L5-SI back pain - sciatic nerve

[bjquil]

I have an L5-SI protruding annulus - with sciatic nerve damage on the left side (numbness in left leg). I am being seen at a pain management center and am in the middle of havng shots in my back. I have had a total of 4 so far - each one being in different areas.  After each injection they tell me it will take a few days for the shots to take affect, however I hurt worse and the pain intensifies.  The last shots I had were the worst - I know have numbness in the right side - the shot must have hit the sciatic nerve.  Now I have numbness in both legs.  I am taking tramado hcl 50mg and tizanidine hcl 4mg for the pain and muscle spasms.  I have an ulcer and am limited on what I take. Trying to sleep at night is stressful, I wake up every 2 - 3 hours in extreme pain.  I went through PT and that did not help - i was in more pain after wards.
I would like to hear from someone who has similar problems and what they have done.

[suzybx]

It's me again.  I just want to know how to approach the doctor and ask for REAL pain meds -- not this ultram, lyrica bull taco stuff.  It's not working. Help!!!

[suzybx]

My Pain doc gave me:  Lyrica, Celebrex, Ultram ER, Hydrocodone (4 times a day - 7.5mg), Amitriptaline and Skelaxin and NONE of it is working.

I need stronger NARCOTICS and I don't know how to present this to the doctor without sounding like an idiot or drug seeker.  I have never been in SOOO much pain in my life.  My entire left side (leg, back, buttock) is in weird bouts of numbness, extreme pain, tingling, falling alseep feeling....it's horrible.  I can't stand for more than one minute.

How do I get it across to my doctor?  I need the real meds like dilauded or morphine or something major.  I can't life like this.  It's hopeless and if it continues, why live?   I'm serious.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.
Ruthie

[bustedgirl]

this is my story, in oct.1989 i went to one of the best neurosurgeons in NYC for a second opinion for my L5S1 herniated disc. I was 35 at the time, working and generally living a normal life. i had severe sciatic pain in my right leg whenever i did anything too strenuous. I got the original injury when my ex shoved me and i fell on the floor when i was 22. Well, when i was lifting my garage door in 89, i felt a familiar shooting pain in my butt and my left leg, and knew i was in trouble. Usually i would have to go on bedrest for a long time before it would subside, but this time it didn't and it got so bad i couldn't even feel my foot. i went for an mri, and the ortho told me i needed surgery or it would never go away. i ended up getting a second opinion at nyhospital cp, and the dr. there said he would do it after a month of pt. Pt. did nothing but make it worse, so he scheduled the surgery for oct.1.1989. it was to be a six to eight week recovery and then i was supposed to be able to resume my life again. It never happened, within a month after the surg. i began to have excruciating low back pain and my leg still hurt.
The surgeon passed me off to pain management and said i fell into the six percent failure rate, the one he never told me about. I had all the usual treatments pain management had to offer and nothing worked, and I was told that I'd have to learn to live with it and more surgery would make it worse. This was all over the course of the last 19 years, and I now live on high doses of opiate pain killers and have had no life since the day of the operation. My right leg got weaker, and caused me to fall many times. I ended up with tears in both my knees in 2002, and had to have surgeries that made the pain worse. Last spring I broke my right leg in three places and it has taken a year to heal, due to the fact I can't rehab fully from the back pain.
Now i am facing a surgery for a different problem that is potentially cancer. The tests I need to take are complicated by the opiate use, and the recovery will be another summer in bed. I have decided not to get any treatment if it is cancer, because it will be a gift to finally end this life of pain. I have no family anymore, they have all passed away. I couldn't maintain a relationship because of my physical limitations, I am financially in ruins living on a pittance from the disability.
I am begging any of you considering surgery to exhaust all the alternatives before you take a step that could potentially end you life as you know it. Once the damage is done there is no turning back, ever. The pain you feel now is nothing compared to the pain of a failed back surgery, it is a searing stabbing constant pain that grips you in the spine and radiates into your groin, hips and legs. I never had any back pain before the surgery, just sciatic. I would trade places with anyone who is presurgical sciatic compared to this hell I have been living in. Please Please don't let these lying doctors talk you into it, and ask them if they'd let their wife or children have it done. See what they say.
All my best to those who are suffering
Bye the way I am now in my fifties and lost all the best years life could have given me.

[SHOKI]

MY XRAY L.S. SPAIN A.P. AND LAT. VIEWS; THE INTER VERTEORAL DISC  SPCEES SEEN NORMAL EXCATE SPACE BETWEEN L5/SIAPPEARS SLIBHT OBLITERATED.OSTRO ARTHNHCC CHANGES SEEN IN BOUGHT 5.I.JTS

[ovenman]

Hi  I had a partial discectomy at L  4-5 in 1992 . Since November I have been dealing with chronic back pain and pain and numbness in my right leg and foot. I was told that scar tissue has formed around the nerve root. the neurosurgeon is suggesting a neuro stimulator From what i have read the success rate is not very good. I would rather he try to remove some of the scar tissue even though I know more would form eventually. Has anyone had this done any advice helpful.

[shortstop7]

Oct. 04, I was moving volleyball steel poles and hurt my back.  Annular tear and herniation in L5 S1.  I have gone through several epi./steroid injections in the disc area as well at the SI joint area.  Pain never went away, but was decently controllable with tramadol.  I had a proceedure done a year ago called IDET to try and burn the inside of the disc to seal the tear.  A couple months ago terrible burning started in my butt, down the back of my thigh, and outside of foot.  A myelogram was done and as a reaction to the contrast (dye) put in my back, it was like my low back especially tailbone area "locked up".  Could not bend forward or arch back.  Myleogram showed L5 herniation, but no significant nerve issues.  Burning seems to get worse, MRI showed tear has not only sealed, but gotten bigger.  They are wanting to do a SI and L5 nerve root block.  I'm scared to death!!!!  For 3 years I have been miserable hoping to die to be rid of pain.  I haven't read much positive about nerve blocks, but I'm desperate for ANY relief.  Can someone please tell me I have a chance at this helping???