Back Pain: How You Stand Gives It Away

Once you see someone doing it, it’s hard to avoid it any longer. You’ve seen it, you may have even done it. You stand on one leg. I’m not talking about standing on one leg like a flamingo, but rather standing where you are putting all of your weight on one side of your body.

Eventually, that side gets tired and you switch to the other side. A sort of “dance” ensues for the rest of the day. Why would it feel more comfortable for you to stand out of your normal alignment? Why is it uncomfortable for you to be straight up and down. And why won’t your back pain go away?

Typically, someone that has this type of condition is regularly experiencing low back pain and possibly sciatica (pain that shoots down the back of their leg). This is a common complaint when someone is dealing with sacroiliac problems. The sacroiliac joint is where your pelvis meets up with your sacrum. The sacrum is a triangle shaped bone that ends in your tailbone.

You have two of these joints, one on each side of your body. Each joint is designed to move, particularly when your leg moves up, like when walking or running. Through various activities, it is possible for this joint to become stuck or not move as well as it should. This causes one side of your body to not move as effectively as it should.

More importantly, that movement out of its normal alignment may cause a functional short leg. One leg may visually seem shorter than the other, even though it is the same length if we were to take out a tape measure and actually measure each leg. This functional short leg makes it very difficult for you to stand straight up.

Worse, if you try to force it, you will become increasingly uncomfortable until you return to position that is out of alignment but is taking pressure off that joint. You see this in almost every condition. Your body wants to keep you out of pain, even if that means that you have to get in a crazy position to maintain it.

So what’s the fix? A chiropractor will find the area of your spine (or pelvis) that is out of its normal alignment and help move it back into place. When the joint function is restored, the normal movement can return, and the person will actually feel more comfortable standing in proper alignment. If nothing is done, the patient will continue to experience more significant symptoms until something is done. At that point, no “dancing” or standing on one leg will be enough to help.