So many good suggestions & sometimes none of them work. I had the bad spasms & pain for years. I quit all sewing for years because of the back pain. And then.....I had a CT scan because the pain & spasms started up again & I wasn't even sewing! The pain starts down my back on both sides over my shoulder blades, then starts fingers of fire along the same path, then ends with a feeling that my muscles are knotting up & want to come out of my back. Lo & behold, I have a herniated disc at the top of the back. It's not bad enough for surgery, but it sure does get my attention.
All of the suggestions about setting up your sewing area so that it is ergonomically correct do help some, but didn't keep the pain from happening for me. Trying to manage the weight of the large quilt sandwich caused more problems & a lot more pain. Breaks from sewing so that you can relax all those muscles are a MUST.
So, fast forward....I managed to get 8 tops ready to quilt & then bought a very preowned longarm. I have to take breaks, but the pain when using the longarm is about 5-10% of what I get when using a regular sewing machine. I use pantos or free hand with very open quilting & can get it done in a day. I stand to do the quilts. I am not good enough with free hand to do anything except the larger patterns & have found that when I try to do something more intense, my back tells me NO!
I think the reason the longarm is better is because you are almost constantly moving. This lets nerves that are hurting be rearranged with each step you take.
Have you tried stretching to get those muscles moving before you start the sewing? That helped me some.
Another solution could be making your quilts in sections, quilting them separately then joining them. There are many tutes out there on that procedure. That was going to be my next method of choice, but I got the longarm, so didn't ever try that out. Good luck & happy quilting!
Last edited by Barb in Louisiana; 03-13-2013 at 05:15 AM.