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15 habits that may not be good for your back.. · Revealing Wholeness with Dr.Troy

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Revealing Wholeness, podcast dedicated to revealing the profound
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  Speaker 1: connections between body, mind, and spirit, where we believe that
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: true wellness arises from addressing the root causes of our
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  Speaker 1: health challenges, not just masking the symptoms. Here we dive
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  Speaker 1: deep into how holistic approaches such as advanced chiropractic care,
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  Speaker 1: personalized nutrition, and natural healing practices can transform your life.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Now here is Dr. Troll.
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  Speaker 2: Hello and welcome. I'm Dr. Troy. You know, I get
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  Speaker 2: lots of content. This one's kind of fun because as
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  Speaker 2: a chiropractor, you know, what do people come into chiropractors with?
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  Speaker 2: Mostly back pain, neck pain, headaches, sometimes sinuses, sometimes allergies
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  Speaker 2: you'll see, but by and large back pain. And so
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  Speaker 2: this is an article on habits that could be causing
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  Speaker 2: you low back pain. I thought, all right, let's go
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  Speaker 2: through this. This will be kind of fun. Let's expand why,
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  Speaker 2: because they usually don't tell you why these things do
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  Speaker 2: what they do, but I'm going to give some insight
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  Speaker 2: here and maybe we can learn something. So sitting hunched.
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  Speaker 2: Oh goodness. This is the first of 15 things. If
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  Speaker 2: you sit hunched, man, I'm sorry. You're going to get
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  Speaker 2: back pain. Now, this is the interesting thing about being
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  Speaker 2: a chiropractor. I'll adjust people. And like I Even from
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  Speaker 2: high school, I'd go back and see high school friends
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  Speaker 2: and they're like, hey, you're a chiropractor, can you adjust me?
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  Speaker 2: And I'd adjust them and they're like, they would call
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  Speaker 2: me the next day like, do you realize it actually
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  Speaker 2: feels good to sit up straight now? I said, isn't
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  Speaker 2: that cool that when your spine is in alignment correctly,
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  Speaker 2: that the muscles are stronger and actually just feels good
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  Speaker 2: to sit up straight? I hear that a lot. But
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  Speaker 2: many of us, we sit hunched because our muscles are
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  Speaker 2: fatigued because ultimately we're probably out of alignment, but also
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  Speaker 2: because of a very important factor that is the next one.
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  Speaker 2: And that is if you eat too many sweets. Well,
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  Speaker 2: as we do a lot of carbohydrates in our diet,
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  Speaker 2: we tend to push out calcium. And because most of
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  Speaker 2: us were not raised on raw milk anymore, we now
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  Speaker 2: don't have a really good source of calcium. And so
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  Speaker 2: if you're like, wait a minute, maybe I don't have
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  Speaker 2: a good source of calcium, then I would consider doing
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  Speaker 2: things like good yogurt that is less refined. I don't
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  Speaker 2: know if there's a company that produces raw yogurt. Not
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  Speaker 2: that it's raw because it's now fermented, but most yogurt
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  Speaker 2: companies pasteurize their milk and then they ferment it. Now
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  Speaker 2: to make yogurt, you still have to boil it, but
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  Speaker 2: to bring milk up to a boil is not as
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  Speaker 2: harsh as instantaneously getting it to 180, 212, 280 degrees
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  Speaker 2: like ultra pasteurization. and really wrecking things in a very
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  Speaker 2: fast way. It is different when we bring something to
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  Speaker 2: a boil. It just is. And so with that kind
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  Speaker 2: of understanding, you may say, hey, let me try to
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  Speaker 2: go for some of these natural dairy products like raw cheese.
