Sciatica🤬🤬🤬😅🤬

Mine has been acting up for the past three weeks too. It's making me pretty short tempered to be honest. FOR ME I find that some light stretching of my hamstrings and quads helps. TENS helped with more sever pain with my Mom. Also her doctor suggested Tylenol and ibuprofen. My buddy who broke his back swears by Bayer Back and Body Extra Strength.
 
Teeter hang up pros.
Can find em at garage sales cheap cheap.
Can operate it by yourself.
Cons.
Takes up space in the garage.
It's a single purpose tool.

Tractor front end loader pros.
It's a multi purpose tool. Many many uses.
Strong enough to lift the heaviest medical patients
Cons.
2 person operation. If your hunting buddy or wife is mad at you, be mentally prepared to hang for longer than you've planned.
 
Well just back from Docs, good news no likely disc causing it from eval. Just an old critter. So the miracle drug for me is prednisone pack plus muscle relaxers. Hopefully I will see some improvement in next few days.

I prefer not to use loader .... yet😂! I have found Tylenol arthritis 650 mg works better for me than Aleve/Advil.

@xsn10s nailed it that you get real crotchety so my wife shouldn't have to put up with shortness so maybe she might like the loader idea!
 
Sciatica sucks!! My L1 thru S1 is pretty much fubar. Herniated the lot of em back in 08. A couple discs had fragments break off. To this day they are all still bulged and torn. The VA has given me steroid injections, tens unit, traction device, muscle relaxers nothing helps for very long. They finally sent me to have a nerve conduction study done what a miserable experience that was! The specialists wants to give me RFA. Basically they want to burn my sciatic nerves out. Im down to give it a go but am now stuck in limbo waiting for the VA to approve it. Lots of stretching throughout the day to keep things loose. Once I sit down for the evening is when everything gets so tight i can barely walk.
 
Sciatica sucks!! My L1 thru S1 is pretty much fubar. Herniated the lot of em back in 08. A couple discs had fragments break off. To this day they are all still bulged and torn. The VA has given me steroid injections, tens unit, traction device, muscle relaxers nothing helps for very long. They finally sent me to have a nerve conduction study done what a miserable experience that was! The specialists wants to give me RFA. Basically they want to burn my sciatic nerves out. Im down to give it a go but am now stuck in limbo waiting for the VA to approve it. Lots of stretching throughout the day to keep things loose. Once I sit down for the evening is when everything gets so tight i can barely walk.
Thank you for your service. I hope you get approved soon. And I hope we all get some relief soon. We must be a bunch of old farts lol.
 
Hey, I'm currently sitting in a friends house in Phoenix. Last Thursday and Friday I had surgery on my lower back. Thursday, the surgeon went in from the front and right side to put in spacers and remove what was left of the disks. Basically no disk between L5 and S1. Friday was spent filleting all the muscles off the vertebrae and putting in the screws and rods. I broke L5 while I was in the Army. It had slide forward 3/4 of an inch. Right now even with all the surgery pain I still feel better. I'm not looking forward to the plane ride back to Fairbanks, though.
Good luck to all with this condition
Take Care
 
Had it last year and MRI showed ruptured disc. Subsequent surgery followed, but left me in a footdrop condition. Went to a neurologist to determine severity of the damage. Severe nerve damage was the prognosis. I doubt it will ever improve, but with an AFO for the footdrop walking is manageable. The good thing the sciatic pain is gone, however I am still having pain to a much lesser degree. Probably will have to live with it. Anyway, do whatever you can to avoid surgery because there is a BIG risk. Good luck.
I ruptured my L5 and had to have surgery to clean up the pieces about 15 years ago. It caused nerve damage and I've been dropping my left foot since. Occasionally when I overdo it my back let me know and I call the chiropractor and he can usually fix me up. I will alternate between ice and heat and this helps some along with stretching exercises.
 
That prednisone is a wonder drug…with a real nasty dark side. When used temporarily it gets the job done. I know a person whose been on it for years (the alternative was die, something to do with platelet count.,.) but now they literally cannot leave the house for any reason to be in public as they have absolutely zero immune system and a common cold could do them in.

I've been on it before to treat a severe allergic reaction (still have no idea what the heck I'm allergic to, have a big reaction every couple of years at random)…it turns off the overreacting immune system (that's what an allergic reaction is) but also - at least at the high dose they put me on for a week - turned me into what my wife called a "rage-aholic" and had me all wired and hyper, didn't sleep much for a few days haha.

Hope you get feeling better soon (and that when I get older I can avoid this!)
 
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