Pinched Nerve or Herniated Disk Back Problems.......experiences

[maverick2112]

Anyone here ever have a pinched nerve or herniated disk problems in their lower back...........talked to a specialist and thats what he thinks I have........



Going to do an MRI next week........



Tell me surgery isnt my only option..........heard bad things about back surgery.........maybe the surgery these days is a lot better

 

[Lookn4help]

Back issues

Back issues

Look into decompression treatment, 87% success rate and after 4 years 93% still happy. Physical therapy etc, avoid surgery if at all possible....if you must have surgery get a NEUROSURGEN to perform the procedure. I have had back surgery and now can't feel one of my legs and have considerable pain even with medication. good luck but please check out everything before maknig a decision.

 

[Nelson]

shot of cortisone

situps

pills

chiropractic

surgery

pick your poison.

sometimes one shot in the spot will take care of it. much back pain is psychological in origin. most people's spines are out of alignment - but most people don't feel the pain you're feeling from it. over time the pain will lessen, particularly if you rid yourself of the emotional problem / the situation clears up, and you do enough situps to let your abs hold you like a corset.

pills relieve pain - by masking it. use them long enough, mess up your organs.

situps, believe it or not, can more or less solve many back problems. so can a shot of a steroid. lying around will not help, will make it worse. chiropractic is more or less a scam to get you coming back for treatment.

surgery might work. it might not. or it might leave you worse off.

back braces are placebos. situps will actually do what back braces are supposed to do.

good luck. back pain is one of the worst things going. if i were you, get the mri, see what the doc says. i would certainly try a shot first; you've always got surgery as a last option.

 

[spartan]

Strecthing and straightening the spine is very important.
People forget to do these things until it's too late.
You can crack your back and realigne your spine by yourself.
Always stretch your whole body in the morning and evening.
Physical activity is important don't sit too much or lay around too much.

 

[SixFive]

if you can get relief from your pain, then ongoing abdominal and lower back strengthening is the key to keeping your lower back stable and as comfortable as possible.

Surgery usually isn't the thing to do unless you have a really bad ruptured disc and associated radiculopathy (pain/numbness running down your leg).

I had surgery for this problem in 2000, and I herniated out the very next year again. I now have another herniated disc. I'm not a surgical candidate as surgery would not guarantee relief.

Living with back pain SUCKS!! Your body gets used to hurting and firing those pain signals. Sadly, not much helps, lots of people think you are faking, most MDs don't like to deal with chronic pain, and everything aggravates it.

Since your problem is new, hopefully the conservative treatments mentioned above will take care of it. If not, you can choose to take pain pills or be like me and grin and bear it, ha ha! I'd rather hurt a little than be stoned out on pain pills all the time.

Man, this post is too long! Sorry, and hope your problem isn't bad!

If you have any specific questions, post them. I think I've had every treatment available for lower back pain in the last 10 years at some point. The only thing I haven't tried is accupuncture.

 

[Penguinfan]

Good advice in the above posts, so I'll keep it short.

Had a herniated disk and had surgery, still hurts every day. Doesn't hurt as bad, but the relief I got was not worth the surgery.

 

[Sylvan]

My sciatic nerve was pinched by a herniated disc in my lower back. I did 3 months of physical therapy along with doing some of the therapy on my own at home and it all worked. Feel like a new man. If you do physical therapy, you have to stick with it in order for it to work.

 

[The Boys]

find a good chiropractor....

 

[DR STRANGELOVE]

find a good chiropractor....

agreed,

 

[Nelson]

agreed,

good chiropractor. you guys are funny.

Chiropractors are essentially insurance scamsters. They are one rung above criminals. Their specialty is teaching fat dumb womenthat they need to bring their three-year-olds in twice a week for 'adjustments.'

What will happen if you go to a chiropractor, guy who started this thread:

The chiro will tell you to strip down. Then when you're half naked, he or she will lay on the guilt trip.

"How committed are you to your spine health?"

"Are you sure you're worthy of owning a backbone?"

"The pain will be the first thing to leave, but that's doesn't mean the problem is gone."

You prove your commitment by signing up for a neverending program of coming in two or three times a week for adjustments.

Now, be prepared for a flood of people telling you how chiros cured their herpes, diabetes and cancer. But what i've given you is closer to the real story.