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  Speaker 2: You can actually find raw cheese. The yogurt that we
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  Speaker 2: make in our house from raw milk is literally to
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  Speaker 2: die for. It tastes so yummy. And so it's where
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  Speaker 2: you might get calcium, and all of a sudden you'd
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  Speaker 2: find that you don't want to sit hunched, but that
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  Speaker 2: you also don't want to necessarily eat a lot of
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  Speaker 2: treats anymore. And so eating a lot of sugar is
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  Speaker 2: going to deplete calcium. It's going to actually take a
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  Speaker 2: toll on your bones and your muscles. So just FYI
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  Speaker 2: on the treats. Next, number three, if you sleep on
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  Speaker 2: the wrong mattress. I thought, really? For thousands of years,
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  Speaker 2: nobody had a mattress. We had a I don't know,
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  Speaker 2: a hemp kind of burlap sack that we would shove
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  Speaker 2: with hay in it, and that would be our mattress.
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  Speaker 2: Or we would sleep on the ground because we didn't
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  Speaker 2: have any other way. Or we'd do something, you know,
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  Speaker 2: animal skins to fluff something up and sleep on it.
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  Speaker 2: But ultimately, I mean, come on. Does that mean everybody
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  Speaker 2: older than like three or four hundred years just had
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  Speaker 2: chronic low back pain because they didn't sleep on a
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  Speaker 2: good mattress? I am going to kind of call a
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  Speaker 2: little bit of myth on this one, but ultimately, if
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  Speaker 2: my back isn't good and in alignment and I don't
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  Speaker 2: have enough calcium, it's really not going to matter what
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  Speaker 2: mattress I sleep on. I'm probably going to wake up
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  Speaker 2: sore and stiff. If I've been in injuries, it doesn't
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  Speaker 2: matter pretty much what mattress I sleep on. I'm probably
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  Speaker 2: going to wake up sore for a while until I heal.
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  Speaker 2: So again, mattress-wise, I do have clients I recommend. I
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  Speaker 2: say Replace your mattress often and buy cheap. And while
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  Speaker 2: if you're a mattress seller out there and you're like,
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  Speaker 2: oh my gosh, I hope nobody listens to this. You know,
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  Speaker 2: I've had an expensive mattress and I had clients who have,
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  Speaker 2: and you know, some like them, some don't. It doesn't
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  Speaker 2: take long and they break down too. And so I
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  Speaker 2: tell folks, look, just go from mattress to mattress. If
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  Speaker 2: you find one that you really like and it wasn't
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  Speaker 2: that much, great, go for it. Buy a really firm one.
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  Speaker 2: Buy a really soft one. Try it. Buy a really
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  Speaker 2: firm one and put a topper on it. You can
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  Speaker 2: kind of do just about anything you want until you
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  Speaker 2: find what it is. But I think when you realize that, hey,
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  Speaker 2: if I just replace this mattress often, I'm probably going
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  Speaker 2: to be better off. And so the next one is
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  Speaker 2: sleep on your back. Like, really? Sleep on your back.
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  Speaker 2: That's what you're going to tell people to do. If
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  Speaker 2: you don't sleep on your back, you're going to have
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  Speaker 2: back pain. How many people don't sleep on their back?
