First is personality type. Are you more extrovert or more introvert? Second, we talked about environment, not just your physical surroundings, but also what I would think of as your social environment. Of course, a good environment is key to being well and happy. But how does that work with different personality types? What adjustments can we make to our social environment so that we feel better and healthier? And how do we cope with maybe those difficulties in interactions with other people that can’t be changed? Before I press play on the music, I’m going to hit you with another quote, which is, ‘Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.’ Who said that? ‘Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.’ So a little something for you to think about there. Answer at the end of the show.

Welcome aboard for Episode 33 of the back pain liberation podcast. I’m in Barker here to help you find your way out of chronic back pain. I just check the show stats, and I’m very excited, we have over 17,000 plays now. I don’t think it’ll be long before we hit 20,000 plays, so I’m really looking forward to that next big milestone. It’s a real privilege that you invite me into your life by listening. I want to return the favor. I’d love to hear what’s going on with you. Your back pain successes and setbacks, your views on the show, and anything else here at Back Pain liberation. Really how I can best serve you the listener. To arrange a one to one chat with me via Skype or Zoom, go to www dot back pain liberation.com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me, that URL again, www pain liberation.com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me no other characters or spaces, or just follow the link in the show notes for episode number 33.

So for me, one of the great things about podcasting is that I get to have fascinating conversations with a whole lot of different people who’ve been on a similar journey to me. Almost all of my guests have, like me, personally experienced chronic back pain. Figured out for themselves, how to deal with the problem, and come out the other side stronger, having developed an understanding of what caused the pain in the first place. A self-awareness. Also like me, they’ve then thought to themselves, ‘Do you know what, it wasn’t easy to fix my back pain. I got conflicting advice. And plenty of that was just nonsense. I had to find my own way. It was difficult and took a long time. But I’m in good shape now. What about all the other people who are struggling with the same problem, the same pain spoiling their quality of life? Instead of letting them struggle on alone, like I had to, I could share what I’ve learned what I’ve found that works, I could help them. This could be something good, something special. Chronic back pain’s such a huge problem, this could be my way to do something positive in the world.’ So because my guests and I have independently of each other, kind of reached the same place, we’re sort of like minded, and we have a natural understanding. And at the same time everyone brings their own unique perspective to the conversation. So there’s always food for thought as the saying goes. My last guest, Abby Beauchamp mentioned two things that got me thinking. First was personality type, introvert versus extrovert. Of course not many people are purely introvert, or purely extrovert, they’re somewhere in between. But most people lean one way, or the other. Abby described herself as an extroverted introvert, which sounded like a contradiction in terms to me, until she explained it. As an example, she enjoyed being on stage speaking in front of a large audience, but afterwards felt completely drained, where a more extrovert person would likely feel energized. And when she was describing this personality type, straightaway I recognized myself. I know that some podcasters have a strictly organized schedule where they’ll set aside a day for back to back interviews. Never say never. But I don’t think that this method would work for me. I love interviewing, but I’m tired afterwards, I need to recharge the batteries. Right now, that means I move on to the other steps in the podcast creation process. The sound editing, production, writing the episode description and the show notes, creating an image that fits the subject matter, and a load of other stuff besides. Which is still work. But it’s a different kind of work I can get into, in my own way and at the risk of sounding sort of self centered, without having to think about other people. So after talking to Abby, I got googling to find out more, and took some of these introvert extrovert personality tests online, that are so hard to resist. Unsurprisingly, I tend towards introvert with some extrovert characteristics. When I’m working alone, my introvert side, gets some space and time to recover.

So what’s all that have to do with back pain? To answer that, we need to think about the second concept from Abby’s interview that’s been bumping around inside my head. And that concept is environment. When Abby was talking about our environment, she didn’t just mean our physical surroundings. Although that was part of it. She meant everything outside of ourselves, that impacts on us as individuals. Things like what we listen to, what we watch. Importantly, who we spend time with, as well as other external factors like traffic conditions, and work stress. A classic stress response is tension and tightness in the upper trapezius muscles. Maybe you don’t notice until after the event, or perhaps someone points out to you that your shoulders are up around your ears. And this is tightness in the upper traps. I was reading a post recently, this poor guy, his suspension arm broke while he was driving his car, so he lost control for a moment before wrestling it back onto the right side of the road and coming to a stop. Luckily, he wasn’t hurt. But it was, in his words, a buttock clencher that was the heading for the post ‘Rear suspension arms give way today, it was a butter clencher!’. And we all know what a white knuckle ride is. The point being that stress and tension in the mind translates to stress and tension in the body. Which might be a quote, I seem to remember one of my guests saying it but for life of me I can’t remember who it was, or even if they were quoting someone else. So if I’ve just appropriated someone’s profound words of wisdom without proper attribution. Sorry about that. Anyway, we know that psychological stress can induce the guarding response, where muscles tense up. If this goes on for too long, we end up with chronically tight muscles, discomfort, and pain. I started to get musculoskeletal problems about the time I left education, and started work. And I’m pretty certain that this is not a coincidence. I’d had part time jobs when I was in school and college. But this was different. For the first time I had real responsibility and felt pressure to perform. Mistakes weren’t a learning opportunity anymore. In the professional world, there are financial and even legal consequences to screwing up. Perhaps just as important, the social ramifications. You don’t want to be thought of, by your colleagues, and by management as the weak link on the team. So my first real job, if you like, was a maintenance engineer, the company had a contract to maintain all the traffic lights in northeast London. If any of them stopped working as they should, we had to get through the traffic, diagnose the problem and fix it – to a deadline. If we failed in that endeavor, then the company had to rebate a chunk of its fee. And you can bet that the management were keen to avoid this. And we were under pressure to prevent rebates any way we could. The company was a startup and us engineers were issued with lots of shiny new equipment, which was fun, including an estate car, which I believe is called a station wagon in the US to carry all our kit around in. This was the early 90s, I was about 22-23 years old. I was pretty pleased to have an interesting job, brand new company car, by the way I’ve never had a brand new car since then. It was a nice car, but had a heavy clutch. So in the UK, most cars have manual transmission – that’s a stick shift. Every time you pull away, come to a stop or change gear, you have to press the clutch pedal all the way down with your left foot. I was driving this big old car, or big new car with this heavy clutch from job to job in the horrible stop start London traffic and pushing that clutch pedal in, all day long, and it started to hurt my left knee. Every time I pressed that pedal down, I felt strain and pain in that left knee joint. And over time it got worse. I remember I used to try not to get too close to the car in front. If it stopped, I’d try creeping forward slowly in first gear, and hope that it would pull away again in time for me to avoid having to stop completely. But driving somewhere like London, there’s no avoiding stopping and starting most of the time.

