Last week, while squatting 205#, I heard a pop in my lower back followed immediately by quite a bit of pain and muscle spasms.
Luckily, being a Physical Therapist myself and an Original Strength Certified Clinician, I knew what to do.
Injury comes with pain and often localized swelling (and occasionally bleeding). Being an injury around the spine, I knew I would be experiencing localized spasms (to protect the injured tissues) as well.
The inflammatory response (swelling) after injury is a complex series of chemical reactions that is governed by the immune system. This occurs in response to overstretching of soft tissues (sprains, strains, tears, etc.).
The first thing I did was to stop what I was doing (of course). Then I laid down on a mat here at the gym and started Pressing Reset.
Pressing Reset is something we teach people how to do based off the Original Strength System. This includes things like Diaphragmatic breathing, Shin box rotations, Dead bug holds, Gentle rocking, Speed skaters and I also threw in some Chinese planks (a plank… but lying on your back).
Later, after going home and taking some anti-inflammatory and pain medications, I did some more resets. I added forward and backward baby crawling and some head nods and rotations while on my hands and knees.
So, why did I choose those things to help mitigate the inflammation, reduce the spasms and speed along the healing process?
Aside from knowing it would help me feel better, there is also a pretty scientific backing to my process.
My body had gone into a high stress response due to the injury and I needed to regulate that response (also known as a Fight or Flight Response).
Some of the typical Fight or Flight responses to an injury sounds something like this: Pain. Spasms. Holding your breath. Clenching your teeth or making a fist. Moving slowly and stiffly.
With all of that comes the psychological or emotional response: Fear.
So where does Pressing Reset come in?
Pressing reset helps to limit the Fight or Flight response (the Sympathetic Nervous System) of the body by stimulating the Parasympathetic Nervous System.
The PNS decreases pain, decreases spasms, and lowers heart rate and blood pressure. The PNS, though, enhances the inflammatory process, thus causing a short-term increase in swelling. But this also speeds along the whole inflammatory process and aids in tissue repair and regeneration!
To address the short-term increase in swelling, I took an anti-inflammatory medication and kept the tissues moving. Shin box rotations, rocking, hands and knees head nods and rotations all help to pump along any swelling that was coming into the area that was hurt. Dead bug holds, speed skaters and Chinese planks were all used to keep the spasms and muscle guarding to a minimum by forcing them to work as normal (and not shut down or over-work).
That covers the mechanical and chemical responses to the injury. Then there is the emotional response… sometime the hardest to overcome!
When the tissues heal, should I avoid heavy squats again? What about dead lifts? Heavy pushing or pulling?
Of course not! Just because I had an injury this time doesn’t mean that I can never do that movement again.
When we exercise, or play a sport, and we constantly try to push ourselves, injuries will inevitably occur.
This is no different than biting your lip. We may chew our food funny for a few days, but eventually we get back to eating our food normally. Too many times, we let injuries get inside our head and we spend the rest of our lives avoiding that movement or situation that led to the original injury.
This often happens because we let our Fight or Flight System get out of control when the injury first occurs, and we lose the ability to regulate it. It then dominates our lives – making us fear re-injury. We start avoiding certain activities and movements.
Eventually, we create the very thing we were afraid of: a back (knee, hip, etc.) that is weak and fragile and likely to get hurt when we do have to lift something heavy.
So, my first reaction, even before lying down to work on gentle resets, was to focus on diaphragmatic breathing and to tell myself that it would be okay, and that I would be back as soon as could. And when that day comes, I will modify my routine as needed so as not to re-injure the tissue, but I will be back!
If you’ve read or seen the movie Dune, you may remember the phrase “Fear is the mind killer.” It can also be the body killer and life killer if you let it. Don’t let your memory of injury, or fear of injury, stop you from pushing yourself and living your best life. Injuries are a normal part of living. But if you are stronger and more mobile…more resilient… they are only bumps in the road.
Keep moving! And keep Pressing Reset!