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  Speaker 2: A lot. You ever watch a baby sleep? Oh my gosh,
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  Speaker 2: they're like everywhere. They should have really sore backs. They
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  Speaker 2: should walk like they're 80 years old. Well, some of
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  Speaker 2: them kind of do. It's kind of fun. But ultimately,
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  Speaker 2: it isn't about sleeping on your back. And they recommend, hey,
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  Speaker 2: roll up a towel or put a pillow under your
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  Speaker 2: knees if you're a back sleeper to protect the natural
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  Speaker 2: curve of your back, which isn't all that true. If
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  Speaker 2: we sleep with our legs straight on our back, what
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  Speaker 2: the quads do, the quads are the muscles in the
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  Speaker 2: front of our legs, they pull on the front of
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  Speaker 2: our low back. And so when we're laying there straight
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  Speaker 2: as a board with our quads pulling tightly on our
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  Speaker 2: low back, it actually pulls more of a curve into
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  Speaker 2: our low back. It's like we're standing all day, or
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  Speaker 2: rather all night, sorry. And so with that, a slight
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  Speaker 2: bend of the knees, they're right. That rolled up towel
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  Speaker 2: and pillow is excellent if you're a back sleeper, just
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  Speaker 2: a slight bend, and now all of a sudden you
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  Speaker 2: relax the quads and the hamstrings and the psoas muscles
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  Speaker 2: and your low back, and you'll find that it's actually
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  Speaker 2: going to be more comfortable to do that. But it
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  Speaker 2: isn't necessarily going to make or break your low back,
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  Speaker 2: though if your low back is not good, you're going
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  Speaker 2: to find that be a more comfortable pathway if you're
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  Speaker 2: a back sleeper. And what's funny is they also talk about, hey,
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  Speaker 2: you should maybe not sleep on your belly. And yes,
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  Speaker 2: we just talked about if you sleep on your stomach,
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  Speaker 2: not only are your quads pulling on your low back
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  Speaker 2: because your legs are straight, but now in order to breathe,
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  Speaker 2: you have to turn your head, which torques your spine
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  Speaker 2: all night long. And so now it's another insult on
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  Speaker 2: the system. So if you're a stomach sleep and you're like, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: but I can't sleep any other way. Excellent. I'm going
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  Speaker 2: to guess that you likely sleep with a knee to
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  Speaker 2: the side. And if you do, it's not a far
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  Speaker 2: stretch to say, hey, can we maybe put you a
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  Speaker 2: little bit on your side and put a small body
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  Speaker 2: pillow underneath of you so that your head is a
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  Speaker 2: little straighter? Okay, maybe. Great. We're going to start with that.
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  Speaker 2: Because ultimately, a side posture sleeping is probably best. And
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  Speaker 2: that is what they go with next. How should you sleep?
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  Speaker 2: And they recommend side posture. And I happen to agree
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  Speaker 2: with that. But it's not the end all be all.
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  Speaker 2: Just like back sleepers, if they put something small underneath
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  Speaker 2: their knees, they're going to find, hey, I really enjoy
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  Speaker 2: this particular sleeping style. I have tried putting something under
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  Speaker 2: my knees. It tends to put a lot of pressure
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  Speaker 2: on my tailbone. I just don't particularly like it. I
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  Speaker 2: feel like my butt goes numb midway through the night
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  Speaker 2: and it wakes me up. But side sleeping, I don't
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  Speaker 2: seem to have an issue with that. But I do
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  Speaker 2: use a body pillow. It's a five foot long body pillow.
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  Speaker 2: Literally is tucked underneath my chin. and I just lay
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  Speaker 2: a knee over it. Sometimes I'll put the other knee
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  Speaker 2: underneath of it and sleep almost like you're sitting or
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  Speaker 2: like on a kneeling chair. But ultimately, it usually is
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  Speaker 2: one leg up, and my arm is over it, and
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  Speaker 2: my other arm is underneath my pillow, and my head
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  Speaker 2: is pretty neutral. And so from that standpoint, that is
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  Speaker 2: the most comfortable way. And for most folks, they're going
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  Speaker 2: to find right side be a little bit happier than
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  Speaker 2: the left side. Now there's some folks out there that
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  Speaker 2: should be left side sleeping, and that would be pregnant
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  Speaker 2: women in their last semester or trimester of pregnancy. So
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  Speaker 2: that the last three months, we want that baby's body
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  Speaker 2: left side down. So you want to sleep on your
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  Speaker 2: left side. That's one of the few times that we'd say, hey,
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  Speaker 2: if you can, you do want to be left side down.
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  Speaker 2: But for most of us, we want to be right
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  Speaker 2: side down because that puts the heart up and the
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  Speaker 2: liver down underneath of it. When you're sleeping on your
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  Speaker 2: left side, the liver's kind of resting on the heart
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  Speaker 2: all night long. And so it tends to actually bother me.
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  Speaker 2: I can feel my heart beating and I don't like it.
