The face is usually darker. The eyes, a bit watery. It is almost as if the edges of the face are slightly blurred. Great care is evident in physical movements—a deliberation that is not fully normal. I can make out backache in a colleague, friend, co-traveller, whoever, because I am a fellow sufferer. Lower back ache is a scourge of modern-day living that is affecting an increasing number of people. The desperation to find a cure, to just stop the pain, has resulted in a proliferation of solution givers—reflexology, physiotherapy, massage, some German technique, aromatherapy, ayurvedic massage, meditation—to name just a few.
On World Yoga Day, I want to weigh in and tell you what is finally working for me. Fifteen years of a weak lower back with a young person’s disdain for rest or care came home to hurt hellishly five years ago—the back packed up. The final trigger was an overenthusiastic gym instructor at the local DDA facility. For the next three years, I went from orthopaedic to orthopaedic, from one physio intervention to another. Kati pasti (the wonderful Ayurvedic massage), reflexology, hot compress, cold compress, meditation, thinking good thoughts about the back and the world (I kid you not—somebody told me to do that), I’ve been there, done that.
One comment
harneet7
June 21, 2018 at 11:32 am
Exercise, yoga, calcium with vitamin d and sea fish will make your back strong