Why Your Core Workout Might Be Flaring Up Your Sciatica

If your sciatica worsens during a core workout, it’s because the exercises you are doing either push on the nerve or pull the nerve. These are prevalent mistakes you might not even know you’re making. My name is Dr. Grant Elliott, and in this video, number 157 of the Low Back Pain Podcast, I will teach you why specific exercises flare up your sciatica and three core exercises you should be doing instead.

Understanding Why Certain Exercises Flare Up Your Sciatica

First, you must understand why certain core exercises flare up your sciatica. There are two main reasons why certain core exercises can flare up your leg, glute, or back, wherever that pain primarily is. The two main components are lumbar flexion and nerve tension. I will give you examples of both so you can thoroughly understand.

Lumbar Flexion

If your sciatica issue is caused by a disc pushing on the nerve, any type of movement that increases the disc’s pressure on that nerve will increase the nerve pain. In most discs—not all discs—lumbar flexion (bending forward) tends to increase pressure on the disc, which increases back or leg pain. Studies show that being in a seated bent position puts more pressure on the disc than most other positions do.

What type of core exercises mimic sitting and bending forward? Sit-ups, crunches, or bicycle rides put the lower back in a flexed position that might increase this type of pressure on the nerve.

Nerve Tension

The second component is nerve tension. Any movement that increases nerve tension will flare it up because nerves do not like being stretched when they feel sensitive. What causes nerve tension? Increasing the length of the nerve increases nerve tension. This will be any movement that fully extends or raises the leg higher and higher. It looks like a hamstring stretch, and someone is going into hip flexion or raising the hip and extending that leg like they’re trying to stretch the hamstring or calf as much as possible. This will pull on the nerve either in a sensitive place or across the disc, thus increasing pain.

If you’re doing a core exercise involving fully stretching the leg, like sit-ups, leg raises, or flutter kicks, these might flare up the nerve due to increased nerve tension.

Three Core Exercises That Won’t Flare Up Your Sciatica

The three exercises I’m going to give you now do not involve lumbar flexion or nerve tension, so they are very safe for most individuals struggling with sciatica symptoms. In our online low back program, we meet with about 150 people every week with sciatica issues, so we know precisely the types of things you’re dealing with, and these recommendations will most likely be constructive.

Kneeling Palov Press

The first exercise is our kneeling Palov press. You want to anchor a band, get on your knees, walk away from the anchor to increase tension on that band and turn away from it. Slowly push the band out repetitively while resisting the rotational force. That band will want to rotate you and pull you back towards where you anchored it, but your goal is to resist it. Why? To strengthen our anti-rotation spine muscles.

Many individuals with sensitive sciatica will usually find rotational exercises uncomfortable, like Russian Twists or other rotational mobility exercises. Helping your lower back to strengthen and resist rotation can be very helpful for these types of lower back issues. This exercise increases the demand on our hips for stability and keeps the lower back in a neutral position, so it does not increase lumbar flexion or nerve.

Bear Position

The second exercise is our bear position. On the ground, on all fours, hands under the shoulders, and knees under the hips, you will hold the spine in a neutral position while bracing the core and raising the knees a couple of inches off the ground. This looks easy at first but is quite challenging as we have held this for a while. This does an excellent job of calming down the lower back, being very nerve-friendly, and increasing the stability of our entire trunk, not only our core.

As you get stronger with this exercise, you can seamlessly progress it by raising one arm at a time, holding the position with one arm, or kicking one leg back to add additional difficulty.

Dead Bug Exercise

The last exercise is the dead bug exercise. For this, we will be on the floor, on our back, arms and legs in the air. Push the lower back into the floor to neutralize the spine and increase core engagement while you slowly alternate, lowering the opposite arm and opposite leg. As you perform this, because you are on your back with your spine neutral, most of you will find this a comfortable position for your back or leg pain.

This is much tougher than it might initially look if you move through it slowly and concentrate on pushing that lower back into the floor as much as possible. I do this exercise every day before I work out, and I swear by it for multiple reasons. If you want a good core workout but don’t want to flare up your leg, do this exercise.

Important Final Thoughts

Before we finish, you need to understand a fundamental concept. Yes, those three exercises will be great, but you need to realise that although I am emphasizing that lumbar flexion and nerve tension might flare up your back, I am not saying that these things are bad for you for life. Not at all. If you have a sensitive back or a sensitive nerve, then yes, lumbar flexion and nerve tension might aggravate your symptoms, and it might be wise to temporarily avoid things that continue to pick the scab and re-aggravate it. These exercises are much safer alternatives.

But I am not saying you must avoid things that bend the lower back or extend the leg any longer than your recovery takes. Our clients in our online program were told to avoid this and that for life and are afraid of doing things, but that’s not true. When they’re done working with us, they should be able to do lumbar flexion movements, all the sit-ups they want, all the leg raises they want, all the Russian Twists they want, and it should not aggravate them. They should be robust in those motions and do them confidently, not fearing being fragile or flaring things up at any moment.

Proper recovery looks like a bulletproof spine that can withstand anything, and that is what we do with all of our clients who are struggling with sciatica issues where the typical treatments are simply not working for them. The typical chiropractor down the street, the typical PT, these things usually are not working for most of our clients. They are looking for a much more specialized and targeted approach, yielding results fast but, most importantly, removing all fear and allowing them to do whatever they want for years to come because they learned how to fix it themselves.

That’s precisely what we do. We teach you how to fix your sciatica issues so you can be in control. You don’t have to rely on anybody else, and you can live the life you’re after. So please, take a stand for your health. Reach out for help. You don’t have to live in pain. Do not choose to do so. Reach out for help. Let’s change your life because you only have one, and you do not deserve to live a life in pain.

I look forward to meeting you soon.

Once again, be sure to join my Facebook group, Rehab Fix Low Back Program, so you can get additional exclusive content and our free sciatica guide immediately upon joining. If you watch this on YouTube, please like, comment, and subscribe. If you are listening on your favourite podcast platform, please leave a five-star rating and review so we can grow this podcast and help reach more individuals who deserve to get results and feel like they’re spinning their tyres and getting frustrated in doing so. As always, move more, move in nature, move in the sun. Thank you so much for listening, and have a great day.

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