My doctor couldn’t find anything wrong with my knee. I tried a compression sleeve to support the knee joint which helped a bit. Next, I tried seated leg extensions with weights in the gym, which helped more. In fact, doing this particular exercise was the only way I found to avoid knee pain, just from doing my job. I thought this was kind of weird, everyone else just got into their cars and drove without thinking about it. While I had to do weight training just to cope. But having a little extra incentive to hit the gym didn’t seem so bad. And the knee problem didn’t really impact on my life too much as long as I kept on top of it. So I didn’t worry about that too much. Years later, I was training a style of Qigong which is mostly single weighted. What this means is that all of your body weight is on one leg, until you change stance and transfer your weight to the other leg. Good form requires you to have your weight-bearing knee slightly bent. So each time I was single-weighted on the left leg with the knee bent, I got pain, that same pain in the joint of the left knee that I used to get years earlier from pushing the clutch pedal down. But by now I’d learned a new way of thinking about this kind of problem, I’d come to understand that like many people, I tend to unconsciously tense the muscles around the hip. So I focused my attention on the left hip to consciously relax it. Sure enough, as I worked my way around to the front of the hip, the hip flexors relaxed, and the pain in my knee melted away. So this is the difference between a mind body exercise like authentic Qigong, and other exercise types, like pumping weights. It’s not that weight training is mindless, its beneficial to I guess increase blood flow to the area and strengthen the joint, muscle and connective tissues. But to identify and address the real cause of the problem, tightness in the hip flexors, pulling my knee joint out of whack, took the kind of inner focus and awareness that’s the essence of Mind Body modalities. And these are the kinds of topics I’d really like to get into in a one to one conversation with you. Because you’re listening to my show, right now. This is a big deal to me, and I’m interested in you as an individual. What are the factors in your life that aggravate your back problems? Are you considering an exercise program? Maybe you already do some training? What’s working for you, and what’s stopping you from making progress or even getting started? Maybe I can help you find a better way. And of course, it helps me to improve the show whenever I can get more insight into who’s actually listening. So don’t be shy. This is your opportunity to talk to someone who understands really what you’re going through. Because I’ve been through it myself and come out the other side stronger, pain free. So to book a call, go to www dot back pain liberation dot com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me, that’s www dot back pain liberation dot com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me no other characters, no other characters or spaces, or just follow the link in the show notes for Episode 33. So anyway, back to my story, a couple of aspects of that particular job that, again, with hindsight, were pretty much perfect for me. First of all, I’ve always liked fixing stuff, which was obviously a basic requirement. Years later, I’m still not someone to throw something away when it breaks down. I like to figure out what’s wrong with it and make it work again, I just find this satisfy. The second aspect is a bit more on-topic its about the social environment. There were around half dozen of us engineers, sometimes we’d help each other out on a job or meet up for breakfast if we were nearby. But most of the time I was out and about on my own going from job to job fixing stuff. There was a friendly dispatcher on the other end of the radio, this being before mobile phones, and I could call my boss or my colleagues if I needed help, or advice. There was some team meetings and admin at the demo. Now and again, we’d work with another department on new installations.

You spend a fair chunk of your waking hours at work. So your job has quite an impact on your life. I definitely experienced some stress from this job, that I didn’t handle well. But I think the social environment was just about right for me. So no added stress in that respect and I didn’t suffer back pain when I was working there. As I said the company was a startup, and there were always cash flow problems. Long story short, it went bust after a year or so. I’d been thinking about a career change even before taking that job. And I’d already passed the selection process for the Metropolitan Police Service, also in London. And they gave me a start date about the same time that that company bit the dust. Sometimes it seems like fate has plans for you. So February 1993, having only known school, casual work, college, which was like school, but you decided yourself whether you turn up to lectures, and working for a year with minimal supervision. I turned up with my suitcase at Hendon Police College in northwest London. And boy was I in for a shock. So just like the society its drawn from the police service in the UK has changed drastically in the last 25 to 30 years. There’s less formality. individuality is accepted, even encouraged. It’s all about being inclusive. Let me tell you, this was not how it worked when I went through recruit training in the early 90s. So this was a five month residential course. There were a few ex-military guys in my intake. It was a breeze for them, or it seemed that way to me anyway. It was a kind of light version of what I imagine army basic training to be like. In the morning was parade. Hundreds of new recruits formed up in ranks in front of Peel House named after the founder of the modern Police Service. Sir Robert Peel, whose statue stood at the entrance. Uniform and appearance were inspected under Sir Roberts watchful gaze. Shortcomings were noted. So you’d better have a perfectly ironed shirt and boots bulled to a mirror finish, or there be trouble. We learned foot drill, law and procedure, arrest and restraint. There was an obstacle course I still remember the technique we learned to get down from a high wall in the event that you needed to do this whilst in pursuit of a suspect. I still use it down again, actually. If you’re interested, you dangle from your fingertips, let go with one hand, use that hand to push away from the wall to turn yourself around as you fall. So you don’t hit the ground, toppling over backwards. Disclaimer, try that at your own risk. But it does work. We trained life saving the pool was maybe 100 meters from the main building. And we were expected to march there as a team. In fact, we were expected to do everything as a team. Teamwork fitting into the group and the organization were valued highly. In fact, they were central to the training. Respect for rank and seniority was demanded. Rules and regulations were to be followed. No exceptions. There were role-plays. Someone would be chosen from the group to deal with an allegation of maybe assault or theft. Two or three others would be briefed in their roles as victim, witness or suspect. And this scenario would be played out in front of the team and the instructors and would usually end up with an arrest or some other police process. Sometimes we’d be outside, but there were some rooms setup for specific scenarios. I remember there was a mock up of a shop in the basement complete with cornflake boxes and tins of beans on the shelves. As a newbie in the real world. You could expect to be dealing with your fair share of shoplifters. So we practiced for that. Something that popped up in my Quora feed today, this guy said that basic training in the US Army was a walk in the park compared to living on on a Nebraska farm. Instead of getting up in the middle of a night to check on the animals in calving season, he had to be in bed between 9pm and 5am. There were three square meals a day at set times, instead of grabbing a bite whenever the work was finished. And compared to long days, manual labor on the farm. The PT was easy. It felt like a holiday. And he put on weight living the good life. Looking back Hendon training school should have been easy for me. Accommodation was on site, all you had to do was go downstairs to the dining hall and breakfast was there waiting for you. It was a minutes walk to parade, the work day was eight to four.

