Saturday 12th October
Warm Up
It’s easy to associate the need to warm up just with strenuous activity or exercise, but it can really help in this instance too. Before you go straight into starting on all your gardening jobs, try to walk around the garden or around your neighbourhood for 10 minutes at a steady pace, as a gentle, all body warm up.
Wear a Back Support
If you garden while your back is already sore, wearing a back support could help. It gives your spine a helping hand as you’re asking more of the muscles, joints and tendons, allowing you to do your gardening bending, stretching and general moving.
If you wear a back support all the time, it can cause your spine muscles not to activate as much as need, but wearing the back support occasionally can be of help.
Beware of Bending
One of the most common issues with gardening is that a lot of the things you need to attend to are low down on the ground, meaning you are often bent over with very little movement. This puts a lot of strain on your back. If you can, bring anything, like small potting jobs, up to table height and even where you can sit down to attend to them. If you must work low down, make sure you get yourself down to that level, crouch, kneel, or sit, and try not to spend prolonged periods of time bent over.
Take Breaks
The severity your back ache, will dictate how long you can work before you will need a break. When you first try gardening with a sore back, make sure you take a break before any pain gets worse. Don’t wait for the pain to increase to be a signal to take a break or stop.
Ask Someone To Help With The Heavy Things!
This one is simple: don’t try to move or lift something heavy! Leave the job for another day or ask someone to help.
