Sciatica hell. What might help?

[tattoonewbie]

I saw the e chiropractor last week and he diagnosed trapped nerve in three places Pain is in my bum, spreads down my leg and currently my outer lower leg is throbbing and my foot is fizzing.
I cannot get comfy. Back at chiro on Thursday but it's worsening. I've got GP tomorrow and will ask for some pain relief as it's awful. I've done my exercises tonight and it feels even worse.
It's so horrible. Just relentless.
Has anyone any top tips ? Please. I'm so miserable and can't see me being able to drive tomorrow to work. I can WFH but even the thought of sitting is making me want to cry. Sorry to sound pathetic.

@justasking111 yes. Same here have lost weight. Not in a concerning way as if you look at calories now and calories BS (before sciatica ) I'm eating way less. The naproxen is horrid and gives me crushing chest pain l. I hope you're seen soon. Physio for me again soon. The other thing is with overcompensation elsewhere in the body I feel so sore all over and also just been told I need to get started on statins - probable side effects mentioned by the nurse- aches and pains. FGS

Statins!! All my joints hurt. Hips, knees, ankles, tibia fibia. No-one has mentioned statins. DH tried them years ago they gave him awful joint pains.

What I need is WD40 to oil my joints 🤣

I need oiling and polygilla for my wrinkles !

🤣🤣🤣

Nearly cancelled hair dresser this morning. Decided to go. Sitting in the chair for hair and mani pedi nearly finished me off. Crawled back to car. Unfortunately needed milk and cat food so had to stop at our local co-op. Phoned DH said you'll have to carry the shopping in because I can't. He doesn't usually come out even though he knows I'm home because the ring doorbell alerts him. I'd grabbed pizza for tea. He moaned that he didn't want pizza. So I told him to bloody get himself something else!!!

Finally had an email from the hospital, they hadn't received my referral, two weeks wasted. Forwarded email to the surgery.

It's not been my day 😭

@justasking111 I had to go with wet hair and skip my colour last two times I've been as the chair was so uncomfortable
I thought I was improving but have been worse again this week. Pain in my actual bum and back and down my leg and a random bruise on my foot on the top.
I went to a sports award thing for my son yesterday for a couple of hours so maybe just did too much and I know I've pushed it a bit with housework mini chores like putting washing out etc but I wanted to see what I can do. Not having answers is making me feel low and back round to the original scary things that can happen. Though AI has given me sensible answers to talk me down, it's not nice not knowing why I've been so sore. I practically crawled into the scanner. Even DH said maybe they confused my scan with someone else's ! Mustn't fret and must just keep at it. I hope you've got beautiful toes and fingers !

@tattoonewbie . I too want some answers now. I'd also like the consultant to explain to my husband how much pain I am in. How it varies and to understand that sometimes I'm just wiped out just getting to the loo.

He said the other day I should go back to swimming. I replied

1. You can't use a walking stick in a pool

1. I'd probably drown.

1. My legs just don't work in tandem.

I despair at his obtuseness.

I listen to his sore eyes, hayfever, his sore knee gardening. I bite my tongue a lot these days. 🙄

One thing a fit friend who goes to the gym, does Pilates was rushed to hospital a few weeks ago. Two herniated discs. L1 and L2, given Morphine, and other drugs, steroid spinal injection. two walking sticks when she was discharged. She's walking unaided now. They said stage 1 she was lucky. It really can happen just like that to even the fittest people.

I've walked a fair bit today - I mean nothing compared to BS days but further than I've done in ages. My foot now hurts on my bad side and my bum hurts deep inside the butt cheek. I've been rolling on it to try to get some relief.
More physio this week and more tests for arthritis this time.
I'm improving but what on earth kicked it off so badly and if I don't take the meds, I really notice it - surely this can't be it ? My friend thinks I've got fibromyalgia ...

I read somewhere fibromyalgia is a catch all. The MRI pointed exactly where and what my pain is caused by.

Have you had the results of your scan?

After years of nigglng low grade sciatic then a really debilitating acute episode during the pandemic I am now sciatica-free. However I do have chronic lower back and hip pain now which is due to being on hormone blockers post breast cancer. If I wasn’t aware of the side effects I’m sure it would be diagnosed as fibromyalgia which leads me to conclude that fibromyalgia is actually another side effect of the menopause.

The hormone blockers have shrunk the fibroids which the consultant decided was the cause of my acute severe sciatica.

My younger DSis died last year, her first symptoms of problems was sciatica and initially it was thought to be Piriformis syndrome. After a few weeks of physio and deterioration rather than improvement she ended up up in A&E with uncontrollable pain. It turned out she had a very large mass in her abdomen that was eventually diagnosed as secondary pancreatic cancer. She died 6 weeks later.

Im not suggesting that all sciatica has a suspicious cause but most women develop fibroids as they age and it is often undiagnosed as a cause of sciatica. Also after my DS’s experience I feel that all patients with sciatica that is not responding to physio should be scanned for other underlying causes. I was lucky that I noticed the fibroids and was referred very quickly for investigation, but generally sciatica is seen as a disc problem and not a secondary symptom of abdomen mal masses.

Currently making suffering from old age. I can’t remember the name of the condition but prolonged sitting down tends to make it worse. The hormone blockers have fast tracked me into the body of an 80 yr old. It’s not really lack of core strength but more the effect of menopause on the musculoskeletal system.

I work one day a week and I have to sit for prolonged periods it’s always worse after a day at work.

I take a low dose of antispasmodic drugs to help with back spasms that triggered the sciatica in the past. I can take a higher dose if I twinge my back. I do find that the more active I am the better it feels. But then when I stop and sit down I stiffen up and really struggle to walk. I’m hoping that when I come off the hormone blockers things improve.

