SAcroilliac injury advice

[tomskarda]

Rip,

I injured my SI joint by tearing some of the supporting soft tissue a few weeks back. My chiro confirmed this and has been treating it with adjustment, a tens unit and ultrasound. The injury is responding and the chiro says it will be 12 to 14 weeks to fully heal.

My question is how sould I train in this period? I can see switching to a seated press from standing to take the pressure of the lower back. Pullups aren't an issue.

Is this something I should try to train through using lighter weight and higher rep squats and deadlifts? My chiro seems to think this will just irritate the tissue and risk reinjury. Although he did recommend squatting and RDLs after it has healed to strengthen the area to prevent re-injury. So he is not one of those guys who is apposed to barbell training.

Not meaning to be a pussy, but I've never dealt with one of these injuries before and the boards didn't offer much advice.

[veryhrm]

I'm not a doctor or even a coach, but if you're talking about when you tweaked your back on deadlifts a couple of weeks ago, just read up on the various back injury threads in the Recovery forum or in the Q&A...

This one is particularly relevant, but read around.
http://startingstrength.com/resource...ad.php?t=10986

You don't likely need the chiro or the ultrasound or tens or acupuncture or other TCM... Just go into the gym and start w/ light weight RDLs and squats w/ full ROM at highish reps and go from there. Do Starr rehab (http://startingstrength.com/resource...3352#post43352) ... even though it is specified primarily for muscles the basic idea of getting the injured thing moving under low load seems to work well for backs (as that 1st thread mentioned). If the thing is healthy enough for your chiro to be doing adjustments to it's good enough for that.

Personally, i've also found taking regular walks to be an excellent at making my back feel better when it's pissed off.

Oh, also by the time you get your squat back to two plates, just go w/ 5lbs a workout.

(note: not a doctor, this isn't advice and caveat emptor)

Edit: and both the walking and the high rep stuff in the gym would pretty much do what TENS is doing in this case but using your own built-in systems...