But even then we tend to neglect it. If a tooth starts aching, we mostly make to the dentist rather soon. If our kidneys are revolting, here we end up in the emergency room. If there is a pinching in the breast, it could be cancer or the announcement of an infarct, and off to the specialist we take. But our back?

It had some pain yesterday, has some pain today, will most likely be painful tomorrow, and we just do nothing. “Can’t be that bad”, we say, “will be gone and forgotten next week”, we think. We never heard of somebody dying from back failure, we never saw somebody collapsing on back pain, there is no such thing as “back cancer”, so why care?

And indeed our back is one of the hardiest parts of our body. It takes a lot of damage before it starts complaining. But consider this: there are millions of people living happily after bypass surgery or kidney transplants, and you can live on with a new heart without really feeling much of a difference. But you never heard of “back transplants”, and once your back is messed up, so will be your life:

Your back carries and protects all your vital organs, and almost all your vital nerves run through your back. So once your back is having problems, most likely your whole body will be severely affected - whether you realize and feel it or not.

So what about taking a little back care?

A well functioning body needs lots of nerves for control, coordination and signal transmissions. These nerves are the very center of our life support, but at the same time they have to be soft and vulnerable. Only then they can react fast and sensitive, can keep our body alert and nimble, and this means they have to be protected very well and at all times.

For this protection we mainly have two powerful shells. One is the skull, and the other one is the vertebral column. Construction of the skull was easy for Mother Nature: basically just nothing but a ball of thick bone.

But the brain inside needed some kind of “data highway” to be connected to rest of the body, and that is where the real challenge set in: to create something like a very strong tunnel to withstand lots of pressure and same time keep this tunnel as flexible as a rope. What no human engineer could ever master, Mother Nature did so with our spine. This is such an outstanding accomplishment that biologists indeed named a whole order of species accordingly: the vertebrates. Humans are vertebrates.

The weak point however is where the nerves have to leave the spine to reach their final destination. For this purpose our vertebral “data highway” needs holes for the nerves to come out from the bone and proceed into the flesh. Holes that have to be part of this structure that at the same time needs to be so strong and so flexible.

And it is at these points that we suffer frequent damage: when spines or cartilage are worn out or injured, when the holes are getting too big or too small, when nerves are getting irritated or squeezed.

But now look at us as of today… There is hardly anybody left who still does what he was designed for. From the perspective of a back, we have a kind of a perverted two class society: those ones who hardly ever move in their offices and cars, and those ones who spent their life with very few restricted movements behind cashiers and assembly lines. And what we were originally supposed to do all day long, we have compressed into a couple of minutes per day in the best case and we call that fitness.

Add to that the fact that thanks to civilization our life span has more than doubled and it comes as no surprise that things do not work well for our back: about 90% of US citizens are plagued by back problems, most of them to a degree that they frequently have to seek treatment.

Do not wait for the pain to come. Keep your back sharp and fit. If you have an unhealthy job - and today almost everybody has an unhealthy job - don’t think half an hour of daily aerobics will compensate for that. They will not. Nor will two weeks of vacation per year. Of course you always have the best intentions of what healthy things you will be doing in these two weeks, but you will not do them and even if, it will not be enough.

The absolute minimum is estimated at about one hour back care per day, come fire or in-laws. If you really have only one hour per day, then swimming is supposed to be the best back training you can have in a short time. If you can afford more time, add some yoga or tai chi or other style gymnastics to that. And never consider this to be “lost time”. It is time gained indeed. Gained by deeper sleep, higher performance, less time at the doctor and better spirits.

Now the first thing you should do is to go to the “back school”. This is how programs are called that are designed to teach you and your back to find back to a healthy, back-conscious behavior once the problems have begun.

There are quite a number of such back schools, more than we could list up and describe here, so one single famous example shall do at this point:

The Feldenkrais Method aims at reuniting body and mind to achieve refinement in body movement and self-awareness. Today it is held in especially high esteem by many dancers and actors. But it was originally developed to cure disorders resulting from injuries and habitual wrong movements.

One of the advantages of the Feldenkrais Method is that is does not come as a “medical therapy” but rather as a holistic approach to make you remember how an healthy body would feel like. It is thus very pleasant for people who hate to feel “sick”.

There are thousands of Feldenkrais practitioners today worldwide, so expect one to be in your neighborhood.

But this is how the world goes, so we will give some advice for all our far too many I-have-no-timers.

Generally speaking non-steroid anti-inflammatory drugs, so called NSAID’s, have been established in the last decades as world’s preferred defense against back pain. They have few side effects, are mostly well tolerated, cheap and easily available over the counter. As the name suggests, they fight inflammations, which in most cases are part of any back pain, and at the same time are real painkillers. Ibuprofen is among the best ones against back pain, if you want something even stronger you can go for diclofenac.

But keep in mind: even very time tested drugs like NSAID’s are not meant to be taken over a longer period of time. So if your back does not stop hurting after a few days, you must see a doctor. If you do not, your back will force you to do so sooner or later, and then you will have time. Guaranteed.

It includes a couple of traditional herbal alternatives, some familiar to you, others probably not.

The first one would be essential peppermint oil. This is best applied in the way of a good massage. Even if you have little time and money, your painful back should warrant this investment once a week - this way return to real back care. Essential peppermint

oil improves blood circulation, relaxes muscles and reduces inflammations. In combination with massage it is very relieving for back pain.

Capsaicin is a substance won from cayenne pepper. It basically does the same like essential peppermint oil, but it is stronger and not applied by massage but usually as a plaster. Your local pharmacy should have such plasters, but they are also widely available over the Internet.

Highly efficient against back pain finally is Kratom. This is a plant from Asia, scientifically called mitragyna speciosa. Kratom has to be taken internally, usually in the form of a tea. Kratom also is widely available over the Internet and this is also the source for a wide variety of recipes for various Kratom preparations to help against back pain.