I am currently making a big effort to lose weight. I’m now 11kg lighter and starting to notice improvements. I still get pain but it doesn’t last as long. Hopefully if I reach target weight it will improve further.

I can’t believe that after 20yrs of chronic sciatica that I no longer have that pain anymore. The low grade lower back pain is so much easier to deal with since simply doing a few stretches then lying down alleviates it and I have no need for painkillers. I’m still cautious about exercise ( weights or Pilates) although happily walk for miles.

I can only sympathise. I used to get exactly pain you described about 2-3 years ago. It gradually improved with heat pad, stretching exercises, and Volterol gel rubbed into painful areas. Now last week out of the blue it's come back again. I'm literally hobbling along with what feels like little electric shocks going from under bum down my left leg. I've taken some codeine I was prescribed for my shoulder as I happened to have some left.

@Angrymum22 I'm so sorry for your loss of your sister. Did she have abdominal or gynae symptoms at all or was the sciatica the only indicator ?

@Angrymum22 I just re read earlier posts and you already said that it was her only symptom. I'm sorry

After my experience with fibroids and my DSis experience I feel that more should be done to diagnose women with sciatica. The first line of treatment is generally physio and it appears from this thread that it is not really followed up.

I first started having problems after treatment for endometriosis, my GP was concerned but useless and physio had no effect apart from the physio pronouncing it to be a weakness in my core and that the exercises she gave me would do the trick. They didn’t.
In desperation I asked my gyni if it could be related to the treatment I’d had and he said that I had probably had an endo lesion close to the sciatic nerve that was probably irritating it after shrinking in respond to the drug I’d been on.
I just accepted that I’d swopped one condition for another and my job probably didn’t help. I was so used to endo pain I just accepted it and got on with life.

Fast forward to the acute episodes in 2020 and subsequent diagnosis of fibroids. The fibroids grew in response to HRT, a side effect they don’t warn you about. I was referred to gyni with the hope that hysterectomy or ablation may help, but events overtook and I was diagnosed with breast cancer ( also probably result of HRT) and put on hormone blockers since the bc was hormone positive.

When I eventually saw the gyni my fibroids had shrunk, a side effect of the hormone blockers ( trials are currently being carried out to see if it can be used as an alternative treatment for fibroids). It took a while but for the last 12 months I have had no sciatic pain. I have lots of joint and muscle pain, a side effect of the drug but I find a couple of paracetamol a day are all I need. Neurological pain is difficult to describe to people. The other common one is trigeminal neuralgia, it’s known as the “suicide disease” and I suspect sciatica is a close second. I remember being high on codeine and diazepam at one point when my sciatica was at its worst, the painkillers were having no effect, I explained to my DH that I was thinking of stabbing myself in the leg, I had checked out the anatomy so I would avoid vital structures, then he could take me to A&E so I could get some serious painkillers. Such is the desperation when neurological pain is at its worst.

My point is that medics always go down the spinal disc root cause. I’m not suggesting that everyone with sciatica has cancer, but women in particular have a range of gyni problems that can result in lower abdominal masses that could impinge on the sciatic nerve. These should be ruled out alongside disc problems.
A simple ultrasound would detect fibroids or ovarian cysts but because they are common they are often overlooked. Most of us have a degree of disc degeneration which often results in lower abdominal masses grade back pain.
I always assumed my sciatica was spine related but now the sciatica has gone and I still have lower back pain I realise that the two are unrelated.

So many ways our plumbing can go wrong. Yet are so difficult to diagnose for the same reason. I get down at times then give my head a wobble because I don't have a life limiting illness but the relentless pain and mobility issues do pull you down. My husband gets exasperated at times by my lack of mobility and can be quite unkind.

How though do you explain it to someone who's never had constant debilitating pain.

Hi, I just wanted to pop back and see how everyone was doing.

I had my back injections a couple of weeks ago and my.pain is so much better. I was very surprised at how quickly they got me in as when I had my appointment with the consultant he said 8 weeks. I was in in less then 2.

I also feel lucky that I seem to have been fast tracked somehow, although possibly due to my GP sending me to A&E whe she did and them doing a MRI at the time.

I'm not pain free and I still have a week leg, slightly numb foot. But it is a whole lot better, am just hoping my disk heals on its own.

@justasking111, I'm not sure you can and as someone who suffered from chronic pain for years. This pain was totally different and floored me in a totally different way. 😪

Well seeing the consultant this afternoon. So wish me luck.

I hope it went well. Xx

Well yes and no. The consultant examined me. Then said I want an x-ray of your hips. I explained I'd had one a year NHS ago mild arthritis in right hip they said then . He looked at it said yes but have another one now.

I was sent off for another. The radiographer took two x-rays. Told me that the right hip was bone on bone, very inflamed. The left hip also very inflamed. So I need two new hips.

I cried a little when she said that the previous x-ray had been taken at the wrong!! Angle.

All this extra needless pain, fear of a wheelchair was so unnecessary.

Husband is furious wants to take it further.

On Monday I have the MRI for my back, will have to wait for the results on that.

Off for an MRI this afternoon. Hate the clanging. Wish me luck 🍀

Is your job prolonged sitting op, if yes can you try a sit to stand desk?

Sorry just saw date on op, hope you are getting on ok.

Good Luck, I had my problem in 1st Lockdown, no body would see me just left to suffer. .
But Ok now so it does improve.

Hello all. Back to check in and update. I have had a nerve study and further x ray and I have directly asked if I can have the injection as my pain is ongoing albeit a lot better since private physio and acupuncture. Back at work but since coming back my leg pain is returning ….
today I’m lying on ice during a training call with laptop in view as otherwise I’d be on the codeine