Oh My Aching Back

It is estimated between 85 and 90 percent of us have problems with our backs sometime during our lives. I have had back pain of one sort or another all my life. I started going to a chiropractor when I was ten years old. One of the worst times was when I dove into the swimming pool the wrong way. Another was when I was moving a chest of drawers and my back "went out". Now I have some arthritis in my lower back and a place under my right shoulder blade that feels like someone is sticking me with hot pokers. It is the same location I once had severe muscle spasms.
Still, I feel lucky. Especially after talking with one of our fellow YMCA walkers this morning. His wife is having back surgery tomorrow. First they will scrape the vertebra where it is pinching a nerve. Then they will put two rods in to try and align the spine. Ouch. She won't be able to do anything for four months. I can't even imagine going through something like that.
I know some (probably most) of my pain is from poor posture and not doing back strengthening exercises - which are actually abdominal muscle strengthening exercises. Losing some weight would help, too, I'm sure. All things I could do for myself. Must do if I don't want to have surgery someday.
Dad always had back pain. Part of it was occupational - farming is hard work. Part of it was being overweight. The week before my wedding in 1961, he was carrying a bushel and half basket of corn across the barnyard from the corn crib to the hog house. His back went out. When I left for the church to get ready for the wedding, I didn't know if he was going to be there to give me away or not. When he did show up just in time to walk me down the aisle I was more concerned about him collapsing than I was about anything else.
Drs. told him he had a slipped disc. He could have back surgery. But that was one thing he wouldn't do. Someone he knew back in the 40's had back surgery and ended up being paralyzed. No way was he going to chance that even though medical procedures had become safer in the twenty some years since then.
Then he decided he had multiple sclerosis or even Lou Gehrig's disease. If someone he knew had MS or ALS, he went to visit with them to compare symptoms. Dad died in 1978 of a heart attack without ever being diagnosed with a degenerative nerve disease or having back surgery. I had forgotten until I recently re-read his obituary that we had suggested memorials be made to the Multiple Sclerosis Association.
Generally after I've been up and moving around for awhile my back quits hurting. I just need to follow my own advice to stay away from any kind of surgery as long as I can.