"Why Does My Back Hurt When I Drive?"

Photo by Will Truettner on Unsplash

“My back always gets worse when I drive.” – I hear this daily. Why is that?

The answer is - sitting is the worst thing for you. When we sit in the car, your spine curves into a “C” shape. In fact sitting produces more load on your vertebrae and discs than standing. When you have back pain sitting only makes it worse. 

There is a muscle deep in your hip, called the piriformis. I call it the pain in the butt muscle. When my patients tell me that they have pain right in the middle of the cheek, it usually means that that the piriformis is not happy.

Well, you see the sciatic nerve runs underneath that pain in the butt muscle, which can cause symptoms down the leg. In the effort to avoid pain, I see my patients shift to the left or to the right. This causes further compression on the spine and brings more pain.

If that wasn’t bad enough, the position of your leg on the gas increases tension on your sciatic nerve. Nerves are supposed to glide between the tissues. Sometimes, the nerve gets trapped between tight muscles which will also give you that tingling sensation.

Whenever you feel burning, numbness or tingling, think of it as your nerve is talking to you and signaling that something is off. Irritated sciatic nerve will scream at you every time you wind it up with your foot on the gas or the clutch.

Luckily, there are certain adjustments you can do to your car seat to make your back feel better. The best thing is to move the back of the seat so it is vertical. If your height and car allows for it, try to raise your car seat so the hips are higher than the knees. You can also try to roll up something small like a hand towel and put it right behind your pelvis. This will take some of the pressure off your lower back. Unfortunately it is not always possible.

Secondly, become aware if you are not sitting evenly on both cheeks. Are you shifted to one side? In that case grab something small (gloves, hat, scarf, t-shirt…) and wedge it under the hip towards which you are leaning. This will keep your pelvis leveled and lower one sided stress on your discs and facet joints. These tips combined with some manual therapy enabled my father in law to drive across country during his back flare up.

If you have tried these adjustments and are still having pain, you may have something serious on your hand. My advice to you is to treat it as soon as possible. If it doesn’t go away with these simple positioning tips, you may be irritating your discs and your sciatic nerve. It will take less time, money and effort when you treat it right away.

We continue to offer you a FREE SAMPLE SESSION so we can find out what’s wrong and prevent it from getting worse. There is NO financial commitment required from you. You don’t need doctor referral or an authorization from your insurance company. And it is only 20 minutes.

At the end of the session you will know what is causing your pain and have specific recommendations on how you can improve your symptoms.

About 95% of spinal dysfunction can be successfully taken care of with physical therapy. But the sooner we get to you, the easier it is to treat. Unfortunately people keep hoping that their pain will go away. They come up with excuses that they don’t have time, money or don’t want to look for a therapist. In the meantime the pain gets worse and they slowly give up more and more in order to avoid pain.

Don’t give up what you love. Don’t give up a 4 hour drive to the mountains. Get your back treated. After all, pain is just a signal from your body that something is wrong. Avoidance of pain doesn’t make it better it just causes you to give up more of your life.

Your health, your mobility and independence are your most precious attributes. They are worth to be made a priority. A lot of time we are so caught up in work, family and taking care of others that there is nothing left for ourselves.

Are you really taking good care of them or just surviving? Are you really helping them or are resentful because you haven’t taken care of yourself? Change it, make this step towards better health. Your family and friends will thank you because you will be happier, brighter and be able to take better care of them.

When you are ready to take a step forward simply reply to this e-mail or call us at (303)669-0941. If you can’t find time for an appointment call us and we will arrange a phone consultation.
I look forward to speaking with you soon.

To you vibrant health!
Elena