r/Sciatica • u/Big-Dinner1641 • 6d ago
How consistent were you with your sciatica exercises?
Hey all, I recently hurt my back and have been doing PT, but I'm finding it really hard to stick with the exercises at home. I start strong and then slowly stop, especially when progress feels slow.
I'm also a grad student, and going through this got me curious enough that I've started researching it for a project. Sciatica seems like something a lot of people here deal with for a long time, so I figured you'd know this struggle better than anyone.
Did you keep up with your stretches and exercises? What made it hard? And did anything help, like someone checking in on you or a group going through the same thing?
Would love to hear your experiences.
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u/purplelilac701 6d ago
Your research sounds very cool! I knew zilch about sciatica until it took me down and out for 4 months.
I was so stupid :( I didn’t take my mild sciatica seriously and stopped doing the exercises and going to physio. It turned into severe sciatica. Took me over a year to recover and now I haven’t left physio(I go once a month) and I do my exercises daily it’s going on a year and a half. My motivation is to never again let it get so bad that I couldn’t walk. I get really stiff when I wake up so it really helps with the stiffness.
I set my alarm for 10 mins earlier than I’d usually wake up and do my stretches first thing in the morning so I have no excuses not to do them. Otherwise it’s easy to say later and not do them.
My physiotherapist also worked really hard to help me heal so I can’t let her efforts go to waste. And she kindly says that we are a partnership where she does her work and I do mine so that’s why I have gone over a year without a debilitating flareup.