anyone have sciatica? How long did it last? What did you do for cure?

sarah7591

Hi all: I am a runner who would run 5 miles 4 x a week. In Dec/Jan I ran 3 half marathons and I think it was too much for my 64 year old body! I woke up on Dec 26 with bad lower back pain and pain going down my right leg. Waited two weeks and went to Dr. and they gave me muscle relaxants...did not help. Waited another three weeks and went to non surgical orthopedic and they put me on prednisone (ladder) for one week. Today is day 3 (steroids)and my back is better but still get pain down the leg. I have not run in over a month and miss it. Doing exercises for lower back and hips. (x rays just showed arthritis in hip & lower back). Has anyone dealt with this? How long did it take to heal? I would love to hear your experience. Thanks!

Xellercin

Sciatica is totally unpredictable, so personal stories unfortunately won't give you much insight into how yours might resolve, but first things first I would find a really top notch physiotherapist. My MDs have always been worse than useless at managing sciatica, but my physio is a miracle worker. I mean, it takes an enormous amount of daily diligence on my part to do what she tells me to do, but I do it, and my nerves are less compressed.

For me nerve compression, not just sciatica, is an ongoing thing I need to manage, and steroid injections are not advised for my condition. But I do respond really well to prolotherapy for a lot of my other compressed nerves. Never tried it for sciatica because I have that well managed with PT.

sarah7591

@xellercin....thank you for your insight. When you say physiotherapist....do you mean physical therapy? That will most likely be my next move. I have never heard of prolotherapy. Could you expand of that? I am able to swim fortunately but even walking starts to bother me after a little bit. Thank you for input.

spiriteagle99

I get sciatica intermittently. I had a bad bout a few months ago and tried steroids, which helped a bit. What helped more was doing exercises my husband was given for his bad back. Things like knee to chest, forward stretch, back to the floor, etc. Exercises for piriformis can also help.

cwolfman13

I've had sciatica, but it has always been a more acute thing for me that comes on suddenly and is gone relatively quickly mostly using heat compression and over the counter pain medications. My wife had more of a chronic issue and physical therapy was the only thing that got her out of it. I've had other nerve compression issues in my upper back that were chronic and lingered for weeks and months and physical therapy was also my ticket out...and I haven't had any issues in probably 2-3 years now, but I still keep up with my physio homework, so maybe that's why.

sarah7591

Thank you all for input. Yes, I think PT is my next best thing.

akm0615

Yes, I have had it for 15 years now, started with pregnancy and never went away. Been managing it with lowering my inflammation, which after many years of suffering turned out to be exasperated by sugar intake. In 2020, I lost over 40 Lbs and in the process reduced my sugar intake significantly and have been pain free since. I still can't hike, my sciatica pain comes right back. I still have no idea why hiking is different from running or weight lifting which I do regularly with no pain.

I highly recommend seeing a PT. There are several stretches my PT had recommended that I still continue to do after my workouts. I hope you feel better soon. I know how painful it is to do even the basic things.

sarah7591

@akm0615 - interesting about the sugar intake! Wouldn’t hurt me to try that either! Thank you for input! I can’t wait to be free of this!

Xellercin

sarah7591 wrote: »

@xellercin....thank you for your insight. When you say physiotherapist....do you mean physical therapy? That will most likely be my next move. I have never heard of prolotherapy. Could you expand of that? I am able to swim fortunately but even walking starts to bother me after a little bit. Thank you for input.

Yes, physiotherapy is the Canadian term for PT, it's the same thing, but insurance works very different here, so PT does as well sometimes.

Prolotherapy has very little research behind it, it's in the same realm as all of the "regenerative" injections like PRP, stem cells, etc. None of them have great research behind them and they are useless for a lot of patients, but they work really well for others. So it's kind of a trial and error thing.

Prolotherapy tends to be the cheapest because it's just sugar water. The concept is that you inject sugar water into the injured area, this causes more inflammation in the area, which sounds counter intuitive, but it triggers more active healing in the area. At least that's the theory.

