Yoga or Pilates for lower back pain

[Twelvefiftysix]

Hi, I have suffered on and off with lower back pain for years. It always kind of feels like it’s about to go/snap/stiffen.
I am nearly 50, have under active thyroid I walk a lot but want to improve my flexibility and strength.
Is yoga best or Pilates?

I’d like an app to keep me on track with it.
Any advice?

100% pilates but go to a proper teacher. Very easy to have poor alignment and cause more issues. Positioning is key

It depends what your issue is

is it slipped discs? Trapped nerve? Lack of fascia stretch, muscle tightness?

if there is an issue with your spine you don’t want to randomly start yoga or pilates but get medical advice/physio assessment first

if it’s muscle/fascia stiffness yoga is great

@MySoCalledWife I think it’s muscles. It’s just really stiff a lot of the time and I have to have a cushion behind me when I’m sitting on most chairs. Could be due to years of working with small children!

I find yoga really helps my back and muscle tightness

I have a bad back, had slipped discs 20 yrs ago, and always seem to carry any stress in my back iykwim

Yoga focussed on stretching muscles as well as consciously relaxing them, so works better for me than Pilates (which seemed to be more about core strength)

No harm in trying both

Am a big yoga fan myself, even though I am rubbish at it

Pilates 100%, it's transformative.

Yoga helps with stretching but muscular weakness will likely be playing a part in your discomfort and pilates is great for that. It's very easy to over-extend in yoga (which I love btw) but pilates is much better for sorting our problems.

No reason you can't do both as long as you're getting proper pilates instruction.

The quality of the teacher makes a lot more difference to end end results you achieve than the absolute choice between yoga and/or Pilates.

It's so important to get your alignment right, so that the movements you make are training the correct muscles. The difference between correct and incorrect use can be kilometres, almost imperceptible from the outside.

Word of mouth ideal, as are 121 sessions. In a group class, it's very possible for people to be doing in entirely wrong without the teacher actually noticing.

Good luck

Pilates 💯

The NHS does a pilates film for back pain. It really helped me and was recommended by my GP. Might be a good start https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/nhs-fitness-studio/chronic-back-pain-pilates-exercise-video/

. The difference between correct and incorrect use can be kilometres

Just how far can you stretch?! 😂

Pilates. Ideally a small group - 3 ppl or 1:1 sessions first. A good teacher will give you homework if you ask for it.
Correct form is super important in pilates and your get that from a large class.
In a Class the teacher should be going around and adjusting the participants and it’s ok to ask questions as well.

If you get it wrong, it might actually be millimetres, but once you get a tear in a flexor tendon, it certainly feels like you've left your leg behind somewhere in the vicinity of Leeds.

I'm a big fan of Pilates myself.
But DH gets back problems - he went to a physio who gave him some exercise (some of which look a lot like Pilates to me) but also he needed massage to sort out muscles in spasm. Nowadays I can sometimes deal with them for him - it's quite hard work, really digging into the ridgy knots!

I’m seeing a physio for lower back pain & stiffness. She’s advised me to do daily yoga moves,

Cat cow x 10
childs pose x 10
cobra x 10

Interesting thread. I do pilates which has helped my slipped disc and trapped nerve. I'd love to do yoga as well but I loathe the woo bit and the teachers all seem keen on it. If I could just do the moves and go home before the " relaxation" I'd be grand.

difference between correct and incorrect use can be kilometres

Or, more accurately, millimetres.

Blush.

I do both. Most help is a restorative Pilates class. It seems to help put everything in place.

Thanks for linking that @Seaweasel
I will give that a try. I've been looking into starting Pilates but I am a bit short of free time.

Pilates, preferably of the reformer variety.

Pilates definitely, with an attentive in-person teacher who can help you with alignment. I absolutely love yoga, but the guidance to protect your spine etc isn't always as good. I think the technique and guidance from Pilates has really helped me with learning yoga.

Yoga often involved a lot of bends and forward folds which can be aggregating to your back it really depends on what's going on. I practiced for 5 years before facet joint injury then I had to move to pilates for a couple years as yoga was just not what my back needed. I'm now back doing both.

In pilates they is still some stretch, it's not all strength. But as I said up thread, the technicality us crucial. If you're doing poor alignment on toe taps for instance that could aggregate your back more.

😁😁

You don't want to end up with a leg in Leeds - especially if youve never been there!

I'm hypermobile so pilates is turning out to be better for my joints than yoga, which I was overstretching before. It's as you say - the small movements make the biggest differences and protect your body against doing yogic stretches poorly.

Thanks for all th replies. I’ll have a look for Pilates instructors nearby. Is there any kind of qualification I need to
look for?

any kind of qualification?

I've not found anything, but have been lucky after trying a few things to find someone with a broad and deep understanding of what I need to do differently to what I was doing.

I'm not a fan of group classes. The differences between really good movement and incorrect movement which will lead to sub-optimal outcomes, even pain, are too subtle to avoid the risk of thinking I am doing things correctly while actually making major problems.

Incase that sounds dramatic, my response to learning anything tended to be to arch my back and use my back muscles to achieve whatever I was doing. Engaging my core and using my abs was a whole new experience which I needed 121 lessons to find and fix.

The teacher I now go to has a delightful trick of giving me something to do, and concentrate on, which has a secondary effect of using my deep abs. If I concentrate on using the right muscles, I get too tense. Distraction works brilliantly.

Finding a teacher who works for you is a lot about trial and error.

Why not do both? They both help in different ways.

‘Woo’????
its an ancient Hindu practice.
nothing woo about it.
🥹