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  Speaker 2: And so I tend to be a left side sleeper.
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  Speaker 2: Some people have no issue with that and they can
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  Speaker 2: left side sleep just fine. And that's okay too. It's
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  Speaker 2: not like we're going to say, oh my gosh, you're
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  Speaker 2: going to die if you left side sleep. That's not
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  Speaker 2: what I'm saying. For most people, they'll find right side
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  Speaker 2: sleeping quite helpful. And most people, at least in my office,
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  Speaker 2: they tend to have a left curvature in their low back,
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  Speaker 2: like a, like a scoliosis, but not that bad. And
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  Speaker 2: they'll find that right side sleeping untwists their low back
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  Speaker 2: most of the night. And so it's super helpful. Next,
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  Speaker 2: number seven, sit too long. Man, if you sit, you're
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  Speaker 2: going to get back pain. I just like, Okay, so
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  Speaker 2: they re-talk about slouching a little bit like they did
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  Speaker 2: in the very first one, but that sitting too long
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  Speaker 2: stresses your back, your neck, and your spine. I'm thinking, what?
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  Speaker 2: All right, so people only just started sitting in the
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  Speaker 2: last 50, 60 years. They never sat before that. Of
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: course they sat. But again, for the reasons that we
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  Speaker 2: already talked about, if you find within a very short
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  Speaker 2: period of time of sitting, that your low back starts
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  Speaker 2: to ache, burn, something of that nature, it is almost
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  Speaker 2: always calcium. I have tested it with many a people.
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  Speaker 2: I'll be sitting at home, and if I've taken my calcium,
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  Speaker 2: I never think about my low back. But if I'm
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  Speaker 2: sitting at home, within five, ten minutes, my low back
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  Speaker 2: starts to get achy and sore and almost burn, I'm like, huh,
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  Speaker 2: oh yeah, I took calcium this morning, and it's late
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  Speaker 2: at night. I'll go take a couple calcium, and within
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  Speaker 2: usually five, 15 minutes, I have no pain and I
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  Speaker 2: don't think about my back again. And so sitting too long,
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  Speaker 2: I'm going to call a little bunk on that one.
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  Speaker 2: But certainly some people out there, if they sit too long,
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  Speaker 2: they're going to get back pain, but it's probably because
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  Speaker 2: of a different reason. So getting yourself to a chiropractor,
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  Speaker 2: getting adjusted and getting some decent calcium, not the garbage
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  Speaker 2: that's mostly out there. Again, if you wonder what kind
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: of calcium is garbage, go pick up the cheapest brand
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: at any drugstore and read what kind of calcium is
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  Speaker 2: in it. It should say calcium carbonate, and then you'll
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  Speaker 2: know what not to buy. Skip exercise. So if you're
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  Speaker 2: not exercising enough, you're gonna get back pain. I don't
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  Speaker 2: know about that too, but again, is keeping your muscles
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  Speaker 2: strong probably helpful? Well, yes. Is keeping your back in
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  Speaker 2: alignment with a chiropractor good? Well, yes. Is having enough
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  Speaker 2: calcium so your muscles can pull correctly good? Yes. I
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  Speaker 2: remember that when I'd play volleyball in Iowa, and nobody
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  Speaker 2: told me about calcium, within like about 20 minutes of
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  Speaker 2: starting to play, I would be absolutely, utterly exhausted. Like
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  Speaker 2: I couldn't even hardly move. It literally took the strength
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  Speaker 2: of everything I had in my willpower to force my
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: body to move. And none of my friends were like that.
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  Speaker 2: But now I realize that was one massive calcium deficiency
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  Speaker 2: I had going on. And I keep thinking, I would
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  Speaker 2: have loved to go back and shown my younger self,
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  Speaker 2: my 21, 22, 23 year old self, hey, here's some calcium.
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  Speaker 2: Tell me how you do. What'd you give me, man?