A lot of treatments in medicine are poorly understood and poorly supported by research, so that's not unusual. I'm lucky that it works really really well for me and isn't too expensive where I live. $200-350 CAD depending on the treatment area, spine is more expensive. Compared to $1200 USD in some US areas.

sheahughes

My sciatica was a secondary condition to my upper thoracic Schuremann's Syndrome, an MRI of my entire spine discovered it at the age of 34 (usually diagnosed in childhood) and treatment for the Schuremann's Syndrome (and quitting the cleaning/trolley collecting job at grocery store) has also worked for sciatica. Basically, I was compensating with my lower back for my upper back (very bad).

Honestly, quitting the job that had me walking 20000 steps a day as well as bending and twisting, pushing and pulling probably worked more than the PT sessions I had (although the massages were nice) and the nerve medication and muscle relaxants did rather little.
If it is ongoing, maybe see if other conditions can be ruled out?

nooshi713

Treatment depends on the cause. If it is due muscle spasm, treatment is NSAIDs, possible muscle relaxers, and stretches. If the cause is a bulging disc, impact exercise like running is not recommended and PT is helpful in addition to the above.

I have dealt with it off and on for 15 years. It worsened in the last 5 years. I discovered 2 years ago that I have two bulging discs. I avoid any spinal flexion or exercises like squats, sit ups, and running. Spinal extension stretches help me a lot. Walking too much also makes my pain worse so my activity is limited now. I used to get 10,000+ steps most days. Now I get around 5,000-7,000.

For people with spinal stenosis, spinal flexion helps. So it depends on what the cause is….

Definitely talk to your doctor.

mwilcox10

Pigeon pose so long sciatica

Theoldguy1

Sciatica is a symptom of an issue. I would recommend looking at the Bob and Brad "The Most Famous Physical Therapists on the Internet" They are 2 physical therapists with close to 60 years experience between them. They have hours of educational material on sciatica. Good luck.

https://www.bobandbrad.com/

sarah7591

This has been going on almost 7 weeks now and not much relief although I have been doing stretching exercises. It's bad at night as my leg has intermittent pain up and down. I have a PT appointment today ....finally. I also will be getting an MRI and seeing a spine specialist. I hope I find out something!

Xellercin

sarah7591 wrote: »

This has been going on almost 7 weeks now and not much relief although I have been doing stretching exercises. It's bad at night as my leg has intermittent pain up and down. I have a PT appointment today ....finally. I also will be getting an MRI and seeing a spine specialist. I hope I find out something!

It's actually much better if you *don't* find anything and your PT is able to manage it. Nothing good comes from finding a cause for nerve pain on imaging, ask me how I know.

christyhut12

I actually had issues with this for YEARS! 2 MRIs said bulging disc, PT didn't work, steroid injection didn't work. Finally went to an ART Chiro and she noticed that my SI joints (sacroiliac joints) were out of alignment and putting serious pressure on the nerves. Turned out to have little to nothing to do with the discs. None of the other docs ever even looked at my pelvis alignment.
Ended up doing prolotherapy since my SI joints wouldn't hold and it was the best thing I've ever done. After many many years of being in pain and having to brace myself for a sneeze (fell over in Target once due to a sneezing fit SOOOO embarrassed) I haven't had serious pain from my sciatic nerves in over 2 years. I still see my ART chiro (active release therapy, so they don't crack joints, they work with the soft tissue to release the joints) periodically, but she and the prolotherapy saved my life.

Xellercin

christyhut12 wrote: »

I actually had issues with this for YEARS! 2 MRIs said bulging disc, PT didn't work, steroid injection didn't work. Finally went to an ART Chiro and she noticed that my SI joints (sacroiliac joints) were out of alignment and putting serious pressure on the nerves. Turned out to have little to nothing to do with the discs. None of the other docs ever even looked at my pelvis alignment.
Ended up doing prolotherapy since my SI joints wouldn't hold and it was the best thing I've ever done. After many many years of being in pain and having to brace myself for a sneeze (fell over in Target once due to a sneezing fit SOOOO embarrassed) I haven't had serious pain from my sciatic nerves in over 2 years. I still see my ART chiro (active release therapy, so they don't crack joints, they work with the soft tissue to release the joints) periodically, but she and the prolotherapy saved my life.

