Back Pain, Nerve Problem?

This is another common physical problem for mature adult. People ranging from 40 above are normally prone to have lower spine and nerve problem due to age factor. People below 40 normally is cause by genetic or injuries to the back bone nerves.

I personally love to do weight lifting just to stay in shape. Sometime just got carried away and I ended up doing more than my body can handle. The impact is I suffered neck, shoulder and back pain. I love this topic as I have personally gone through qigong to heal the problem. It is quite common for bodybuilder to face the spinal problem along the muscle pain which can recover quickly compared to nerve pain. Only god knows the pain that I endure as it looks great from the outside but inside you feel like vegetable. First lets get to know our Nervous System which control lots of our organ body systems.

The nervous system is a very complex system in the body. It has many, many parts. The nervous system is divided into two main systems, the central nervous system (CNS) and the peripheral nervous system. The spinal cord and the brain make up the CNS. Its main job is to get the information from the body and send out instructions. The peripheral nervous system is made up of all of the nerves and the wiring. This system sends the messages from the brain to the rest of the body.

The nervous system is made up of nerve cells or neurons that are "wired" together throughout the body, somewhat like communication system. Neurons carry messages in the form of an electrical impulses. The messages move from one neuron to another to keep the body functioning. Neurons have a limited ability to repair themselves. Unlike other body tissues, nerve cells cannot also be repaired if damaged due to injury or disease.

That's why it takes time to heal when you have injuries to the back bone. There are Cranial (12 pairs), Cervical (8 pairs), Thoracic (12 pairs), Lumbar (5 pairs) and Sacral (5pairs) nerves. The below illustration will indicate each role of the pairs of the nerves.

So now we know here they are, we can zoom down to each reaponsible area that causes the pain and for most body builder the neck pain and shoulder are due to C3 & C5. For elbows, arms and hands focus on C7 & C8. Now, this pain is mostly due to injuries while doing weightlifting where the nerves and bones are pushing to the limit.

For elderly people, they normally suffer the knee and lower legs problem due to the nerve root called sciatica. It is the connecting nerve back to L5 of the vertebral level. Sciatica is defined by a pain along the large sciatic nerve that runs from the lower back down through the buttocks and along the back of each leg – is a relatively common form of back pain. Sciatica is usually caused by pressure on the sciatic nerve from a herniated disc (also referred to as a bulging disc, ruptured disc or pinched nerve).

So how can qigong help? There are few qigong movement that works fine to cure the above problems. The "dragon crane", "churn chi", "opening of the upper torso" and tung pi" for neck, shoulder, arms and fingers. For knee and Siatica problem, it is best to do "knee rotation" "wall squating", "hip rotation" and laying "leg rotation".

Next article I will talk about bone related problem which somewhat effect the nerves system like slip disc (herniated disc), scoliosis, spondylosis, etc.