Can Pilates Help Back Pain After Cauda Equina Syndrome?

I will share my experience of can pilates help back pain after Cauda Equina Syndrome with you in this post. I suffered from Cauda Equina Syndrome in 2017 and after a back operation and further disc herniation, I started pilates. I am sharing my improvement 1 year later on.

Life Changing!

If I could share one quote to explain my pilates journey it has been life-changing. I know that’s super dramatic, but when you’ve been in pain all day every day for 5 years and then you have pain-free days, it’s life-changing.

You can take a read of my Cauda Equina Syndrome issues, and all about my back operation over here on the blog and the issues I have had.

I started seeing an Osteopath on and off a couple of years post-surgery for my Cauda Equina Syndrome back issues, lack of strength, trauma and my body being in panic mode all the time. She was amazing, and she taught me what was happening with my back, and why I was getting the pain and explained the small movements I could start to do. But my back was constantly on fire, you could even feel the heat from the area.

I then had another disc herniation that broke off and was free-flowing (sequestered disc herniation) in my spinal canal. I needed to hope my body would reabsorb this, and save me from having another operation. Luckily for me over a few months, it did slowly disappear, and my body did what I wanted it to do, but the pain and a small disc herniation to were still there.

When I went back to my osteopath to help me she said it’s going to take a very gentle few months and to start ahead with pilates. I was super scared to do anything exercise wise as I didn’t want another disc herniation, but also my surgeon had told me it was time for a spinal fusion, which meant a lot of metal work in my spine, which I really wanted to avoid for as long as possible. I asked him if I could try and build my own metalwork, and his response was ‘it will cause you a lot of pain and won’t help’ but at 38 I didn’t want the metal work and also I didn’t think I was strong enough to cope with the surgery and long recovery when I didn’t have a great start in the first place.

When you’ve spent so long in pain, your body is always on edge, always in protection mode and it was really holding on tight to my spine. It needed to as my spine was very unstable, and I didn’t have many core muscles to hold on tight!

My osteopath told me were looking at about a year, with a few ups and down. I must admit I thought that was a huge amount of time, and I’m not very good when I don’t see improvement quickly.

What she meant was a year until we get out the other side and can be involved with all the pilates classes, taking part in a full hour long class and would really notice a big difference in my life.

Well a year down the line, I am there!

I started off having 30 minutes 1:1 classes with an instructor who specialised more in rehabilitation and injuries. They were gentle with me, took each lesson as it came, and only introduced a new move each week. My body did shout at me when I did one that was too much, had we had a couple of setbacks with new sciatica pain. But we learnt what triggers it, and she would adapt our pilates lesson to suit me. This is why the 1:1 lessons were very important.

When I first started, I couldn’t even get up off the floor, we had to learn a way to transition between each move so it didn’t trigger the back issues.

So as you can tell, I was in a pretty bad way! But each week I would notice an improvement, and as each month went on I could look back and see the changes. They were small, but I was allowing my body to move my spine, which was allowing it to learn that it was OK to move it. It was so used to holding onto my spine, so we were teaching my body and nerves that it was safe to do.

I was also practising my pilates stretches at home every day, doing stretches, strengthening and just simply laying the floor and knees up when my bad days hit. The difference is, I knew it was OK to do that. When I had been standing a long time or walking the dog, I would come home and stretch out my back. Something I was scared to do, as I would get so much pain doing so. But now I get relief from doing this.

My spine clicked and clunked a lot when I first started doing pilates, it was quite scary but I was warned it would do this. It was OK as long as there wasn’t any pain or causing any issues after. The more stretching I did and the more time went by this stopped, as my muscles weren’t holding on so tight anymore. The key in reducing the pain.

I also notice if I struggle to do one of the moves one week, the next week I can do it much easier the next week. Your body can go into a panic but you’re teaching it that it’s OK to do that, and that muscle memory will kick in next time.

I will warn you though, every time I moved up the stages it triggered a relapse in symptoms, so would reduce a few of the tougher exercises and give myself time to recover and listen to my body.

How I Increased Pilates After Back Surgery

• 30 minute 1:1 pilates lessons
• Osteopath massage 30 minutes after pilates for the first couple of sessions
• 1 hour 1:1 pilates lessons
• Increased osteopath massages again
• 1 hour group of 8 pilates lessons
• Increased osteopath massages again

Adding in-home stretches and small exercises daily

The biggest thing I’ve learnt is how to listen to my body, I listen to the types of pain, what they mean and how I could help that pain. I thought when I got back pain that I couldn’t do anything else but rest to help it. When really, backs love to move and kept moving, and you need lots of muscles to support your back to help it recover.

I have currently achieved my goal of helping pilates with back pain after Cauda Equina Syndrome, it has given me days of no pain, being back to lift washing baskets, and not causing sciatica pain when bending over to do the dishwasher. I can keep up with the kids more, I can walk on the stone beach and swim with the kids. Each month that goes by I feel I can do more and more pilates moves, I can do more in the class and I am pretty proud of myself for achieving this.

Stick at it, and keep constant and slowly but surely I think it will help you so much.

Tips For Can Pilates Help Back Pain After Cauda Equina Syndrome?

• Find a recommended Osteopath and pilates class that specialise in the rehabilitation
• Explain all your symptoms, don’t hide any
• I don’t have any manipulation of my spine, just massage which helps a lot
• If you have MRI scans (you can request these from the hospital) then get them seen by your Osteopath
• Start very slowly
• Get the Osteopath to give you small movements to do at home before moving up the scale
• Notice the small achievements
• Don’t give up, it’s easy to think that if you can’t do it one week, that means that is that, it’s not, you might be able to do it next week no problem.
• Wear clothing that allows free movement
• Listen to any warning signs from your body, pain in the spine and sciatica pain is a stop now warning for me.
• Learn the feeling of muscle pain, sciatica/nerve pain, and joint pain
• Keep consistent, go to lessons and do it constantly at home too

I visit The Totalcare Clinic and I see Amelia the Osteopath and Katies for Pilates

Pilates has been life-changing for me, so please do consider it if you have back pain, I know how scary it is to do something like this when you’re in pain, but take it slowly and you will quickly notice improvements and you will be helping yourself so much.

It’s easy to say we don’t have time, and by booking pilates lessons for back pain I think your make sure you’re fitting it in, your own health is important and you need to make it a priority, you can improve your life long term.

Red Flags for Cauda Equina Syndrome?

The red flags for Cauda Equina aren’t shouted about enough, when I had my surgery my GP ignored all of these red flags, and I admitted myself with them, so please be aware and go to A&E straight away.

Symptoms include:

• sciatica on both sides
• weakness or numbness in both legs that is severe or getting worse
• numbness around or under your genitals, or around your anus
• finding it hard to start peeing, can’t pee or can’t control when you pee – and this isn’t normal for you
• you don’t notice when you need to poo or can’t control when you poo – and this isn’t normal for you

Cauda equina syndrome requires emergency hospital admission and may require emergency surgery, because the longer it goes untreated, the greater the chance it will lead to permanent paralysis and incontinence.