r/Sciatica

40 m. Relatively fit and healthy. Extremely active before this mess. April 30 hurt back (only back pain) stayed that way for about a month. Then on May 22nd things went downhill literally all the way down my right leg. This led to Memorial Day spent in total 10 pain and then foot drop. This has me puzzled because I’ve never dealt with this before. