Back Pain Health Center

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Supportive relationships

Your loved ones can offer support by:

• Giving encouragement. This can keep you from feeling hopeless or alone.
• Offering to help. Getting a helping hand can keep you from feeling overwhelmed. This may include helping with small daily tasks or bigger problems.
• Going to doctor visits. Your loved ones can offer support by being involved in your medical care.
• Being honest and realistic. Make sure your loved ones understand how serious the problem is. They can help by not setting unreachable goals or acting like the problem will just go away.
• Respecting your wishes. You are responsible for your decisions. Your loved ones can offer support and encouragement without interfering with your major decisions.

Having trouble getting support from friends and family? There are steps you can take to make your social support stronger.

Keep moving

Having chronic back pain can make exercising, even walking, difficult. Being active is often the last thing you want to think about.

But the truth is that daily activity and physiotherapy exercises can help relieve back pain and can lead to long-term improvement for low back pain.¹⁴

So be as active as you can. Take short walks as often as you can. Talk to a physical therapist about exercises you can do. Also see:

Fitness: Increasing Core Stability.

Low Back Pain: Exercises to Reduce Pain.