I found the classroom work fairly easy, always got high test scores, I think they were really looking for people with the leadership skills to improve the performance of the team. And if I’d been more naturally extrovert and group oriented, I might have paid more attention to the one or two who were struggling and tried to help them out. We had evenings free and the world’s shortest commute back to our rooms. But I didn’t have that team leader instinct. So instead of taking the initiative to help out the team members who needed it, I usually studied for a little while or did some training with the same two or three guys, before hitting the bar, which was also on the ground floor, of the accomodation block. My salary hit the bank account each month with no expenses for housing, utilities. Even food was free, unless we went out to eat. It should have been an easy life for five months. But I’d only been there a couple of weeks before I started to get back pain by my shoulder blade. Ther was PT of some sort at least once a day. On top of that some of us trained in the evenings as I mentioned. So from a cardio and probably strength point of view, I was in the best shape I’ve ever been. I put the ache in my back down to muscle strain and got someone to spray the area with Deep Heat. By the way, I googled Deep Heat because I wasn’t sure my American listeners would know what I was talking about. It turns out, it’s actually a US product. And you guys call it Mentholatum Deep Heating Rub. Now this sounds to me like something from a traveling Medicine Show in the Old West wich is a bit more fun than plain old Deep Heat. But it’s the same stuff. That’s just what it’s marketed under in the UK. Anyway, Deep Heat didn’t make any difference didn’t help my back one bit. And the back pain would just come and go for no apparent reason. Over time, it would come more and go less. It spread to other areas of the back and hurt more. The pain got worse over time. So at the time I assumed physical pain like this must be from an injury, like a sprain or strain. But I hadn’t injured myself that I knew of I just couldn’t figure out why I had this back pain. So recruits in the Met used to do some boxing. This was stopped, sadly in my view, even before I joined. We learned some very basic wrestling. And I wondered if this was the issue. Maybe I picked up an injury there. Years later, I had a job where I was working regularly with forensic medical examiner’s. So that’s police doctors. One in particular was really good and very well respected, we’ll call him Dr. Neil. He was one of those people who spoke quietly. But when he said something, everyone listened. And I remember one of his pearls of wisdom. He said, ‘The best instrument in medicine is the retrospectoscope.’ Now I’m not a doctor, but I do have over 25 years personal experience of back issues. And I can confidently say that, in retrospect, it was no physical injury, causing my back pain as I was going through police recruit training.

