelf-life foods do not.
- Begin taking a high quality fish oil supplement: Fish oil offers healthy fats that become a lubricant for the intestines.
- Begin taking a high quality probiotic: probiotics help to replace the bad bacteria with good.
- Exercise: Get yourself moving … when you move around it helps stimulate the intestines.
- Mange your stress: Stress gets stored differently in all of us. Some of us hold stress in our shoulders, low back or belly region. Take a minute to see how much stress may also be contributing you’re unhealthy GI system.
- Watch for food intolerances: when we eat foods that our body cannot tolerate this too can lead to bad bacterial overgrowth and inflammation. Signs of food intolerances can be anything from a headache, to gas, bloating, diarrhea, or constipation.