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  Speaker 2: That was amazing. And I'd say, you need calcium. And
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: I'd look at him like, you look a lot like me. Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I know. It's just a coincidence. Take some calcium, my friend.
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  Speaker 2: You'll enjoy it when you're older. I would have loved
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  Speaker 2: to go back and do that. That'd have been awesome.
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  Speaker 2: And so you definitely should stay strong. But again, there's
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  Speaker 2: more than just staying strong. Next, smoking. Oh, how amazing.
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  Speaker 2: If you smoke, you're going to have back pain. But
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  Speaker 2: it does. I didn't know this statistic. It says, hey,
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  Speaker 2: if you smoke, you're three times more likely to have
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  Speaker 2: low back pain. I was thinking, wow, that's pretty amazing.
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  Speaker 2: And of course, what does smoking do? It robs you
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  Speaker 2: of lots of nutrients to detoxify that smoke. And while
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: you're doing that, you're inevitably going to deplete yourself of
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  Speaker 2: lots of things that help with inflammation, that help you
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  Speaker 2: with pain. The smoke's going to add noxious chemicals. Noxious
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: means pain-causing chemicals to your bloodstream. They're going to rest
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  Speaker 2: in joints and all kinds of places, and you're just
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  Speaker 2: going to be in more pain. So it kind of
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  Speaker 2: makes sense. So hey, if you don't want back pain,
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  Speaker 2: you should stop smoking. But I don't smoke! Yeah, well,
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  Speaker 2: you should stop anyways. overeating the extra pounds could strain
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  Speaker 2: the bones and muscles now while this is true it
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: is interesting because I've had patients lose 40 to 60
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  Speaker 2: pounds and I am impressed at how well and easy
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  Speaker 2: they adjust and how much better their body does stay
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  Speaker 2: in alignment it's awesome so I must admit overeating is
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: probably not the best thing you can do for yourself
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: as well next overloading your bag. In fact, your backpack
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: is what they're talking about. And you should use nice
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: wide straps, they recommend, and don't just over one shoulder.
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  Speaker 2: That's going to cause you problems. So for children, the
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: going rate is 20% of their body weight. Their bag
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: should not be more than that. And I wish they
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  Speaker 2: would have told me something like that when I was
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: hiking for six days in back country. My gosh, my
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: pack was ridiculously heavy. I think it was half my
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: body weight. And so backpacks, beware. Next, riding the wrong bike.
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  Speaker 2: I'm like, nah, you didn't just say riding the wrong bike.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: How many people out there bike? Now, I guess a
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: few more people are biking, but what's more funny is
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: I ride my bicycle down this trail. You know, it's 2025.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: Let's just be honest. What What passes me a lot?
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: You probably guessed it. Electric bikes. I'm just thinking, are
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: they just sightseeing? Is that what they're doing? Because they're
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: really not getting a whole lot of exercise. And maybe
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: they are. Maybe they're like, hey, I'm going to pump
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: these pedals and this heavy bike for at least a
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: good five, ten minutes, and then I'm going to e-bike
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  Speaker 2: it the rest of the way. I mean, okay, that's awesome.
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  Speaker 2: But what I thought was hilarious is that They said,
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: if your bike is not adjusted to you or not
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: right for you, it could cause back pain. So do
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: you know who they recommend that you should kind of
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: help fit you for a bike? A physical therapist. I thought, uh-uh.
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  Speaker 2: I guess I would have never guessed that. I would
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: have said, a really good bike shop that knows what
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: in the world they're doing, that's who I'm going to trust.
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: somebody who's a professional that knows how to fit a bike,
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: you go to a physical therapist, they'll be like, what
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: are you talking about? Fit you for a bicycle? I
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: don't know what to do with a bicycle. But now
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: I'm really interested. I'm like, I'm probably going to get
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: some mail from physical therapists now saying, of course we
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: know how to fit people for bikes. I'm like, who knew?
