Stiff, compressed back by evening? These 4 standing moves help create space.
Your back can feel stiff and compressed by the end of the day, like you just want somebody to pull you apart and create a little space in your spine. There may actually be something to that feeling. Your spine spends much of the day under compression from gravity, sitting, standing, carrying weight, and general muscular tension.
Compression isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Your spine is designed to handle load. But sometimes changing those forces and creating a little more space can feel really good and have a lot of positive benefits for your nervous system.
As a fitness trainer, I use a handful of simple standing exercises to give my clients’ spines that space. These four moves, plus a bonus for your jaw, can help you undo a day of compression without a machine.
What Decompression Actually Means
You’ve probably heard this called spinal decompression. But what does decompression actually mean, and can you really accomplish it with exercise?
When people hear the term spinal decompression, they usually picture a machine pulling on the spine. Technically, that’s closer to how decompression, or traction, is clinically studied. But there’s another concept I want you to understand, and that is simply creating space.
Between each vertebra is an intervertebral disc. Behind those discs are the facet joints. Between adjacent facet joints, there are openings called intervertebral foramina, where the spinal nerves exit. You don’t really need to know all those terms, but it can be nice to know them, especially if you’re discussing your back with a clinician.
When the mechanical environment of the spine changes, the relationships between all these structures can change as well. Research using mechanical traction has measured temporary increases in disc height and changes in the space available around different parts of the spine. Researchers have also observed changes associated with fluid movement within the intervertebral discs themselves.
How Exercise Creates Space
That doesn’t mean an exercise is doing exactly the same thing as a traction machine, and that’s an important distinction. What we’re really trying to accomplish with these exercises is to actively create length and reduce compressive forces through specific areas of the spine.
Instead of simply hanging from something or having a machine pull on you, you’re going to use very specific positioning and muscular tension to create an active form of what we call axial elongation. That’s just another way of saying stretching or lengthening the spine.
I like to think of it as giving the spine an opportunity to create some space. We’re taking an area that spends most of the day being loaded and intentionally changing its mechanical environment. Depending on the position, that may alter loading through the disc, change the relationship of the facet joints, and potentially reduce compression around the sensitive structures.
We’re not trying to avoid loading your spine. A healthy spine needs loading. We’re trying to give it both sides of the equation: appropriate compression and opportunities for relative decompression.
Jefferson Curl
Holding weights technically puts you in a compressive position, since they’re pulling down on the spine. But as the weights pull you past your toes, you create a stretch from the back of your calves all the way up through the crown of your head. Because your spine is in flexion, the vertebrae start to pull apart. The longer you stay here, the deeper gravity pulls on the weight, letting you create more and more space through your spine.
How to Do It:
- Stand at the edge of a step, or anything that lets you reach down to your toes and, as your flexibility improves, past your toes.
- Hold a pair of dumbbells. If you don’t want to use weight to start, that’s totally fine.
- Gently tuck your chin and let your spine articulate down.
- Let the weight start to stretch and pull you. Relax and try to breathe into your back.
- Let your head drop and relax as the weights pull you deeper and deeper.
- Pull your belly in to activate your TVA, the deepest layer of your abdominals. This pushes your organs back toward your spine, which gives you a little more stability and helps create a little more space.
- Hang out here for about 60 seconds.
- Set the weights down, then slowly articulate your way back up. Take a couple of nice, deep, relaxing breaths.
- Roll back down, articulating one vertebra at a time, find your weights, and hold for another 30 to 60 seconds before setting them down and rolling back up.
Avoid These Mistakes:
- Don’t fight the weight. Relax and let gravity pull you deeper.
- Set the weights down before you come up. The goal is to decompress the spine, so don’t load it on the way back up.
- Don’t rush the roll-up or roll-down. Articulate your vertebrae one at a time.
Sets and Reps: 3 to 5 reps, 1 to 3 sets.
Form Tip: Remember the whole concept is to pull the vertebrae apart, so breathe into your back the entire time.
Dowel Deep Squat
Each time you inhale in this position, your ribs lift a little. The ribs are attached to the vertebrae, so movement in the ribs can create movement in the vertebrae. The more flexion you have in the spine, the more those vertebrae pull apart and create space. The longer you sit here, the more gravity helps you, and the more ligamentous creep sets in, giving you more length through each vertebral junction and eventually through the entire spine.
