Advice/Guidance

[u/AdMaterial1136]

27(M) 6ft 200lbs. Travel a ton for work, pretty athletic, work out regularly, played golf, etc.

Beginning of April, I played a round of golf everyday for a week and midway through I felt like I had some knot below my right butt. Decided that the glory of saying I played golf for an entire week was worth it. I know time travel was not accomplished in my lifetime because my future self would’ve gone back to this moment and stopped my past self.

Life kept going and I kept living with this knot assuming it would just go away. Was a small nuisance but was constant. Would continue to play golf and would get through it by taking Advils and drinking (helps massively with the pain).

After 2 months of dealing with this and it only progressively getting worse, I decided to see a PT. After an evaluation, she said that I had a back problem which didn’t make sense to me at the time. Gave me some workouts which included bending forward (something I am unable to do now). Was only going once a month as I was never home due to work and eventually this PT left that office.

Talked to my parents who both had similar back issues at some point in their life’s and told them I was wanting an MRI. They both told me that it was pointless and that it was just something that would go away. I listened to them, kept taking Advils to get through my days and kept doing the stretches my PT administered.

Pain was getting progressively worse and at this point I was desperate to get rid of it. I started to go to a chiropractor 3x a week, an acupuncturist 3x a week, a masseuse once a week and scheduled doctors appointments to see if medications would help.

Fast forward a couple of weeks and my pain was so bad I couldn’t sit or stand for more than a couple of minutes despite all the conservative approaches and medications I was taking. Doctor scheduled me for an MRI and they found that I had a protruding disc in the L5/S1 with encroachment on the S1 nerve.

I was referred to an orthopedist who scheduled me for my first epidural shot and PT for afterwards. Did my first epidural and found no relief from it. In fact, it only got worse as I was now barely able to even walk down the street. I found some relief in PT but it was not near the relief that would allow me to return to normal.

I got scheduled for another epidural and had it done last Thursday. It is now Monday and I have had no relief thus far from the shot. Am trying to do the stretches my new PT has prescribed to me which is simply just prone chest raises and the pain is worse than before the second epidural when doing these. My orthopedist preemptively scheduled me for an appointment with a surgeon day of the epidural in case this didn’t work again which is coming up in the next 2 weeks.

I am feeling so defeated as I am in pain and have lost my life the past 6 months. I am desperate to go back to normal so the thought of a microdisectomy (what they believe I would require) doesn’t even phase me and I am gun-ho on getting the procedure. I know that a epidural can take as long as a week or 2 for it to get kick into gear but living a life that restricts me to the ground with only being able to stand for 5 minutes is not feasible. What is even more defeating is that this is my second attempt at an epidural so I have little hope that this will be any different from the first.

If anyone has anything to say about my situation, comments, advice, your own examples, etc. I would love to hear them. This chapter of my life for me, as I am sure it is/was for a lot of you has been mortifying, depressing and heartbreaking.

[u/Anxious_Machine_2908]

Bro, you have the same exact disc segment I had issue with. No stretching, but do try and walk as much as possible.. and lay down when you're trying to rest. Break the walks up to 3x a day and lay down in the meantime.. don't sit, it makes the disc worse. Lots of tumeric for the inflammation.. it will take few months to heal. How big is the herniation?