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Not medical advice, just a comment.
There’s growing evidence in sports medicine that return to light activity as soon as possible is better for recovery, particularly with (some!) back injuries. Also, there’s growing evidence that taking too long to return to activity is bad for a full recovery. This might be common knowledge already but it’s a departure from what I’ve seen and had a lot of doctors advise: rest for X number of days then return to light activity. It seems that what we should be doing to optimise recovery is using our bodies as soon an injury has healed enough that light activity doesn’t continue to damage it, which isn’t necessarily a set amount of days or weeks.
Adhiero-
That's certainly true of the advice I've received from the last two physios I've seen, they've both championed active recovery. In my case it basically boiled down to doing the prescribed mobility exercises as soon as I could perform them with no more than 3 in the 1-10 pain scale and walking as much as possible every day.
ElGonzo
I've had about 6-7 episodes like this over the past decade or so when my back just 'goes'. It is absolutely debilitating and usually takes about 7-10 days to get back to anything close to full range of motion, in my case it requires prescription anti-inflammatories. I also had to get moving as soon as possible; the more I walked (well, hobbled) the better I felt. Best of luck and hopefully the pain eases quickly.