lower back injury advice

well I hurt my lower back doing bent over rows a few months back, must've been early january as it was just before i came back to school... i took it easy for a while because, well, there wasn't any other way i COULD take it as it was pretty much difficult to move. I continued to work out upper body, but basically took all of my leg days as pretty much every exercise puts strain on your lower back and i couldn't take it, even with light weight. Eventually it got better, maybe 3 weeks later. once i could move without pain, i started slowly getting back into legs, only a couple exercises and light weight. was feeling pretty good and was doing medium reps of deadlifts and felt the pain again. as soon as i felt a strain on my back i dropped the weight and called it a day because i didn't want to really hurt myself. so i've decided i will not do any more bent over exercises in attempt to save my back. the problem comes in, though, that i can strain it doing ANYTHING at this point. the other day i hurt it by getting up from my chair too fast. then today i hurt it real bad by sneezing. it's rather frustrating. do i just continue to try to take it easy on it for a while? do i have to stop lifting all together for a while? doctor? chiropractor? not quite sure what to do here, especially with summer coming up. i don't want to spend all summer in pain...     

Ok it doesn't sound like a herniated disk or anything like that, but xrays are going to make sure it isn't a more serious problem.  So seeing a doctor might be smart to rule that one out.  You need to check your form on those exercises, and probably cease from doing anything like that, but more importantly you need to get things figured out and do physical therapy on your back, you want to work it doing various exercises, many of which you do on your hands and knees, such as arching your back then going the other way into a big hunch, things like bringing left arm out straight and right leg out striaght and alternate.  Raising one knee at a time straight to the side like a dog peeing.  Those are just a few that are simple and basic.  You aren't trying to make your back massive and strong at this point, but you want to tighten up those muscles so you aren't straining it doing little things.

Later on if it starts to feel healthy you can start doing ball hyper extrensions, and standard hypers and other tougher exercises like lying on your back and doing hip raises one leg at a time on a ball.  you'll wnat to gradually strengthen that back before doing deads and rows, and make sure you don't hunch when you do them.

http://www.discussbodybuilding.com/Seos-Log-2008-m442008.aspx

Same thing happened to me recently.
 
About a week ago I had a dull ache in my lower back, thought it was just strain after doing deadlifts. But on Saturday I was doing deadlift again and felt a sharp pain in my lower back on the left hand side, in close to my spine and I knew I'd done something. The pain was bad enough to make me stop. Couldn't train anything after that.
 
I've had pain since. It hurts when I walk or bend backwards (or try to)/ or bend down. Difficult to get a comfortable position in bed because of the pain. Hurts when I'm sitting up in a chair as well, like now at the computer.
 
I'm worried it's a herniated disc. There is a bit of swelling around the area where the pain seems to be coming from. Pain isn't as bad as it was on Saturday, but still too soon to lift weights again. No pain anywhere else except in this localised area on the left side of my lower back.
 
I'm wondering if that sounds like a torn ligament.
 
I've had no treatment yet except rest and it's not worth going to my doctor because he'll give me an appointment around about Christmas. :)
 
 
 
 

Seriously, if your doc can't see you find another one...

Your back is nothing to screw around with. I am not particularly Doctor happy, and I don't trust 3/4 of them, but some things you don't go the let's see what happens route.

If you have swelling around your spine, we would all be doing you a great disservice, to say anything other than to see a doctor for advice. I would not lift anything until he or she gives you the OK.

Thanks, I take your point. This is probably the most serious injury I've had. Can't believe it's still really painful after almost a week. I don't plan on doing any lifting until I have some idea of what I've done to my back. That would be completely crazy. Judging by the position and the type of pain, it seems likes Iliolumbar ligament sprain or tear, although the pain is slightly higher up than the 5th lumbar.

 i was doing deadlifts and i think i pulled my muscle or got a disk herniated hurts like heck.

219 weight trying to lower 217 now. 2 months later. lol.
250 bench
305 squat
345 deadlift