The first possibility that comes to mind when you think of injuring your back is likely lifting something heavy, doing a quick movement that wrenches your back, or maybe a traumatic injury like hurting your back in a car accident. With these possibilities, your back can be fully healthy, or previous back pain is fully resolved, but the stress and strain on the back is so great that it still causes a new injury or recurrence of the old injury.

The final category is also very common to see in the clinic. While big and small causes of low back pain may have been the final culprit that led to a full-on flare-up, often there is an underlying unresolved previous low back injury that has led to it. 

Maybe you’ve had small low back pain episodes that have mostly resolved without treatment. Maybe you’ve had more significant back pain that improved with the help of your physiotherapist or other healthcare provider. Whatever the case, often these previous episodes of back pain get better to the point where we can manage our daily tasks, but they never fully resolve. It could present as stiffness, chronic tension in the muscles, difficulty with certain movements, or weakness and fatigue with activity. If left unresolved, your low back can go from feeling ‘okay’ to flared up without much for added stress or load. 

Now that we’ve talked about the types of things that can bring on back pain, it’s important to also mention that there’s lots you can do to help relieve it once it starts. Here are some examples of exercises and stretches that you can try at home when you’re dealing with an episode of lower back pain.