My first post, so please be patient and if my wife or father in law reads this. Please don't be too critical of my grammar.
So at the moment I truly sympathise with all you suffering now and future suffering readers of this post. For the last ten days I have been at my wits end in pain with sciatica. Having played impact sport most of my life, I thought I'd experienced pain! How wrong was I?
As with most of these things, no one cure is going to be good for everyone, but let me share my experience. I have Piriformis Sciatica, left side, pain shooting down my left buttock & down my leg.
My first mistake, dont try & live with it & wait for it to go away. Also, & my second mistake, don't try heat pads, that will inflame the injury. Do go to a doctor, however they will generally only give you medication and tell you it will go away with time. Time is not a great healer, action is! If you know a good chiropractor or physio they may help if they have the experience. The best advice I got from a physio that I'd seen the day before was : "Call an ambulance". Now, I know that we dont like to waste the NHS time. However by this time I was in absolute agony. It turned out to be the best thing I could have done. You see, I had been lying on my back for days trying to keep from agrievating the nerve. There is only one way to get rid of it and that is to walk about, but how do you do that when walking only makes the pain worse. Gas & Air, that was the answer, and two paramedics who understood my predicament. They gave me enough to get myself up and walking about for 15 minutes and this seemed to alleviate the pressure to allow me to get up every hour to walk as far as I could, each time pushing it a little bit further. Dont get me wrong, it hurt like hell & I didn't go far. The kitchen to the lounge was a marathon. Next thing is research, but not so much on Google, it's too "matter of fact" and overloaded with "experts". Try You Tube and particularly Bob and Brad (physiotherapists). Find someone who you can relate to.
Also treat yourself to a TENS machine, Med-Fit1 on Amazon is inexpensive and helps a lot. Tens machines don't seem to be an exact science, you'll need to experiment by placing pads in lots of different positions, it will take lots of attempts unless you are lucky, and your unlikely to feel lucky if you have Sciatica. Again, refer to Bob & Brad.
What I have learnt is that most of our daily routines seem to be adverse to having a healthy back. Today I tried to load the dishwasher, it occured to me that everytime I pull down the door, or bend over to load or unload it, my back is in the bent over position. Then I looked at my kitchen cupboards, the lower ones almost invite you to put your back out. We need to change our habits to stop Sciatica. Or maybe try something else.
Personally I'm going to try Tai Chi, when I'm over this. Yoga might be better, but not sure I was ever that flexible, & sure I'm not now.