Pop Your Sacroiliac Joint Back In (5 Proven Methods)

This article is a transcribed, edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in January 2024. For the original video, go to https://youtu.be/pnPdVTUmz4c

Brad: Oh, sorry, I'm late, Mike. Right SI pain. It's a problem I've had for years. I know how to take care of it. As well as it's really enjoyable when you get rid of it just like that, as a therapist and your patient, it puts a smile on their face immediately.

Mike: So we're going to go through five proven methods we've used with patients to leave them feeling better and relieve their pain.

Brad: There you go. All right, so we're going to go through five different techniques that we've had success with, and they really put a hamper and successfully deleted that pain in the SI joint. But what I'd like you to do is go through all five of them, perform them gently. You'll know some of them will work, some of them won't, so do them gently at first. If they create pain, scratch it off, go on to the next one.

Mike: So, tip number one is actually a real patient Brad used to work with. They walked about 50 feet, and they'd be limping so bad it almost looked like their leg was broken.

Brad: Wait, wait, that's a little bit off, but you're close. It was actually someone who was viewing a video.

Mike: Oh.

Brad: Yeah, and he's a friend of mine, and he called me. He said this idea about putting a belt around the waist really worked for me. He walked 50 feet, pain, pain, put the belt on, pain went down to zero with walking. What belt? It's an SI belt. Let's talk about this. You can easily do this at home. Take a belt that you can adjust fairly easily, and we're going to put it around your waist. The placement is very critical. Make sure you put it so it goes around your pelvic bones.

Brad: If you get too high in that hollow spot, it won't help. If you get too low around the waist, it won't help. And you put it on there. I'll demonstrate with a belt, and what you need to do is simply get it in that location, and then you pull it nice and snug. That's why you need a belt that's the right size. And then walk with that snug feeling around there, and if your pain drops from an eight down to a two or better, you're right on. You're going to want to use an SI belt, which you can purchase; they're not too expensive. Mike has one on right now.

Mike: Yeah, this one's just called a Serola SI belt. That's the one that we have here at the studio. You simply put it on, like Brad was showing you with the normal belt, as tight as you can. But this one has two extra straps, and this is how it gets tighter yet. So you can see in the back when I pull it, it makes it tighter, and then I pull it up front like that and Velcro it on. Again, you have to make sure you get over the SI joint to actually keep your pelvis more compressed.

Brad: Right. If the regular belt's working fine for you, you don't need to purchase one. And then in his case, he just wore one of these for a few days every time he was up walking. His pain subsided, and the SI joint went back into place. It reduced, I should say, and he was fine. It was a win-win situation for all involved. All right, now this next patient, she came in, she was in her 40s, and she complained of right SI pain when she was walking or standing. It wasn't severe, but it was, you know, one of those pains you could easily live without. So I did the assessment, and I tried a muscle energy technique. If you're a therapist, you know what I mean. And there are two different ways to do it. I use this one on myself from time to time, and it worked really well for her, and I had good luck with other patients as well. You can do it seated. I usually try it in supine or lying on my back. You can do it on the floor, probably better. Carpeted floor. You can do it on your bed; a firm bed is better. And you're going to lie on your back. If I have pain on the right side, what I'm going to do is you're going to do it on both legs. I usually try the technique on the good leg first. You can put the other leg down or up. Do whichever way works for you, you know, experiment. But this is a technique, I'm going to take my hands, go over this knee, and pull it up tight. You can actually wrap your arm around it because we want to really stabilize this knee so it doesn't move. We're going to do an isometric push going away from you, but we're going to hold it stable with our hands or forearms. Typically, I'll have the other leg go down right away, and sometimes just moving that leg down puts enough torque on that SI joint to put it back in place or reduce it, and you'll feel it better, feel better already.

Brad: If that's the case, you're right on. You may not even have to do the isometric. Usually, I'll have the person do it. Then we push for a count of six, and then relax. So assess the pain. Does it feel better when you go up, and when you push, does it continue to make it feel better? Take note of that and then do the same with the other leg. Okay, this would be the sore one, the same thing. Put the leg down, push for six seconds, and assess how it feels. If it feels better with the right or the left, whichever one makes the pain reduce, you're good. That's the exercise.

Brad: You're going to do it three times a day or more. Every time you do it, it feels better, and it'll get that SI joint back into place. It may be that neither one helps and they just both hurt, or they don't do anything. Then we'll go on to one of the other techniques coming up. All right, this technique I actually learned from a therapist I worked with. It's really easy to do; it either works or doesn't. Very simple. You can do it seated like Mike is or lying down, and you're just going to be in a hook-lying position if you're lying, just like Mike is there in a firm-backed chair, not in a soft, cushy recliner or a sofa. And what we're going to do is we're going to do another isometric, going out with our knees, hold it for five to six seconds, and then we're going to squeeze our knees together. I'll talk about some more details. So let's go out first, Mike.

Mike: So when you go out, you can use your hands, or if someone else is available, they can push. And what I'm doing is pushing against them as hard as I can, but I'm not actually moving. I'm just holding this position here. And you can kind of mess around with where your legs are. Most people feel pretty good in a neutral position like this, feet shoulder-width apart. Some people you can try getting closer to and pushing out, but it may be more uncomfortable. Just do what motion feels good for you when going out like that.

Mike: And then we want to do the opposite direction, so resist pushing your knees together. You can either use two fists like this, or you can push out like this as well. This may get tiresome. If you happen to have some type of firm ball, you can do that as well because you can't move past this position.