I too have great response to prolotherapy, it kept me walking a year longer than I should have been able to. Here chiros can't do it though, only MDs.

westrich20940

I have issues with it from time to time after irritating my piriformis muscle. When I did that the first time (which was years ago) ... I mistakenly then over-stretched along with overcompensating and messing up my whole left-hip area and I'd say I had that pain and wasn't able to run for like... 8 months or so.

I focused on glute strengthening exercises when they were not painful.

In May of 2020, I had piriformis issues again...but it did not hurt when I ran so I continued running and doubled-down on my strengthening routine, added in more back-chain stuff and joined a Planet Fitness that opened near me to get some more weight (I'd just been doing body weight stuff at home).

I've also now started realizing that my left hip area is just really tight compared to my right side. I still have left buttock/hip/outside or knee and ankle pain related to this but usually it's acute and not an issue for me as long as I stay on my strengthening routine and am working on doing stretching (daily) and mobility work.

I know that at one point when it was really bad the first time I injured it I'd looked into heated ultra-sound therapy...maybe that would help. Or have you been to a PT to get some routines going?

sarah7591

westrich20940 wrote: »

I have issues with it from time to time after irritating my piriformis muscle. When I did that the first time (which was years ago) ... I mistakenly then over-stretched along with overcompensating and messing up my whole left-hip area and I'd say I had that pain and wasn't able to run for like... 8 months or so.

I focused on glute strengthening exercises when they were not painful.

In May of 2020, I had piriformis issues again...but it did not hurt when I ran so I continued running and doubled-down on my strengthening routine, added in more back-chain stuff and joined a Planet Fitness that opened near me to get some more weight (I'd just been doing body weight stuff at home).

I've also now started realizing that my left hip area is just really tight compared to my right side. I still have left buttock/hip/outside or knee and ankle pain related to this but usually it's acute and not an issue for me as long as I stay on my strengthening routine and am working on doing stretching (daily) and mobility work.

I know that at one point when it was really bad the first time I injured it I'd looked into heated ultra-sound therapy...maybe that would help. Or have you been to a PT to get some routines going?

@westrich20940 your experience sounds like mine. I am going to PT....not sure if it helping. I went and had an MRI and they did not really find anything significant (I guess that is a good thing). The orthopedic thought it was my spine (sciatica) but then then after the MRI the spine specialists wants me to have cortisone shot in hip to rule that out. I almost wonder if my piriformis is inflamed and touching my sciatic nerve? Could have happened from all that running. I'll ask orthopedic when I go for the shot. I cannot walk even a quarter of a mile and it will hurt so bad. This is from someone who was running 5 miles 4x a week 3 months ago. The spine Dr. put me on gabapetin for at night when the pain hurts. Will give it a try. I just want my old life back! I am focusing on glute and abdomen strengthening and stretching.

avatiach

For my mom, yoga really helped with sciatica.

westrich20940

@sarah7591 I'm so sad for you. I know that at times when it's flared up on me over the past couple years, even the thought of not being able to run felt like it would devastate me.

I'm happy you're going to PT, I was almost going to do that. I happen to also have a good friend who had a slipped disc in her back that was causing her a lot of sciatica as well -- and she was on a similar regimen to you it sounds (gaba and PT). She's much better now, but I know she was frustrated at having to be pretty sedentary for a long time.

