Sciatic Exercise | How Warm Water Gets You Going Again
Sciatic Exercise sounded like an oxymoron to me at first. But in reality, while bed rest is good for you at the beginning of a sciatica flare up, it will probably worsen your condition if going on too long (more than a day or two). You need to get back to your normal rhythm of life as soon as you can (of course avoiding the strenuous things you did that got you into this mess in the first place). Once your worst pain has simmered down you should seriously consider different types of sciatic exercises, depending on what caused your sciatica pain. What helps for one condition may worsen another. That’s why you should always see a physician before starting exercises to find out when you can start exercising, which exercises to do and how often.
Having said that, I’d like to focus on a particular type of sciatic exercises, which will probably be one of the most beneficial types of treatments for your sciatica pain: warm water exercises. Even though at the beginning of a sciatica flare up it is better to treat with cold rather than heat, once the healing process is underway warm water is very beneficial in a number of ways.
Soaking in warm water will help relax you, it also increases blood flow and will help to soften up tightened muscles. Warm water will help to speed up your healing process. It’ll augment your range of movement, since warm water makes tight muscles more pliable. You might want to take a warm bath before doing your exercises (don’t overdo it, since at some point your body temperature will rise too high).
Now being relaxed and with loosened muscles, you could do some water exercises. These exercises are a lot easier to do than the normal kind, since being suspended in water takes most of the pressure from your weight off your spine, muscles, disks, ligaments and joints. This will also help reduce the pain that comes with some of the exercises, especially when you just started exercising and there is still some inflammation and stiffness present. It’ll also help with the fear of possible pain, which by itself can tense you up like a spring.
The water’s density will make your muscles work harder while simultaneously it’ll reduce the stress for your entire body. Just marching or walking in the water can be a good start to reduce muscle spasms and pain.
Water exercises altogether and warm water exercises in particular are a great starting point for exercises in general to treat your sciatica or other kinds of back pain. Warm water exercises are among the most beneficial types of exercises, since they will strengthen the muscles you need to keep your spine aligned and the pressure off the sciatic nerve and also reduce inflammation due to increased blood flow.
Apart from water exercises there are all kinds of other exercises you can gradually work towards, but before doing any kind of exercises (now that you have consulted your physician and know which exercises to do), always start out with a warm up routine of at least 5 minutes; like for example a short walk, even walking in place or the use of an exercise bike.
In the beginning you should probably only do gentle stretching exercises for your back and then bit by bit grow into back and abdominal exercises to build strength. It would probably also be a good idea to add in some low impact aerobic exercises, like swimming. When finding a good balance with all these exercises you use a wide selection of muscle groups and that in turn will help you to prevent future flare ups.
So, to put it into a couple of sentences: Sciatica and exercises go together like pie and whipped cream, if you want to see some true and lasting changes in your situation. Just be sure you have consulted your physician before starting your exercises or to self-treat your symptoms and underlying causes for your sciatica, to make sure you know which kinds of treatments you can, should and shouldn’t do.
Learn more about sciatic exercise. Stop by Christina Meier’s site where you can find out all about sciatic exercises and what they can do for you.