If you have ever experienced a back spasm, you know how painful it can be and all you want to do is lay curled up in a fetal position with your spine pushed out. That is because a spasm is when the muscles close to or next to the spinal cord or the nerve endings contract and it is quite excruciating.

Most of the time a person can continue to move, twist, turn, pull or push or exercise, but after a while the pain will be too severe to move. The pain increases after a couple of hours because of bleeding in the torn tendons and muscles causing them to stretch. These types of injuries can be common in sports like weight lifting, golf, basketball, football, and baseball or any sport where pushing, pulling or twisting of the back occurs.

There are some things that cause the risk of this injury to go up. Weak stomach muscles, pelvis that tilts forward more than normal, tight hamstring muscles, or weak muscles around the spine or if there is arthritis, as well as other things like a slipped disc.

No one likes pain and when it is something you can’t really touch that it makes it even worse. If you are experiencing back spasms a trip to the doctors office is probably in order. Sometimes, you can try to treat this with just some rest, ice, and heat. Your doctor may prescribe some anti-inflammatory medicine, or it may need to be treated with pain injections or he/she may recommend you go see a chiropractor for the injury. If there is severe pain on touch close to the spine, then you may need to be x-rayed to make sure that there isn’t a  fracture somewhere in your spinal column.

At any rate, back pain is nothing to fool around with and you should see a doctor if the pain lasts for very long. With most back spasms the pain is intolerable and you will probably head straight to the doctors office or the emergency room for relief.