A key factor to living with a spine or back pain condition is staying healthy. Overall wellness is a combination of a balanced diet, appropriate exercise and physical activity, restful sleep and positive lifestyle choices.
Exercise and Exercise Therapy
Exercise is one of the most significant ways we can increase our longevity, improve our health, and decrease our pain and suffering. Proper exercise can improve flexibility, increase strength, and even reduce back pain. Knowing the best exercises to improve your health or decrease your pain is essential to a workout plan or a pain management program.
Massage Therapy
Most people enjoy a massage, but few think about its benefits. According to the American Massage Therapy Association, research shows that massage therapy provides several important health benefits, including improving blood circulation, relaxing muscles for an improved range of motion, and increasing endorphin levels (which helps improve mood and decrease the effect of chronic pain). Knowing about your options when it comes to massage therapy will help you make better choices in dealing with your back pain.
Nutrition, Diet, and Weight Loss
Is there something more fundamental to our existence than diet and nutrition? Most of us eat at least three times a day, every day. This has a cumulative effect on our bodies – either diet and nutrition help fuel our body or they harm it and weigh it down. Bad nutrition, diet, and obesity can lead to conditions such as osteoarthritis, osteoporosis, and chronic pain. Knowing about vitamins, proper nutritional balance, and effective methods to shed unwanted weight can help give a person his or her life a new start.
Sleep, Mattress and Insomnia
Think about this: you have probably spent over 25% of your life sleeping. With that much of your life spent under the sheets and on top of the bed, it makes sense that proper sleep and a good mattress can go a long way towards mitigating back pain and improving your health. Knowledge about better sleep techniques, proper mattress guidelines, or the role of insomnia in regards to chronic pain can help make your nights (and your days) far more enjoyable.
Yoga, Pilates, and Tai Chi
Although Yoga, Pilates, and Tai Chi are different types of exercises, they all have something in common – they can help alleviate pain and improve quality of life. Whether you are interested in Yoga’s ability to heal injured back muscles and preventing re-injury, Pilates benefits in improving strength, flexibility and suppleness of hip muscles, or Tai Chi’s effect on balance and stress, there is information, resources, and advice for you here.
Source: spine-health.com