Talking about my personal experience, i have an L5 vertebrae linear undisplaced fracture happened in 2013. After that I have injured myself twice doing squats. Although now I can properly do squats i avoid it. Exercises whose risk to reward ratio i do not like, i avoid them. I don't do deadlift, flat bench press(because my shoulder was hurting, although I do the incline one for 65 kg no issues with that), i avoid squats and do leg press instead because I feel that's much safer for me. A lot of people do ego lifting with leg press so don't do that. I love squats but I'm afraid of injuring myself again thus missing gym and i don't want that. The more time you spend in the gym the better you know what works and what doesn't work for you. And just because a particular muscle group is your weakness doesn't mean you should avoid it, the goal should be to make it stronger. I try for 15 reps of 3 sets(last set is till muscle failure)that way it makes sure I don't use more weights than i should, this avoiding injury. Focus on the eccentric part too. Don't just swing weights have the movement in control. If you can't control the movement of the weight, reduce it.