Brad: There you go. So you're gonna, again, hold it for five to six seconds. If you're lying down, you can hold it with your hands, but that's kind of hard. I suggest taking a belt and putting it around your knees. Use the old belt again, and it makes it much easier. I'm going to push out, assess how the responds, if it's painful or not. If it's painful, you're not going to go any further with that. And then I do like the ball as well, or using two fists, but a firmer ball will probably be better, but this is working fine, and then I squeeze in. If one way makes the pain go down, then that's your exercise. A lot of times, one way will make it a little worse. Going the opposite direction will be better. And always follow the pain-free or the direction that feels better. Listen to your body. It's telling you what it likes.

Brad: Number four, I just got back from a continuing education course, and they taught me this technique. And lo and behold, I had a SI patient come in, he is about a male, 35 years old, he had left SI pain. So what I did was I had him sit between a door. The door has to be wide enough; it's too narrow, it won't work. I don't know if this is a 36-inch door. Whatever. You sit there on a stool or a chair, and you're going to take a foot and bring it up on the door frame. This is actually a muscle energy technique; you don't need to know that, and I'm going to push that way with my back against the door here. And it's an isometric, again. We're going to push. And I'm pushing, I'm not maxing out, I'm sussing. If I push and it feels good, it's good. You're going to continue to do that one, maybe three repetitions, hold it for five seconds, three or four times a day.

Brad: As long as it continues to put that and reduce that SI joint, it will feel better. If you do this and it hurts, the red flag comes up, you're done. You're not going to do that leg. Then try the other leg and see how that goes. Usually it's the side that hurts, but I always like to go to both sides and be complete. And again, the same rules. If it makes things worse, you're done with it. If it makes you feel better, you continue doing it. Sometimes this is not the right technique; it really will be a neutral situation. You can go on to the next one. Okay, I've already mentioned my right SI joint is unstable, and when it goes out, I know it. And these are two techniques that I consistently use to get it back in, and it works very well, like clockwork, actually. The first one is that you have a chair, or you can use a stairway. I oftentimes use a stairway because it's convenient at my house, and either way it's the same technique, and you're going to lean forward so the knee comes all the way up. Go a little deeper, Mike. There you go. Now lean forward so your right shoulder comes to your knee, get that right, there you go.

Brad: That works for me; it may not work for you. You may want to stay up. You'll know because your right side is going to tell you this feels good for me right now. And I do this for maintenance as well. Then I noodle the knee around, you can see Mike working it there. I'll come up like this, so I stretch the hip flexor on the other leg just to be a little more complete, seeing how I'm here, and that works well.

Brad: Oftentimes, if I'm up and working and it's tender or it's tight, this will release it quite quickly. The other thing I do is if you have a massage gun, you'll want to utilize it for this diagnosis. That's right, SI for me, and I have my massage gun out, I'm using it anyway, I'll use the air head typically. And now they've come out with this head that actually heats up or cools down. For this one, I'm going to put it in hot mode, and that's just going to warm it up. Be careful because you don't want to use a very aggressive, hard head when you get over the SI joint. You want to use that on your glute maximus, and I'll show you that in a bit. There you go, Mike is doing it there. He's got a soft head. Now that massage gun is the D6 model. It is a big, powerful 16 millimeter amplitude gun. If you are a larger person, a lot of muscle, more soft tissue, that might be a gun for you.

Brad: For the average person, the smaller T2 massage gun will work out fine. This is what I use. I actually have the C2 Pro massage gun, but they're very similar. Now this is exactly how I do it. I lie on my left side so my right hip is up, bring my right knee forward, and I let it drop down, and I'll just work with the soft airhead. I can go right over the bony aspect of the sacrum, and that works. As a matter of fact, right now I'm a very happy person. Feels good.

Brad: And then if you want to get more aggressive and you want to get to the other muscle, you know, at that point, that's where I'm going to easily put the other head on. It's nice and warm right now, and I'm going to stay away from that bony area. I want to get down to the large glute max muscle, and I can work that, and that heat will help relax that muscle. That muscle connects directly to that SI joint. When that muscle relaxes, it allows things to fall into place better, so it reduces. And this is the kind of thing, I'll also go down to my hamstring, not because it has a lot to do with the SI joint, it just feels good. I want to maintain some nice, loose hamstrings as well. So if you have a massage gun, use the right heads, use that technique.

Brad: Mike's doing it in standing, and it works well there as well when you're stretching out the hip if you try that.

Mike: Yeah, it's good to try different areas when you're massaging. If your muscles are more taut or relaxed, it can feel different and get in there differently. So just experiment in standing, lying down, and seated positions. It can work. And I mean this cushion head doesn't hurt to go on my SI joint. I wouldn't really recommend it, but I'm not in pain right now.

Brad: Yeah, you use the soft head, especially with the big guns, and you're going to be okay. You know, I've got a shoulder problem right now from swimming. This works really well. I'm just saying.

Mike: Well, that's for a different video, Brad.

Brad: Well, you know.

Mike: If you want more information on SI joint problems, you can check out our other video.

Brad: That's right. "SI Joint Pain: How to Get Immediate Relief." It just goes into a couple of these techniques and a little bit of a different angle. I think it'll help you out.

Mike: I'm helping you now.

Brad: Oh yeah, that shoulder's getting much better.