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: I'll be like, this is great. So if you're a
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: physical therapist out there, please shoot me a line and
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: let me know how much you or how many times
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: you fit bikes for people. Next, ladies, this one's for you.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: wearing high heels. Yep, you're gonna back pain. Now, what's
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: fascinating is I read something like this and I say,
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: but wait a minute. Little children, when they first start walking,
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: how do they walk? They walk on their toes. Why?
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: Because they're forming the arches in their feet. And ultimately,
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: as humans, when you take shoes off of people and
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: they've never, ever once used their feet on hard surfaces,
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  Speaker 2: they immediately get off of their heels and they are
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: on their forefoot just like a child walking on their forefoot.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking, well, that's kind of like a heel. Now, ultimately,
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: as we walk, our heel does touch the ground, but
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: if we're barefoot, we tend to walk with a forefoot
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: strike because that's what makes the most sense. Our calves
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: are an energy return system. And so, If we're heel striking,
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: it actually isn't doing its job, but it's also very
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: jarring to our knees, our hips, and our back. And
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: so if you are a long distance runner, you have
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: probably already come across the concept of the minimalist shoe
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: or barefoot running and hiking to be excellent for you.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: And you'd be right. And so wearing high heels, even
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: though they do put you into that position, they're doing
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: it in kind of a weird way. And so we'd say, hey,
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: a lower heel would probably be best, but you may
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: find yourself being just fine as long as your calcium
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: intake is good and your diet is fairly complete nutrition-wise
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: and you're getting your back aligned by a chiropractor. So
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: just FYI there. So I'm not totally against heels. Should
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: you do yoga? Oh my goodness, maybe we should do yoga.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: Maybe if you do too much exercise, including yoga, it
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: could cause back pain. I'm not so sure about that either. Now,
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: just for reasons we've already mentioned, if your back needs
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: proper alignment and you need to get to a chiropractor,
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: you may find your flexibility waning. Let's say you're too flexible,
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: like you have flat feet and your joints don't feel
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: like they're being held together. That is another indication of
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: calcium need, but also manganese need. And so you may
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: find yourself that if you're doing a lot of stretching
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: type of exercises, yoga-ish things, you may find that if
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: you have more low back pain that you need to
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: do some things to actually help really function on a
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: better level internally. And so these are just some ideas
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: as we go. And you might be out there thinking,
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: why didn't you mention collagen? Well, yes, you could. I
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: don't like a lot of collagen products because I tend
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: to have estrogen. So there you go, cat's out of
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: the bag. So if you're doing collagen, you're wondering why
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: you have little red spots on your tongue, or if
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: you're a man, why you're gaining weight when you feel
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: like you're doing a really good job diet-wise, you may
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: want to check your collagen or bone broth. Anyways, my
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: two cents there. Now, last but certainly not least, you're
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: doing sit-ups incorrectly. I'm like, what? All right, I suppose.
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: And this is something that I do coach folks on.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: I tell them, I said, you know, most people's low
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: backs have way too much curve. Now, it sounds weird.
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: So as chiropractors go, by and large, if you take
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: a low back film on somebody standing, Normal curvature for
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: low back is 35 degrees. And how we take our
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: measurement is the back of L1 and the back of L5.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: Where they intersect, we measure that, and it's usually right
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: around 35 degrees, plus or minus, I would give it
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: 10 degrees. But when you have a 50, 55 degree
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: curve in your low back, they call it a sway back,
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: where you can lay down and you can put your
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: arms underneath your low back because there's so much room.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: you may have way too much curve. Now, every once
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: in a while, I find somebody who has almost no
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: curve in their low back. And then on occasion, I
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: can only think of a couple in over 30 years
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: of practice where they actually have a reverse curve in
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: the low back. It's very rare where the neck is
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: not uncommon to see a very straight neck or reverse neck,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: but a low back, not so much. Those that have
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: almost no curve in their low back, you can almost
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: guarantee they did not crawl. Their parents may have put
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: them directly into a Johnny jump up, and they just
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: sat right away for their entire years or months that
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: they should have been crawling, developing their low back, and
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: now they don't have one. Sometimes I'll have people say, hey,
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: I want you to go home and crawl. Get some
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: knee pads, some really good ones, and crawl. Get some gloves, crawl.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: Sometimes that's super helpful for chronic low back pain where
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: they have no low back curve. But for the vast
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: majority of us, doing things like a plank is going
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: to be hard on our low back, especially if you're
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: not watching yourself carefully enough. If you go even, I
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: tell folks, I want you to do a slightly incorrect plank.
