Last October, Albert Renaud did something millions of homeowners do every autumn weekend.

He walked to his garage, grabbed the starter cord of his 23-pound Stihl gas blower, and yanked.

The crack he heard wasn't the engine turning over. It was his L4-L5 disc.

"I was flat on my back for three days," Albert told me from his workshop in Tampa. "At that moment, lying on my garage floor, I made myself a promise: never again."

What happened next is why I'm writing this article today.