lifting tips for a local food service delivery guy?

they sell a back brace for lifting.

http://www.braceshop.com/productcar...27p19121.htm?gclid=COK9y5n2rLUCFQ45nAod5DAA8A

 

Get out of food service! Left sysco after 20 years, never felt better.

 

You will also start having elbow and knee issues. If you just started your back might get use to it, but I doubt it. Also most of those companies once you get hurt will kick you to the curve. So if you are going to stay in that for the long haul. Might want to hit the gym and do lots of knee and back exercises. I know once I left food service the pain stopped.

 

I never did food service but I do a lot of lifting on the dock and have had a bad back since I screwed it up at 18. I would just say use common sense and lift with your legs. Don't twist when lifting either.
Anyone with a bad back will attest to this - you won't throw it out lifting a couch.. You'll throw it out with a sneeze or something stupid like reaching for the remote.

 

Pay attention to what you are doing. Don't get in a hurry. Those two things will take you a long way. Use the back brace, and BE CAREFUL TAKING LOADS up and down that RAMP.

 

The only problem with wearing a back brace is that your body becomes dependant on it, and the day you forget it or don't put it on could be bad news.

 

We used to have to wear back belts on the dock until about 2006 when it was determined they really didn't do any good. The only thing it did for me was push my shirt up and my pants down. Back then I was still in crosstraining shape too.

 

It will eventually ruin your back. I did that for awhile, then went back OTR reefer; sometimes then I had to sleep in the truck sitting in a folding chair because if I laid down pain would shoot from my lower back down thru my legs. That OTR company recruited a lot of drivers from the beverage & food service companies because they couldn't handle the back pain any longer. Consider getting into the tanker/hazmat work; can make the same money. Usually the only labor is hooking up a hose and turning on a pump