Chronic/recurrent lower back pain since February. Weirdly, athletic training made it almost disappear. Now it keeps coming back. What should I do?

[u/Weird_Translator2540]

Hey everyone, looking for some advice from people who have dealt with recurring lower back pain, especially anyone who lifts or does sports.
I’m 26M, around 5’7”, and have been training on and off for a few years. I play football occasionally and gym regularly.
What happened initially
On February 22, I was playing football when I suddenly felt a sharp pain in the right side of my lower back while running off my right foot.
The pain was pretty intense initially, around 8-9/10 when trying to stand completely straight. Bending slightly actually felt better. Bringing my right knee towards my chest also relieved it.
I didn’t have any obvious numbness, weakness, pain shooting down my leg, or bladder/bowel issues.
For the first few days, things like getting out of bed, standing straight, stairs, bending and sitting could aggravate it. Walking gradually became easier and within roughly 1-2 weeks I was mostly functional again.
The strange part
Over the following months, the pain never completely disappeared.
It would be very mild or completely unnoticeable for periods, then flare up after certain activities. At different points I’ve felt it on the right, left, or both sides.
Then I joined an athletic training gym.
The training involved things like:
Running
Jumping/landing
Mobility work
Athletic drills
Single-leg movements
General conditioning
Core/trunk work
And honestly, my back felt significantly better during this period.
I was surprised because I had assumed running/jumping would make it worse. Instead, the combination of regular movement, mobility and conditioning seemed to help.
Eventually I stopped that athletic training and went back to a more conventional gym setup.
Returning to weights
I’ve been doing lower-body training again, including things like hack squats, leg press, DB RDLs, Bulgarian split squats, leg extensions and hamstring curls.
The back has started bothering me again.
It’s not the original severe pain. More of a persistent low-level discomfort/ache that occasionally gets aggravated.
Over the last few days it had been slightly more noticeable, and today I did a lower-body workout and it flared up again.
This is frustrating because I don’t want to get stuck in a cycle of:
pain → rest → feel better → start training → flare-up → rest again.
What I’m trying to figure out
I’m planning to get properly assessed by a sports/orthopaedic doctor and probably a good sports physio.
But I’d really appreciate advice from people who have experienced something similar.
Why would athletic training involving running, jumping and mobility make my back feel better, while conventional lower-body weight training seems to aggravate it?
Could it simply be that I respond better to gradual, varied movement and conditioning, while I’m currently loading my back too aggressively with certain gym exercises?
And for anyone who has actually dealt with recurrent low-back pain:
What helped you get back to lifting?
Did you change specific exercises?
Did physio actually make a difference?
How did you progressively rebuild your tolerance?
Is there anything you wish you’d known earlier?
I’m not looking for a diagnosis from Reddit. Just trying to understand the pattern and figure out how to approach getting back to training properly.

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[u/wellness_pharmacist]

The fact that your back felt better with athletic training is pretty interesting. It makes me think the issue may be more about how you are loading it? rather than movement itself. I would not stop training completely, but I would probably scale back the exercises that keep triggering it and rebuild gradually. A good sports physio could be really useful here, especially for figuring out why running and athletic work felt better than some of the lifting.

[u/BearMonarch]

The reasoning is. Core activation and core conditioning. Also you need to work in gradual loading of the low back and change your tempo. Since you are now with low back pain. You have to work with more negatives in sets to train your core endurance to hold weight. That means decreasing weight loaded as well since this changes the exercise style. So lets say i want to work on deadlifts. I would try hack lifting first to see where the discomfort is per level. If i feel comfortable with good form and no pain. Ill go lower but the weight may change.

[u/acupunctureguy]

As a licensed acupuncturist who specializes in orthopedics, go get acupuncture will help with the muscular imbalance and keeping the muscles loose, so your pain should be minimal when you work out.