 

[THE KOD]

Nelson

for a newcomer you sure got some wise crack in ya

gl

maybe you should check out the AI thread

theres alot of backcrackers in there

 

[Nelson]

Nelson

for a newcomer you sure got some wise crack in ya

gl

maybe you should check out the AI thread

theres alot of backcrackers in there

well he asked for experiences, and my report is first-hand. it's VERY hard to think clearly when your back is fooked up, it's just utter misery, and chiros take advantage of that. their gig is basically sucking as many 40-50$ payments out of customers/insurance companies as they can. and they do make much of their income by brainwashing mothers that little kids who are perfectly healthy need to have their backs adjusted.

not sure what thread you're talking about.

i'm just telling maverick, what worked for me was getting a shot - an epidural (like they call the pregnancy shots). it cured the problem immediately, and was fine for years. then when i had a reflare a decade later, a MRI and epidurals did nothing. what worked that time was doing lots of situps and getting out of an extremely stressful situation. the problem with pills is they work too good. you dont want to go down that road or surgery if you can help it.

and yes, not just chriopractors but MOs and MDs are just as likely to be greedy and money driven as any other people.

 

[DR STRANGELOVE]

good chiropractor. you guys are funny.

Chiropractors are essentially insurance scamsters. They are one rung above criminals. Their specialty is teaching fat dumb womenthat they need to bring their three-year-olds in twice a week for 'adjustments.'

What will happen if you go to a chiropractor, guy who started this thread:

The chiro will tell you to strip down. Then when you're half naked, he or she will lay on the guilt trip.

"How committed are you to your spine health?"

"Are you sure you're worthy of owning a backbone?"

"The pain will be the first thing to leave, but that's doesn't mean the problem is gone."

You prove your commitment by signing up for a neverending program of coming in two or three times a week for adjustments.

Now, be prepared for a flood of people telling you how chiros cured their herpes, diabetes and cancer. But what i've given you is closer to the real story.

sciactic nerve was giving me isues 2 years ago, went to see a chiro and no problems since

 

[jordan23]

Sylvan

What types of excersises did you do? Is there anywhere online which shows the excercises? Thanks

 

[PaSprint]

find a good chiropractor....

I tend to agree with the chiropractor is a joke thing. I still think to this day the "adjustments" messed me up. I had hurt my back in early 2005 and went to see a chiropractor. When I left that day, everytime I put my left foot down as I walked I could feel it "click" in my back. About 3 days later a started getting shooting pain down my left leg (like a hammy cramp). I dealt with it for a while until I couldnt take it anymore as every day that passed it got worse. I started living on Vicodin's but eventually it got to the point where I couldnt even put my shoes on without assitance and the pain was unreal. To make a long story short....I had surgery in July of 2005 and have been pain free ever since. I just try to be extra careful when lifting heavy and not to torque my back in any way. The surgery lasted 45 minutes and i went home the same day. They just went in there and "shaved" the spurs off the rupture and I was only off work for a week. Best thing I ever did as far as my health goes.
Get an MRI to confirm the rupture. The doctor who fixed my problem is a genius in my book.

 

[bulldog]

agree with pasprint the chiropactor is a joke. went to chiropator around 3 years ago and got better after a couple of weeks, but as my neosurgeon confirmed you will get some better with time as body has amazing skills to repair itself.
ended up having surgery in september as had been hurting in both legs for over a year (no back pain) and was getting in hot tub most every night. in early september went to get out of hot tub and something in back popped and I ended up on patio and could not get up. called for wife and she finally came outside and pulled me inside; could still not get up even with her help. went to er and they put me into hostipal for 3 days and fed me pain medicine and did mri. local doctor at small hosipal in hometown read mri and said no rupured discs.

brother and sister in law are both doctors in large town 150 miles from me and knew good neosurgern and got me appointment. took all records and he looked at mri and said I have 2 rupured discs which he said were repured toward my stomach instead of to each side as is normal. said I would probably need surgery but could not do it for 5 days this was a friday and he was booked until wednesday. told me to see if I was any better by monday as he said body repairs itself and I should get better with time. monday morning I could not even walk. called and set up surgery for wednesday.

surgery lasted 2 hours as it was worse than he thought and had me up and walking that same night.

I am doing much better but still have some pain in legs as he said nurves were crushed and could take a year for nurves to get okay. said if I had gone much longer there would have been perament damage.

now is the 1st time in 5 years I can cross my legs without lifting my leg with my hands. thought for years I was getting old (53) and was getting stiff and also thought pain in legs was arthritis.

hope you get better and would highly recommend seeing a neosurgeon.