Talk to your PT more I'd say and ask if the strengthening/stretching/mobility stuff would be good to start all together. I also almost made an appointment with an OD (osteopathic doctor), who also specialized in musculoskeletal ultrasound --- I got a recommendation from a friend who's struggled with some tendonitis and he is still my plan if I ever get bad pain that I can't kick on my own again. So maybe look into that type of doctor -- usually their appts are long and detailed and his included an ultrasound -- and there was a PT office right there too in case I'd need that. It would have been out of pocket I think but at least the first appt was less than $250ish....so to me it was worth it to at least start to figure out what was going on.

I wish the best for you and hope you can get back out to pound the pavement soon!

mikhnpaitsmum

For relief, besides the stretches- and this is just me- a tennis ball placed just right under the butt cheek will to roll on. It massages and relieves pain. I keep one by my bedside at night as that's when it usually acts up.
My pt recommended it. Sounds odd works great.

emmamcgarity

I hope the physical therapy is helping you. As someone else mentioned “Bob and Brad” have a YouTube channel with lots of great info.

I am also a runner and experienced low back pain last year. It took a few weeks of following their recommendations, but it really helped. Once I started feeling better, I started walking again, but I still occasionally had back spasms. I didn’t rebuild my running base miles until I could walk 5k without any pain at all. Then I rebuilt base running miles slowly to avoid injury.

sarah7591

Thank you so much for all your input. I will keep plugging away. I am hoping in 6 months this will all be a distant memory and I will be walking again. @emmamcgarity I like your approach. when I can walk 5k (please God soon!) I will start running again slowly. You all give me hope that this is something that should go away and not be permanent. I'll keep you posted. Thank you again.

Bridgie3

sarah7591 wrote: »

Hi all: I am a runner who would run 5 miles 4 x a week. In Dec/Jan I ran 3 half marathons and I think it was too much for my 64 year old body! I woke up on Dec 26 with bad lower back pain and pain going down my right leg. Waited two weeks and went to Dr. and they gave me muscle relaxants...did not help. Waited another three weeks and went to non surgical orthopedic and they put me on prednisone (ladder) for one week. Today is day 3 (steroids)and my back is better but still get pain down the leg. I have not run in over a month and miss it. Doing exercises for lower back and hips. (x rays just showed arthritis in hip & lower back). Has anyone dealt with this? How long did it take to heal? I would love to hear your experience. Thanks!

God save us, they're feeding you pills for sciatica.

Sciatica happens when your vertebrae get knocked out of alignment, often by exercise, and a nerve in the spine is pinched. There's more than one nerve that can be pinched, and a chiropractor will ask you where the sciatica ends before shoving your spine back into place. I get it either down to the front of my shin, or down to the back of my calf; these are two different problems.

So... chiropractor. My chiro used to call me a crack junkie because I loved it so much. I have scoliosis, which is a sidways curvature of the spine that means the shock absorber that is the normal curve didn't work that well. I would go in with migraines, and numb fingers, and inability to walk - and come out smiling with a bounce in my step. I had a good chiro so the first thing they did was x-ray my spine and show me where the curves and bends and messes were; and then every year or 2 I'd get another x-ray and we'd compare and see how the spine had moved.

Some people like osteopaths better, which is slower and more caring and sharing. yes, I like that too. Massage - totally. Another thing I learned was that my spine was too mobile. I had to get it into the right place with the crack junkie thing - and then ice it so it would shrink into position.

I had a GREAT time when I worked in a packhouse, because when things went bad I'd go lie with my knees up on the coolstore floor. The chiro showed me how to twist myself on chocks in various places, so that my spine would naturally return to its correct alighment.

It's all mechanics. There's no magic in it, it's simple mechanics.

roseym10

Yoga helped, but then I had a massage and then it was gone and never came back.

sarah7591

update: I am getting better!!! Slowly but surely. I did have a hip injection a week ago don't really think it helped that much. A few days ago I started feeling better. I actually walked a mile yesterday. I had not been able to do that in 3 months!! I am still doing physical therapy. Do exercises daily and swim 3x a week. I really miss running but not sure when that will happen. For now I am just SO HAPPY to be able to walk.