Yes, well... I injured mine (back) a very long time ago before there was WH&S.
Being bent over old fashioned card punch machines (computer cards kiddies) then the old disc drives that were as big as a washing machine. Only way to do the fine adjustments was to bend your back so you are reaching over the beast and the fine adjustments took about 15 to 20 minutes each. Couldn't straighten up after those episodes!
I was then in my early 20's.
Many years of back abuse later, after many doctors and pain killers, physio, chiro etc (even tried self-hypnosis!) I happened to find a sports Physiotherapist. He actually took the time to tell me how to lift stuff! After 20+years of doing it wrong. Nobody back then told you how!
After that my back was still bad - historic, but at least I could lift stuff, and refuse to do the work that stuffed my back in the first place.
Many years later, after still more incidents, I got to know a physiotherapist that not only agreed with the other bloke, but taught me how to relieve the spasms. Now that was a miracle. I have some bad discs in my back. When I get stressed and tired, and I overuse my back, to protect me from pain, the muscles around my spine go into spasm. (which hurts a lot more than the actual back pain!). But now I can deliberately relax those muscles. Two Nurofen and relax. Next day take it easy but exercise my back. Do the stretches etc and within a week its all good (well as good as it can be).
For those who may be interested, because I only worked for one company all my working life, and they really should have known better than to put me in those situations, I sued them. I had all the facts and evidence. And I won.
Didn't get much, but it did make me feel a lot better!
Just an example of some of the situations I was in: I had worked at a major supermarket with a critical server down. I worked on it for about 18 hours without a break. I knew the fault but we didn't have the right parts, so I had to try other ways. No joy so I had to order a whole server from interstate. That was late that night. Went home for some rest. Replacement server arrived next morning so I was there to swap it (or parts from it) out. A courier bought it in (to a cramped office/server room) in a shopping trolley (long story why). And left me to it. I couldn't dismantle it in the trolley so I lifted it out onto the floor (40 kilos by the way). That hurt my back big time, but the store was down. They were hand scanning everything. The replacement was a different model, so I couldn't swap out the faulty part. But it was compatible. But it, too was faulty. So I had to fix that one so the store could trade. Now I am in agony, but there is no alternative. Got it working (late that evening). THEN I had to load the faulty server into the trolley take it out to my car and load it into the boot of my car. No help available. My team were all deployed elsewhere.
I had some time off work after that, but it was by no means an isolated incident. Another example was unloading 500+ servers over 3 Saturday mornings. Each weighing 38 kilos, then stacking them up to head height ready for later deployment. Again no room for bad back or injuries, just get it done.
Hence I felt good when my case was proven.
If it helps anyone, the key is to lift with a straight back (duh!). Get your back in position and dont use the back muscles to lift, Just to hold it steady.
Stick your bum out as far as you can. Then lift with your arms and legs. Back straight - or partly concave if you can. Watch how the weightlifters do it.
Trouble is with a mower you have to lean over it to get it on the centre of gravity. They are a bad thing to lift. And most of us at our age dont have knees strong enough to use our legs to lift!
Use a motorcycle jack if you can, or a transmission jack. Have a browse through ebay. Some wonderful devices on there for lifting cars etc, so even the poor quality ones would easily lift a mower.
I am lucky, I have a retaining wall in my yard that I use as an outdoor workshop. At the back of the retaining wall is a ramp. So its up the ramp and work from the low side of the wall.
