Every day that I go to my office, 50% of the clients I see suffer from back pain. I had a client in so much pain that he could not sit in a chair, lie on his stomach or on his back. I was on the floor on my knees with my head on the chair when I came out into the waiting room. In 1 week I helped reduce his pain by 50% and in 3 weeks he was back to work without pain. This man had tried everything for years. This was not a fluke as I see this every week in my office. It’s not a miracle either, just an understanding of why our back hurts. Somehow the medical establishment missed this in their training.

First of all, I am not a doctor nor do I pretend to be. I am a masseuse who has gone beyond just giving massages. I have been fascinated by the muscles of the human body and how they play a role in how we feel. Too much attention has been paid to strength training our muscles. In all the peer-reviewed journals, there are hundreds or thousands of studies on strengthening our muscles. There has been very little research on why we need to stretch and what is the best way. This is mainly the reason why we cannot solve back pain, once and for all, until now.

There are three areas of our body that can cause back pain. Finding out which one is not difficult. If your back hurts when you stand up after sitting or lying down for a while, or after standing for a period of time, or after bending down to pick something up, the cause is likely to be in the front from his body. More specifically, the front of the thighs if the pain is on either side of the lower back. If the pain is in the middle, the inner thighs are likely causing the pain. On the other hand, if your back hurts after sitting for a while, that usually means your hamstrings are tight.

As you can see, I didn’t say anything about my back. These three sets of muscles can tilt the pelvis forward or backward, putting tremendous pressure on the lower spine. This can lead to bulging discs, herniated discs, or pinched nerves later on if left untreated. Let’s not wait for that to happen.

If you work out in the gym and talk to a coach about these areas, they will show you stretches that really don’t work. The quad stretch where you stand and bring the heel to the hip is more suitable for the knee, at best. You may feel a pull on your quads, but that’s only because they’re tight and any tight knee flexion will cause it. Squatting will do the same. Once the quads are tight enough, the knee cannot bend as much. In the resource box below, I’ll add the link to some of my videos.

The second mistake in back stretches is trying to stretch your back by leaning forward. It feels good in the moment, but since you’re not stretching your front thighs, it won’t last long.

The inner thigh stretches where you sit on the floor, place the soles of your feet together, then pressing your knees down won’t work either. If you are already flexible this is great, if not you may injure yourself.

Touching your toes when standing up and leaning forward thinking it will stretch your hamstrings or your back is also a mistake. First, you have three hamstrings, so you only stretch one at best. Second, if the cause is on the front side, this will not help. I worked with a woman who was an avid yoga person. He had back pain and went to his doctor. When she showed him that she could lean forward and place her palms on the ground, he said, “Yes, you are flexible, that’s not the problem.” When I asked him about leaning back to stretch his front thighs, he said he never did it because it was too difficult. I showed her how to stretch them and in 2 weeks she was no longer in pain and still is after 5 years.

The biggest mistake people make about stretching, or teaching stretching, is not including the brain. Your brain will not allow you to do something if it thinks you will hurt yourself. If the brain doesn’t think it can do it, it won’t. Stretching is showing the brain that movement is possible. When people try to force a stretch or hold for more than 5 seconds when they feel pain, the brain will contract opposing muscles to stop the pain. this can cause cramps. It will take a different mindset to learn to stretch properly.

The key is to be able to unlearn everything we were taught about stretching and relearn a new way that is much more beneficial for your body. If you can do that, you will find that the older you are, the less pain you will endure. I have practically no pain every day at 60, however at 40, I was in so much pain that it led me to create this technique.