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What are the 3 Best Exercises for Sciatica

Exercises for sciatica are not always helpful, some will ease pain and at times others will make your pain worse. Sciatica is a debilitating condition where pain travels down your leg, sometimes to as far as your toes.

So exercising needs care, you shouldn't jump straight into exercising until you know exactly where your problems come from.

What causes your Sciatica?

Sciatica is actually a symptom rather than a specific condition. The sciatic nerve is formed from the lower joints in your spine, the nerves exiting your spine joint to form the sciatic nerve.

The nerve then travels through your pelvis and either through, under or directly next to the Piriformis muscle. It then proceeds to run down your leg to your toes. Sciatica will occur when the nerve is irritated, which can be anywhere from your lower back to your pelvis. You can also have more than one site of irritation. This is why sciatica at times is difficult to manage; unless you know the exact mechanism of irritation you may accidentally make the condition worse.

How does the Sciatic Nerve become irritated?

Although many people believe the disc herniations is the most common cause of sciatica, in fact these are the least common. The most common way to irritate the nerve is via joint disruption, such as spinal imbalances, or pelvic imbalances.

The pelvic imbalances also lead to the common pseudo-sciatica or Piriformis syndrome. The Piriformis muscle tightens which will also irritate the sciatic nerve as it runs through the pelvis.

Sciatica can be a combination of all of these situations, which is why it is best to first detect which spinal imbalances you have.

Is exercising the best cure for Sciatica?

Although exercises for sciatica are important, they are only ever a part of the solution. To get long lasting relief from your sciatica you must follow a simple 5 step plan.

The first step is finding the exact cause of your pain; this is best performed with self-assessments of the spinal imbalances. Once you detect these imbalances the next step is reducing and easing pain. If pain levels are lowered your muscles and joints will return to balance faster and easier.

Steps three and four are rebalancing your muscles and joints. Corrective exercises include sciatic exercises, but stretching and joint techniques are essential to remove all the causes. Too many people fail to remove sciatica long term, as they only remove part of the cause.

The final step is making sure you have long lasting relief. To achieve this you must reinforce the steps above to make sure your spine stays in balance. If you regularly reassess your spinal imbalances you can easily detected when problems first arise, and then target them before pain develops.

What are the 3 Best Sciatica Exercises?

Once you detect the underlying causes of your pain, exercises for sciatica must include targeting the following areas. If not, then you will likely miss part of the causes of your pain. You should aim to:

Strengthen Your Abdominals

Your abdominal muscles are the most important muscle for pelvis and lower back stability. If your abdominal muscles are stronger then these areas are more stable and able to move easier.

Abdominal muscle strength does not mean spending countless hours doing sit-ups or crunches. In fact these types of exercises do little to strengthen the abdominals; they can actually target the hip flexors which if over tight help create your sciatica.

Abdominal strength requires a good nerve and blood supply to the abdominal muscles and then targeted exercise that increases the strength of these muscles in days.

Relax Your Hip Flexors

The hip flexor muscle group if tight increases the curve of our lower back. This increases pressure on the sciatic nerve and allows your sciatica to occur. The hip flexors and abdominal muscles work together. A strong abdominal group and a balanced hip flexor group give you stability, flexibility and strength in your lower spine.

To stretch the hip flexors, you need to target them correctly and the most important aspect of stretching is not what to stretch, but knowing when and how to stretch. Knowing when and how means you spend minimal time stretching with maximum gains. Easing tension can be achieved within days not weeks or months.

Piriformis Stretching

As the sciatic nerve either runs through or next to the Piriformis muscles. If tight the Piriformis allows sciatica to occur. So with all sciatica, Piriformis stretching is essential. Again, you must stretch the muscle but you also need to make sure the nerve and blood supply are correct too.

If the nerve or blood supply to the muscle is reduced, the muscle will tire and react by tightening. Stretching will therefore only offer temporary relief. This is why using generic stretches for sciatica or using exercises for sciatica that are not targeted at the true cause, will potentially cause more harm than good.

The principles of Spinal Balancing address the both the pain of sciatica and also the root cause of the condition that is responsible for your sciatica. Through strategic body assessments, your individual spinal imbalances can be identified, and a very targeted corrective program can be established for your specific needs.

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Here are some related web pages of interest:

Trigger Point Release

Sciatica - what is it?

Spinal Balancing

Inversion Therapy