Lower Back Pain During Pregnancy – Back Pain Specialists in the NYC Tri-State Area

By: Dr. Sarah Wendler, PT, DPT, OCS

Back pain during pregnancy

Lower back pain during pregnancy is the most common and prevalent source of pain for women in the pre-partum months and the pain can be due to many reasons. 

The top 2 reasons for back pain during pregnancy are anatomical and hormonal changes.

The great news is that women’s health physical therapists at FemFirstHealth in the New York City Tri-state Area can fully address the structural and anatomical changes.

Prenatal physical therapists can also educate you in the hormonal changes that can impact lower back pain, and patients can follow that expertise to prevent and alleviate the pain as best they can.

The best attitude for preventing back pain during pregnancy is to fully educate yourself in the process and prevent the impact to your body as much as possible before the baby arrives.

Changes to the body during pregnancy

The anatomical changes to the body during pregnancy include:

• Increased laxity and movement of the joints due to hormonal changes

• Decreased stability of joints

• Increased curvature of the lower back as belly and baby grow and increased forward (anterior) pelvic tilt

These are only a few of the changes, but these are the most important to address when preventing and treating lower back pain.

In regards to the hormonal changes, there is a hormone called Relaxin that is present at the beginning of pregnancy, and it slowly increases over time.

This hormone causes the increase in ligamentous laxity which prepares our body to accommodate the growth of the baby and the opening of the pelvis. 

Unfortunately with these changes comes the increasing lack of stability and excessive movement of the spine and the pelvis. This is usually the culprit of lower back pain.

Treating pain during pregnancy

Obviously again, many factors contribute to lower back pain, but the ones we can absolutely control are counteracting the structural stability and laxity changes with proper alignment and stability.

A women’s health physical therapist can help you create a custom plan of treatment. Contact us today for an appointment.

Below are some examples of simple alignment and structural changes that will provide some relief.

Pregnancy is a really good time to work on yourself and help improve strength and prevent pain before the new baby comes. 

There is little time to be selfish during the newborn months, and it is proven that prenatal physical therapy prevents worsening of pain and issues postpartum.

Back pain exercise

To help alleviate some of the pain in your back, try lying down with your back on the floor, but take care and use proper form.

In the first image below, you can see the space under my lower back and excessive forward tilting of my pelvis. This is incorrect form and we want to avoid this position as much as possible. 

In the next image, you can see how I’ve corrected the excessive tilt and curve in my spine.

You can see I’m drawing in my abdominals and tilting my pelvis more to a neutral position.

You can hold this 10 seconds x 10 at least 3 times a day.

This technique applies to all positions including supine, sitting, and standing.

This will put the least amount of stress on the lower back and allow for more abdominal contraction.

Correct form