Day-to-day activities, prolonged sitting, or weight lifting may result in lower back stretches. Pressure on your spine or back pain threatens your overall health. Nowadays, digital media has brought everything to the desktop. Therefore, sitting for a long time inhibit blood flow and cause muscle stiffness and back pain. Not only you; numerous people wonder for ways to stretch their back to relieve pain.
Despite prolonged sitting or lifting heavyweight, some strenuous movements cause stiffness, soreness, and lower back pain.
How will you deal with this common health concern? For instance, stretching is not a remedy to cure lower back pain. However, it can provide relief from mild discomfort and stiffness that causes back pain.
Here are some expert-recommended exercises and lower back stretches that can help you ease back pain.
The benefit of Lower Back Stretches
You might be thinking about why regular stretching of tendons, muscles, and ligaments is essential. Or why all the doctors and physical therapists recommend stretching to relieve back pain.
Here are some benefits of lower back stretches:
- Minimize tension in the spine muscles
- Improve range of motion
- Impact overall mobility
- Reduce the risk of disability
Whether you have chronic back pain or acute, you can mitigate it with some simple stretching poses. Continue reading to learn more about lower back stretches.
Also, read – 10 Great Exercises for Diabetic Patients
Stretching Exercises for Your Back Pain
One of the best and most recommended lower back stretching exercises is knees to chest stretch. To perform this exercise, you only need a yoga mat.
- Lie on the yoga mat and pull your legs towards your chest
- Keep on pulling until you feel a stretch
- Hold your knees to your chest for 15 seconds
- Slightly return to the straight position
- Repeat this movement for nine to ten terms
For proper assistance, you can hire a personal trainer. Or, for extra padding, you can place a cushion below your head.
You can try another traditional yoga pose and gently stretch your thing muscles and spinal extensors. It will give you a relaxing effect and reduce back pain.
A child’s pose is beneficial to reduce tension along your spine, neck, and shoulders.
Here is how to perform this traditional yoga step
- Take a yoga mat and sit on the ground with your hands and knees on the ground
- Sink back through your hips
- Stretch your hands in front of you in a way your belly lies on your things
- Breath deeply and release air to relax the areas of tensions
- Keep holding this child’s pose for up to 1 minute
You can do this pose several times or whenever you want. Also, you can add this pose between the intervals of other poses.
Also, Read – Is Pre-workout Supplement Bad for You?
One of the best lower back stretches to strengthen the spine is prone press up. It is the best way to stretch your back without the risk of injury. Some other names for prone press up are cobra pose or seal pose.
To do the prone press:
- Lie with your stomach on the yoga mat
- Position yourself on your hands and elbows
- Extend your back with your inhalation
- Don’t lift your hip bone from the floor
- Keep extending your back until you feel a gently
- Hold this position for five seconds
- Slowly return to the straight position
- Repeat this cobra pose nine to ten times
Another effective lower back stretching exercise is spine twist stretch. Numerous experts recommend this to lower back pain.
To do the spine twist stretch:
- Lie on the yoga mat and bend your knees to touch the ground
- Keep your back straight on the floor and move your hips towards the right until you feel stretch
- Retain this position for 10-15 seconds
- Next, rotate your hips towards the left with your back on the ground
- Hold this position for approx.. 15 seconds
- Return to the starting position slightly
- Keep repeating this pose for nine to ten time
One of the effective lower back stretches is cat stretches. You might have heard about the cat-cow pose in yoga, which extends the spine. The cat stretches are the same as the cat-cow pose. It enhances mobility and encourages blood flow to the back. Moreover, it nourishes the spine and back muscles to reduce back pain.
Here is how to perform cat stretch:
- Get on the floor with your hands and knees
- Place your hands exactly below your shoulders
- While exhalation, look towards the ceiling with your face positioned upward
- Keep doing this until you feel a gentle stretch in your back
- Hold the cat stretch position for five seconds
- Move towards the straight position slowly
- You can repeat this pose nine to time times
Spine but the stretch is quite popular among all yogis. Lie on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor.
- Push down through your feet as you slowly lift your bottom off the floor.
- Hold for a count of 10.
- Return to starting position.
- Repeat nine more times.
One of the classical lower back stretches is a seated spinal twist. To increase the mobility and flexibility of your abdomen, you can perform this twist.
To do a seated spinal twist, follow these steps:
- Sit on the floor with both legs extended out in front.
- Bend your left knee and place your foot to the outside of your right thigh.
- Place your right arm on the outside of your left thigh.
- Place your left hand behind you for support.
- Starting at the base of your spine, twist to the left side.
- Hold this pose for up to 1 minute.
- Repeat on the other side.
Lower Back Stretches – Conclusion
From walking to running, you use your lower back for a lot of things. For flexibility and mobility of your lower back, you can perform all these lower back stretch poses. Repeatedly doing weight lifting and strenuous activities can result in lower back pain.
To avoid the risk of developing chronic back pain, perform these lower back stretches. As with any exercise program, be sure to check with your doctor before you begin. They will tell you which stretches are suitable for your circumstance and which ones to avoid.