I hurt my back in a fall many years ago. The only advice I can give is what I am sure you have learned already:
a) beware of muscle relaxers and pain killers. The pain and spasms are telling you something about your back, and if you remove their signals it is always easy to forget and do something again that damages things further.
b) this is particularly true of pain killers. Learn to live with the pain. Isolate it in your mind. Temporary use of the muscle relaxers is fine, but the pain killers are a waste of money in the long run.
c) The stomach muscles are the most important protection you have against back damage - exercise them. Get rid of excess weight.
d) Beware of people who propose operations, particularly fusing parts of your spine. I had an over eager surgeon who wanted to do that, claimed I would not notice any loss of flexibility and that it would solve my problem. I didn' t have the surgery, and since have learned that in 10 to 15 years people who have the back fusing start having other problems because of the added stress on parts of the back near the fused place.
e) don' t shovel snow, don' t sit for long periods of time, don' t stand for long periods of time, ... When everybody is pitching in moving something ignore the urge to join in, even if you see some frail person contributing more than you are. I don' t have to tell you this, from experience you learn these things pretty quickly. No fun to help someone unload a grocery cart and then find yourself needing to spend a week in bed on your back.
f) Good luck. I found a book called " Oh my aching back" which gave me some exercises to do and other advice. I used to give copies to friends who had problems.