Heat rubs

Don't despair, Angela. I came down with exactly the same symptoms about 6 weeks ago but I started getting slowly better after about 4 weeks. I'm on Naproxen, which helps a lot, plus Diazepam at night to help me sleep.  I'm seeing a physio once a week who applies heat treatment - but to my lower back (which is where the sciatic nerve emerges), not to my leg (which is where the pain is). So when you apply the heat rub, try applying it to your lower back as well as to your leg. My physio also gives me a very vigorous - and quite painful - pumelling in my lower back and buttocks. And he's prescribed stretching exercises too. I think the medication eases the pain, but it's the massaging, hear treatment and exercises that are helping to actually cure me. Are you seeing a physio?

Hi Angella. I hade the same problem. I did not want to take pills so I started to do some exercises and strechings and it is very helpfull. I practice almost every day and the results are good. Try easy streches and do it in a gentle way and as much as you feel comfortable. 

 

Hi Angela

Perhaps rhis will help you understand your pain and how to best address it....

Brain to spinal cord to biforcation with each traveling deep within each buttock through the Greater Sciatic Foramen to down the back of the thigh to biforcation to tibial nerve and fibial nerve.

So consider these nerves like a road map...somewhere is a road block causing a of the pain you feel as burning down the back of your thigh.

From an anatomical standpoint, the L5 to S1 disc compression is a possibility, as is compression on the nerve as it passes through the Greater Sciatic Foramen, fancy word for hole.

Have you had an MRI?

Are you taking neuropathy medication such as Neurotin-gabapentin or Lyrica-pregabalin?

Are you taking an NSAID, nonsteriodal anti inflammatory drug, such as Naproxin or Motrin or Feldene?

Are you taking a steriod such as prednisone?

Are you taking acetaminophen?

The sciatic pain you feel is the symptom of the compression.

The compression must be treated. So, lying on your back relieves the compression...have you tried gentle stretching by raising both legs straight up and pausing for 5 seconds? In the lying flat position you might consider a heating pad on the lower back below rhe waist and or your buttock.

You can also considet ice which reduces inflammation...I prefer the gel packs you can purchase at the pharmacy because they are flat, they stay cold longer, they do not leak, you can reuse them..I purchase two or four depending on the size so I can keep at least one or two in the freezer...the really good ones can be frozen or heated in the microwave.

kind regards

Hi Angela, I really feel for you and your pain and hope it soon starts to subside, as I can still vividly remember my first attack, even though it was over 20 years ago. I was in absolute agony at the time, with back and leg pain and no amount of pain killers would take it away. I had an X-Ray at the time which showed up the problem, MRI scans were not an option back then and maybe hadn't even been invented.

Following my attack, I wasn't able to sleep in a bed at first and I finished up on the sofa for a few weeks, but even then sleeping was a problem, however, the pain for me did slowly lessen and after 3 weeks, I returned to work, albeit still in a lot of pain, but I feared losing my job and wasn't getting paid (even though my sciatica was as a result of moving some office equipment at work).

The pain for me did finally go after a period of around 6 months, in which I tried everything, you name it and I gave it a go, Chiropracters, Accupuncture, Physiotherapy, Osteopathy, Ice Packs, Heat Packs, but nothing helped and in the end, time was the only real healer, although I do know others who have been helped by one or more of the above.

Hopefully, when your pain finally clears, you won't have any further attacks, although that wasn't the case with me, as I would have further attacks of sciatica, maybe once or twice a year, generally triggered by picking up something and forgetting to bend in the correct manner, but on the positive note, never to the extremes of the first episode and generally, the pain would go away after a few days or a week.

Hopefully, if your attack started 3 weeks ago, it will soon start to ease and your agony will be over, for the time being at least, although I think the main message is to be careful how you bend, as I've even had an attack after bending to take a bottle of milk out of the refrigerator! one other thing to remember from my experience is, if ever you feel like a sneeze coming, try to brace yourself, as my worst incident followed a sneeze.

In the main and until recently, I was able to lead a normal life since the first attack and even played rugby for a few years, so hopefully, you will be able to get on with life as normal in the very near future.