♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the Internet ♪
- Hi, folks. I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- And we are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet.
- In our opinion, of course, Bob.
- Today the name of the video is
How a Locked in Spine Can Help Your Back Pain or Sciatica.
- Yes.
- This video is a part of a series of videos
on sciatica and back pain.
If you wanna see the entire series, go to our website,
bobandbrad.com. - Right.
- And go to the program section.
- As well as all of these have a PDF printout
you can print out on your computer or your printer
and take this with you for memories.
- Like a handout.
- Yup. A handout.
- They can, you can carry along with you.
So today we're gonna talk about a locked in spine.
So, a locked in spine.
The spine was developed to be the strongest, actually,
believe it or not, in what we call an S curve.
So you have a curve, a slight curve in, a slight curve out,
and a slight curve in.
- Right. So, behind the neck, around the shoulder blades
and the lower back.
- Yes, this should be an S to you, Mike, right?
(laughs)
- He's gotta think about (laughs).
- Yeah, anyway. So one way or the other, it's an S.
- Right.
- And the bones are actually designed
to kind of lock in place and be the strongest that way.
- Right. There's little joints between each vertebra,
the facet joints, and they lock in at that point.
And, you know, if you're lifting heavy weights,
this is proper body mechanic,
get them all locked in so they're in support.
- And we'll show you in just a minute
how to kinda give yourself a Q on that.
But what we don't wanna see,
is your back in this rounded out,
what we call this C position. - Right.
- Got the two letters of the alphabet here.
In this position, now you got stress on the discs.
- Mhmm.
- Without a doubt, if you have,
especially if you have herniated disc or a bulging disc.
- Right. - This could make this worse.
There's stress on the ligaments.
Ligaments attach bone to bone.
If you're in this position for a long time,
you can actually stretch out the ligaments.
- Sure.
- The back becomes less stable.
- Right.
- The muscles can't work as well in this position either.
They can't exert forces like they would like to.
- Right.
- We --
- So this position is essentially
the slouched forward posture position.
- Right. Yup.
- He's exaggerated a little bit there. But --
- Right.
- You gotta --
- Just make a letter C.
- Yeah. That way you can remember it.
- But I also wanna, we should show a demonstration
how it feels to stretch a ligament, Brad.
- Oh yeah.
- And remember that we used to just take this,
take a finger and pull back like that.
- Yup.
- And you're like, "Well that doesn't feel too bad."
Well hold it for quite a while, and it starts
to feel pain in there.
If you kept doing it for a long time
and putting stress on,
you can actually tear that ligament or get micro tears.
- Sure. You're gonna have a sore finger.
Yeah. We, actually, I learned it from McKenzie course,
I don't know. - Oh, did you?
- It's actually in the book too.
- Oh, it is? - Yeah.
So yeah.
- We can't take credit for it, Bob.
- That's stretching a ligament.
Again, ligaments hold bone to bone.
- Mhmm.
- So you're in this position for a long time,
it's like you're doing this to each level of the vertebrae.
Each bone. - Right.
- So, we want to get that back in that straight position.
Oh, I guess we're gonna give one more demonstration, Brad?
- Right. This actually, you know, if your back
is locked in on that good posture position,
it's kinda like.
- Yeah, look how strong it is.
- Right.
- I can really push on that.
- Now, the only thing different about this,
it doesn't have the S curve, so--
- Right.
- Forget that. But when everything is locked in
where it's supposed to be strong, and if it does go off...
(blocks clattering)
- Yeah. If you start bending off, it's not as stable.
- Yup.
- The bones can't lock in like they should.
And they can become less stable.
- Right.
- And that can cause you problems.
So with all the subsequent videos that we're gonna show you,
we're gonna wanna make sure
that you do try to keep your back
in the locked in position.
Now I wanna show it to you standing.
Brad, you mind handing me a Booyah Stik?
So, real easy to do in a standing position.
If you just take a stick, the Booyah Stik,
and you put it, and there should be three points of contact.
Contact on the head, mid-back, and low on the pelvis.
Okay? So if you can imagine that,
like I tell people, imagine that your back is in a cast.
When you're moving.
- Yeah. Switch hands for this, Bob.
Then they can-- - Sure.
- They can see the bottom too. There. There.
That's probably a little more clear.
- There we go.
So, when you can picture a stick like this being in place
if you're bending.
Now look, it's like your back is in a cast.
All the movement is coming from the hips.
- Right.
- That's why we talk about hip hinging.
That's why it's so important that you develop
that range of motion in your hips
so that you can move like this.
Now, we actually do even squats like this,
what we call posture squats,
which we'll show you later.
Because it trains your body, then,
like whenever I wanna pick something up now,
the first thing I think is,
put my body, you know, my back into a cast,
keep it straight. - Right.
- And bend from the hips.
- Right.
- And then you can bend like this.
Or you can even go like this.
- Sure. - (murmurs)
- Keep that back locked in,
just like the beginning of the video.
- So it doesn't matter if you're getting off a chair,
it doesn't matter what you're doing.
You wanna go ahead and keep that back
in a locked in position.
Thanks for watching.
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