Tweaked lower back

[confuzzl3don3]

Ok so today things felt better and i was hoping that it'd be ok. I was having a light day (so only 80% of my already deloaded weight) so i was doing 76.5kg. Warm ups were ok, but during my last warmup set (70kg) felt a bit of pain. After the first set the pain cropped up even more. 2nd set felt bad. And both of these sets felt really hard despite being so light, because i couldn't exert force through my left glute without having a stab of pain. In the end i dropped it back to 60kg for my last set which felt better, so i think i have indeed fucked up my left lower back and glute. I guess i'll need to apply Starr's rehab

And it's even affecting my other lifts. Power cleans were fairly painful when acelerating from the squat position and press felt a bit strained. Only the bench seems to be unaffected and chins/pullups don't feel strained either. Not sure about the deadlift, because the pain while working out seemed worse than on monday. So i was wondering would i need to alter my program slightly to switch in some of the exercises that hurt less as opposed to things like the clean until this thing heals up. Of course i'll still try squatting albeit very lightly (like i say you'll fix it how you injured it) but do i need to vary other things?

Edit: haha forget to add that i had a painful yet hilarious episode with hot gel. After my workout decided to apply some to the problem area. My skin was sensitive the stuff and it felt like my ass was on fire. Had to run to my shower and wash it off lol

[Paul Sousa]

I would get it checked. Could also be you inflamed your sciatic nerve. Have you been taking ibuprofen and icing? If it is an inflamed nerve DO NOT put heat on it.

[confuzzl3don3]

Only did some on and off icing. I don't get injured much, and when i do i usually just leave it alone (i never see a doctor or physio for most of my aillments) and it goes away and i train on :P I don't know if it's a nerve, but it feels more like a muscle injury. It o nly hurts basically when i lean to the right reaching for my toes, and when going down into the bottom of the squat (1/4 squats are fine

and i know that whenever u go to a doctor here, they'll basically tell u to lay off whatever hurts it until it completely doesn't hurt anymore. So that'll be no squats or anything at all

[Greg C]

I would get it checked. Could also be you inflamed your sciatic nerve. Have you been taking ibuprofen and icing? If it is an inflamed nerve DO NOT put heat on it.

This sounds so much like when my sciatic flames up that I think Paul here has made a good call. Try this, and work lighter with increased stretching daily until the light stuff doesn't hurt anymore - this is the only way I've ever worked through sciatic issues successfully. The doc recommendation, though a nuisance, is probably a good idea too.

[Weakling]

This might be a ridiculously obvious question for anyone here, but I'll ask it anyways because I have no idea how to search for related posts.

Even given perfect form, is it still possible to injury something? Can injuries occur just from pushing oneself too hard which is why it's suggested to reset. Or is it that the increased difficulty leads to an obvious increase likelihood of form breakdown which results in injury.

I'm assuming it's the latter, but I just want to make sure because confuzz seems to be able to maintain good form even when it's a fecking hard set in his videos.

Sorry if this derails the thread a bit.

[Paul Sousa]

This might be a ridiculously obvious question for anyone here, but I'll ask it anyways because I have no idea how to search for related posts.

Even given perfect form, is it still possible to injury something? Can injuries occur just from pushing oneself too hard which is why it's suggested to reset. Or is it that the increased difficulty leads to an obvious increase likelihood of form breakdown which results in injury.

I'm assuming it's the latter, but I just want to make sure because confuzz seems to be able to maintain good form even when it's a fecking hard set in his videos.

Sorry if this derails the thread a bit.

This is purely anecdotal based on my experience, but I have found that even with good form (won't go as far as perfect) things can break down. It could be due to overtraining, or due to being completely unconditioned and then jumping into training. Could also be due to a lack of proper warmup/stretching. I know my IT band pain has diminished a ton since I've taken more time to properly warmup and stretch.

Also, there is a difference between an injury (i.e. - herniating a disc) and being hurt (i.e. - IT band pain, sciatic inflammation). I woudl say the former is unlikely given proper form, but the latter can happen even if form looks good.

Just my thoughts on it.

[nisora33]

I guess i'll need to apply Starr's rehab

If it's nerve pain/discogenic in nature, I'm not sure how well the Starr rehab protocol will work.

-S.

[IWillLiveFreeOrDie]

I have an inversion table at home that I use for a few minutes everyday. It does wonders for when I tweak my back. The traction will take the pressure off of any pinched nerves you may have.

You could try and do dead hangs from a pull up bar to get a similar effect. I find the pain usually clears up in a few days. I usually lighten my workouts for a couple of days when this happens.

[confuzzl3don3]

Thanks guys for all the help. I'm just taking it easy right now. Usually it doesn't seem to hurt but when i load some weight on the bar and squat it'll start flaring up again. I'l just see on friday if there's been an improvement on how much weight i can handle pain-free. I hope it ain't a sciatic nerve thing, because don't nerves take longer than muscle injuries to heal

I'll try that pullup deadhang thing to see if it can straighten things out.

[Paul Sousa]

I had some sciatic inflammation about a year or so ago and it only took a few days of rest, ice and ibuprofen to go away. Ice the crap out of it and down some Advil between now and Friday and see how it feels.