How to Do It:
- Hold a dowel for stability. If you don’t have one, a chair, a railing, or a bar works just as well.
- Squat down as far as you can. Maybe that’s partway, or maybe you can get all the way down.
- Keep your hands up on the dowel. Let your head drop and let your pelvis drop.
- Breathe into your back. With each inhale, you should see your ribs lift a little.
- If you feel good and have solid balance and flexibility, let go of the dowel and let everything stretch.
- When you’re ready to come out, walk yourself back up, using the dowel if you need it.
Avoid These Mistakes:
- Don’t force the depth. Squat only as far as you comfortably can.
- Don’t let go of your support until your balance and flexibility are good.
Sets and Reps: Hold for 1 to 5 minutes, depending on your fitness and comfort level, for 1 to 3 sets.
Form Tip: Watch for your ribs lifting on every inhale. That rib movement is what helps move the vertebrae.
Standing ELDOA
This is one of my absolute favorites. You’re getting your spine as flat as possible, what we call axial elongation, and then using your breath to add movement. As you breathe and your ribs expand, they help move the vertebrae they attach to, creating more space.
How to Do It:
- Take a wide base, wider than your hips and shoulders.
- Turn your knees and thighs in, then bend your knees a little.
- Tuck your pelvis under, like you’re tucking a belt buckle up toward your belly button. Keep your abs relaxed.
- Tuck your chin so your neck lengthens, and push your tailbone down.
- Bring your arms out in front, spread your fingers, bend your wrists, spiral your arms open, and bring them up.
- Lift your shoulder blades up toward your ears as you gently tuck your pelvis under.
- Breathe through your belly to create nice movement of the diaphragm.
Avoid These Mistakes:
- Don’t brace your abs. Keep them relaxed while you tuck your pelvis.
- Don’t breathe shallowly. Look and feel for movement of the ribs with each breath.
Sets and Reps: Hold for 60 seconds continuously, 1 to 3 sets.
Form Tip: Play around with the width of your arms to see if you can lift a little higher.
Standing Diaphragmatic Breathing
Your diaphragm is a dome-shaped muscle. When you inhale, it pushes down, which pushes your internal organs forward, down, and back. As those organs move, they can put different stretches on different parts of the spine.
How to Do It:
- Beginner version: Bend down and support yourself with your hands on your knees. Keep your spine flat and breathe from your belly, feeling for extension and lateral movement of the rib cage.
- Once that’s easy, stand up with a slight bend in your knees.
- Take big inhales and exhales.
- Done well, the first two-thirds of each breath comes mostly from the diaphragm. The last third comes from the secondary respiratory muscles: pec minor, intercostals, serratus anterior, and scalenes.
- Notice everything lifting on the inhale and relaxing on the exhale.
Avoid These Mistakes:
- Don’t do too many breaths in a row. You don’t want to get lightheaded, and you certainly don’t want to pass out.
- Don’t lock your knees. Keep a little bend so no joints are locked.
Sets and Reps: 3 to 5 breaths, then take a short break. Run 3 to 4 rounds.
Form Tip: Master the supported beginner version before moving to standing.
Bonus: TMJ Self-Massage
TMJ stands for temporomandibular joint, and just like your spinal column, it has a disc in it. This gentle self-massage gives that joint some space too.
How to Do It:
- Put your fingers on the edge of your jaw. If you can’t find the joint, open and close your mouth a few times and you’ll feel the space.
- Open your jaw and gently push a little in and a little forward with your fingers.
- Close and relax your jaw, and relax your fingers.
- Repeat the rhythm: open, push, close, relax.
- Next, glide your jaw side to side: left, right, left. This is called lateral trusion, which just means gliding.
- Once that’s comfortable, add resistance. Glide your jaw to the right while your right hand resists, then push back with your hand while your jaw resists. Switch to the left side and keep working back and forth.
Avoid These Mistakes:
- Don’t press hard. I can’t overemphasize this: be gentle.
Sets and Reps: 60 to 90 seconds for each drill. I set a timer.
Form Tip: Sync your fingers with your jaw. Push as you open, relax as you close.