So let’s take a break their tune in next time for more on personality types and environment and my, I guess, journey of discovery for want of a better expression. Before I go, a note of caution on MRI scans and back pain diagnosis. I was contacted recently by a listener to this show, I won’t mention his name, or go into detail. But long story short, he got an MRI scan in his mid 20s and was told that is S1-L5, so that’s the joint between the top of the sacrum and the bottom, of the lumbar spine was in the condition of a 50 year old manual laborer. And yet he went on to overcome his back problems through Mind Body training. So how do these two things fit together? The diagnosis is a defective or degraded joint in the spine. But this guy manages to get himself out of pain. And back to doing the things he loves to do, with exercise. Something doesn’t add up. So I just read read his email as I was preparing to record this episode. And it actually made me angry for a few reasons. First of all, I turned 50 last year, and I don’t appreciate 50 year olds being used as examples of worn out beyond repair basket cases. So yeah, I wasn’t happy about that at all. But more seriously, why would you say that to a young person?

When you’re in your twenties, 50 is old! Why would you tell someone at that age ‘Well, your spines worn out like an old man. Sorry about that’? I think most people put in that position would find that depressing and maybe even give up hope. And really, what does it even mean? Before I left the UK, I used to live next door to Phil, a landscape gardener. Phil was maybe five or 10 years older than me. So early to mid 50s at that time. So there’d been a storm and the fence between our two properties blew down. We repaired it together, which was great because he had the tools and the knowledge to make some improvements to the footings. So it would be stronger and better. But this did involve breaking up some concrete, which we did by hand with a digging bar, which is a big heavy steel bar that stands up to about shoulder height with a pointy end. And we took it in turns slamming this heavy metal bar down into the concrete over and over again until it broke up. And let me tell you that this was hard, manual work that Phil did every day. And he was fit and strong. And I just couldn’t keep the pace. When I started seeing spots in front of my eyes. I knew it was time to sit down, take a little breather and just watch Phil work for a while. He did not complain of back pain. Despite being a manual worker in his 50s he was just in great shape. Degenerative disc disease is present in a large proportion of the population, and does indeed become more common with age. But most people who have what would show up as an abnormality on an MRI scan, are happily getting on with their lives without experiencing back pain. My guest on episode 19 Dr. Sebastian Gonzales said that while an MRI can be a useful diagnostic tool in certain circumstances, the idea that is somehow the gold standard way to get a definitive diagnosis of what’s really causing your back pain is misguided. So definitely check out Episode 19 for more on this subject. A common phrase used by medical professionals particularly involved in back pain rehab, is this ‘You are not your MRI’. Try googling that exact phrase, ‘You are not your MRI’, and you’ll see what I mean. And yet people are told to come into a hospital put in a big expensive MRI machine. And then given the results by a doctor. And if this authority figure tells them that their back hurts because their spine is prematurely worn out, they’re going to believe him or her. Finally they have a diagnosis which then defines the problem in their minds, and almost defines them as individuals. I’m contacted all the time, by people listing which of the joints in their spine are defective. Look on a Facebook group for back pain sufferers and this will be the opening line in many of the posts. And I always think ‘Really? Are you sure that’s what’s causing your pain? Are you sure surgery is necessary? Have you exhausted all the other possibilities first?’ And on the flip side are the people who do suffer chronic back pain, and the MRI scan comes up negative. So they are told that it’s all in their head. Again, MRIs show structure, they don’t show pain. That’s all I’ve got to say about that. The quote at the beginning of the show, ‘Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom’ is from the ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle. Probably. The phrase was certainly around in the classical Greek period, although it can be hard to sort of pin down the exact source of quotes from the ancient world. This one is widely attributed to Aristotle. So we’ll go with that.

And just final reminder to book a call with me to talk about how you’re getting on with your back issues and other stuff. Go to www.backpainliberation.com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me for that. That URL again www.backpainliberation.com slash talk hyphen to hyphen me no other characters or spaces. And I think I really am done now. So thanks for listening to Episode 33 of the back pain liberation podcast. I’m Iain Barker all the best

Transcribed by https://otter.ai