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: I want you to kind of butt up in the
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: air just a little bit because I don't want you
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: even remotely straight or in extension. And we would call
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: it hyperextension at this point. So if you're doing leg
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: length or leg lifts, sometimes those can be super hard
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: on a low back. I do not recommend leg lifts either.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: I tend to recommend to folks, hey, get on the floor,
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: pull your knees to your chest, and gently pull your
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: shoulder blades up off the floor. That's plenty. Feel it
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: all the way through your entire stomach. Don't let your
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: knees come toward your head, but rather pull your upper
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: body toward your knees. Keep your knees very still in space.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: And you'll feel it very different in the lower abs
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: when you do that. Don't pull on your head. Just
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: have your hands lightly resting on the side of your
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: neck when you're doing this. Try to keep your chin
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: almost up. It's not easy because everybody wants to tuck
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: their chin to their chest when they do this. pull
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: their body up towards their knees. Don't do that. It's
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: hard on the neck. Don't pull with your hands on
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: your neck. Just get your abs involved and keep your
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: chin mildly elevated. It is the best way to go.
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: If you want to do a crossover like elbow to
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: opposite knee, fine. If you want to go even further
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: or do a side kind of crunch in the air,
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: go for it. I do all of them and they're
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: very effective. So, Sit-ups can make your core very strong,
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: but even as many sit-ups as I do and sports
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: that I play and as strong as my stomach is,
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: my obliques are, and my transverse abdominis is, the four
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: components of the ab, I, last week, was getting really
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: bad low back pain on Wednesday. And so this is
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: just kind of a... For everybody else, if you want,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: you can listen to the story. But for everybody else,
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: it's the end of those things. But this is kind
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: of a funny little story. I'm thinking, I don't ever
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: get low back pain. And then I'm thinking, of course, calcium.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: And I thought, ah, there's one reason why I would
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: be pulling calcium from my body right now. And my
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: muscles of my low back would be giving it up.
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: And that's an infection. And so Wednesday, I realized... I
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: must be fighting something. And Thursday I woke up and
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: had just the mildest of sore throat all day. I thought,
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: how fascinating. The incubation for a cold is three days.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: So I look back three days. That's typical. Can't go
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: as long as seven days, but I look back three
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: days and I'm looking back at anything that I might've eaten.
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: And I thought, oh, I just gave a talk at
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: a farm and they had chocolate milk and I'll bet
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: they used high fructose corn syrup Hershey's chocolate. And of
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: course they did. And since I don't eat that at all,
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: it opens up the gut because it's an allergen to
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: me because corn is kind of already an allergen to me.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: And it just, you know, allowed everything right into the
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: blood and I had a mild little cold. So that
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: was a week and a half ago. And so here
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: I am, I don't sound nasal. I'm not blowing my nose.
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: It's just a run-of-the-mill thing. And it's just comical that
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: we could have low back pain because, especially out of
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: the blue like that, when you don't know what you did,
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: I'm going to bet you're fighting something. And so just
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: kind of another little tidbit on low back stuff, but
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: you ought to get yourself an adjustment if you have
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: a cold because that cranks up your immune system, turns
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: everything on, and now you get over it much, much faster.
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: Until next time, I'm Dr. Troy, and remember, there is
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: way more right with you than there is wrong with you.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: The information on Dr. Troy Munson's podcast is meant to
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: educate the listener and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: or prevent disease.