painful sitting

I am a 58 year old women. I had knee replacement 15 months ago. I also had lower back surgery,9 months ago.  They replaced 4 discs. I have hardware & bolts & screws. A few months after the spine surgery I stared having a issue of severe pain when I sit. The pain is only on my right side. the pain starts in my right buttuck and travels down into my hip and right down to my ankle. The Dr thought it was the hardware, so he took out all the hardware on the right side. That didnt help the issue at all. As time goes on the pain is getting worse. . When I ride in a car the pain is so bad I have to get out of the car. Now they want to replace my hip. I just dont know what to do. Im tired of surgery. It would be one thing if it got rid of the a pain put it seems to be making it worse
Has anyone else had to deal with this & what was the outcome

[EWhite37]

If possible, look into something called Somatics.   In July of 2007 I had sudden onset pain in my lower back / hip.   Active at 46 (at the time), I was only about 20lbs heavier than I should have been and never had any back issues or pain until then.   In the next 15 months I had an MRI showing nothing of significance (one small disc bulge that shouldn't have caused the pain), a clean X-Ray, P/T, massage, chiropractic care, an anti-inflammatory shot for periformis (minimal results), more P/T, 3 shots over 9 months into my spine, another MRI showing 2 small disc bulges (everything was getting worse instead of better)...  I was still in constant pain ranging from knife like pain don my leg to headache like throbbing in my buttock and hip.  Aleve/Motrin seemed to help ease it a bit, but couldn't take it away.  Staying active kept it loose and laying down or sitting aggrevated it as things tightened up which aggravated the sciatica.  UNable to sleep more than 2 hrs. at a time due to the pain waking me up, I was even considering surgery (despite the MRI showing the bulges shouldn't have been causing that much pain) as I needed to do something...  On-line research led me to somatics and I was game to try anything at that point.

Basically, its premise is that over time your body, through small injuries, bad posture, tension, etc., 'forgets' how to relax certain muscles fully. Stretching hurt because it was tearing at muscles tying to contract, working them out felt better initially by loosening them but then exacerbated it by creating more tension.  That constant tension (even though you feel relaxed) creates problems.  Although hard to find a practitioner around my home, I finally found one about an hour's drive from me.  One 1 hr. session a week for 5 weeks and I was almost back to normal.  The third week I was sleeping through the night!   His feeling was that the bulges were because the spinal muscles in constant tension were compacting my spine...

Unfortunately after about 2 months of feeling almost normal (I still felt a little tension bending over to put on shoes, etc.) I made the mistake of shoveling 18" of heavy snow (I live just outside Boston MA) and the back tightened up again.  Combining that with a 4 hr. drive on Christmas and I am back trying to get rid of the pain, up every two hrs. again...  Frustrating, but I now know it can go away an am back for more somatics.

Best of luck to all!
Please feel free to contact me if I can answer any questions.

[Ambers_Neemie]

   I was diagnosed with MS three years ago and only the last 8 months or so have been seduced by the relative ease of access of the wheel chair. Not a very patient person I want to be as quick to get about as I did walking, and conversly have walked less, causing me to sit more.
   Have you looked into the nerve issue? I see alot of muscle concerns, but I discovered while looking for a better chair to use in my home, a site for cushions and in turn saw a phrase I didn't recognize. Always looking for opportunity to learn, I looked up the word "ischial" and found something called PNE (Pudendal Nerve Entrapment).
    I read it first and THEN realized that what I was expeirencing as a temporary thing was in fact getting WORSE from all the sitting I was doing! I have worked since I was ten in jobs all of which required nearly 90% standing, walking, crouching, etc, all except sitting and a chair was something to stand on to reach overhead!!
      Now it appears to be an inflamation (inflammation) in the nerve endings that pass through the hole in your pelvis to go to the right or left legs, The spinal chord ends at your lumbar before the pelvic area and therefore is exposed to more interference from sharing space with other muscles, tissue and blood vessles. Being crowded into one area as such can cause inflammation and the more it's irritated from passing so close to the bone or being PINCHED as it were, it can feel like it radiates.
   I especially notice it while going to the bathroom and cleaning that area, or shiffting my wieght in the chair trying to aleviate the pain and that in turn can cause poor posture and wieght distribution, inviting even more problems. I had a nurse look the site up on line and she agreed with me, reccomending pain killers and anti-inflamatories. My physical therapist says more wieght bearing excersice on my legs and of course getting up and moving around. Ms is progressive and is limiting the time I have on my feet. They discuss steroids and surgery in this report and I do not wish to go that far, but I agree it can be very painful, annoying and hard to sleep. My hubby is kind enough to rub it when he's home, (gives us both a since of closeness we don't get on an everyday basis anymore,) but that only lasts so long, too.
      I am lucky it hasn't spread to my left side but read that it can and I look forward to the time my insurance will grant me a newer cushion ment for preassure sensative spots. I don't have one yet, because I just "started" getting these symptoms taken care of as the MS progresses, but I assure you, ones standard of living can be effected by the amount of pain we try to live with every day and do not realize how much energy is drained by trying not to let it get to you!!
See the article I read at:
http://www.pudendal.info/faq/IntroductoryFAQ.htm#WhatIsPNE

[sittingsolution2]

Consider buying reasonably dense foam pieces smaller than full seat size, that you can position yourself to achieve maximum relief with minimal expense.