Lower back pain.

Yesterday I saw the doctor about the reoccurring lower back injury I’ve been dealing with for the past six years. I was supposed to see Lisa’s doctor, but somehow they screwed that up and I was scheduled with another doctor at the practice. Rather than reschedule, I went ahead and saw the doctor they scheduled me with. The doctor spent a lot of time with me, and I was happy with the care I received. Unfortunately I don’t have much solid information about what might be wrong with my back yet, but here’s what I do know….

I gave the doctor lots of detailed information about what causes the injury to flare up (heavy squats and deadlifts), my long history with lower back pain and all the things I’ve done over the years to combat this issue (chiropractic care, foam rollers, countless stretches, inversion board, core strengthening exercises, anti-inflammatory medications and so on). I also told her about the persistent dull ache that I feel in my lower back while mountain biking and even while doing mild stuff like gardening.

I’m not a particularly strong person for my weight when it comes to squats and deadlifts, but when I told her that the issue flared up on Friday while doing deadlifts in the low 400s, her eyes bugged out of her head. I think there’s a real disconnect between general practitioners who typically see mostly overweight couch potatoes and people who actually train seriously. I tried to tell her that for my body weight the weights I’m lifting are not at all noteworthy. After some further explanation she seemed to accept what I was saying, but she said “You’re 42 years old, and you’ve had back issues all your adult life. It could very well be that your back is simply never going to be able to handle those kinds of weights again.” Actually, I sort of expected her to say that, and she may be right. If it comes down to it I guess can live with backing off the weight I use for those two lifts. I don’t like it, but I can live with it–especially if we can figure out how to make my lower back stop aching all the time when I’m mountain biking.

After we talked a technician had me lay down in four different positions and she took a bunch of x-rays. I don’t have the results of the x-rays yet, and probably won’t until I see the doctor again on March 8th (she did say she’d call me right away if the x-rays showed something serious). If the x-rays don’t show anything, she’s going to order that an MRI be performed. The MRI should be very informative.

In the meantime, she put me on a NSAID called Celebrex (200 mg). She told me to take the Celebrex until I see her again in three weeks. I can workout normally, but I am going to avoid back squats and deadlifts until we figure out what’s going on.