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Why Your Back Keeps Hurting When You Sit All Day
By Coach Ace, founder of Dynamic Fitness & Company
It's the end of the day and your back is talking
You've been at your desk, in the car, on the couch after dinner. You stand up and your lower back lets you know about it.
Most back pain I see in clients didn't start with an injury. In my decades as a personal trainer, it usually comes down to how you move every day. The good news is that this kind of pain often gets better with the right stretching, core work and a few food changes.
Check with your doctor first if your pain is sharp, getting worse, runs down your leg, or started after a fall or injury.
Reason 1: Tight hips
When you sit, your hips stay bent for hours. Over time the muscles around them get tight, and when your hips stop moving well, your lower back starts moving for them.
That's a lot of extra work for your back, all day long.
Reason 2: Busy hip flexors, quiet core
Your hip flexors are the muscles at the front of your hips. Your core is meant to help hold you steady. When your core sits out, your hip flexors and lower back take over the job, and they get tired and sore.
That's why I have clients skip sit-ups and crunches for now and start with a gentler core move.
Reason 3: Inflammation
What you eat can affect how stiff and sore you feel. You don't need to overhaul your whole diet. One change at a time is plenty:
Cut back on processed sugar and alcohol
Choose fewer heavily processed foods
Suspect a food? Leave it out for 2 weeks and notice how you feel
Ask your doctor before cutting out whole food groups.
Start here: the one-minute hip stretch
This is the stretch I give clients who sit all day. You can do it at your desk.
Sit tall near the front of a chair.
Cross one ankle over the opposite knee.
Keep your back long and lean forward until you feel it in your hip.
Hold 30 seconds, then switch sides.
Try it every 30 minutes you sit. Move slowly and stop if anything hurts, and skip any move your doctor or physical therapist has told you to avoid.
Your next step
I put all three fixes into a free guide, Move Without Back Pain. It has the hip stretch, the core move I use instead of sit-ups, the food changes, and a one-page plan to track how your back feels over two weeks.
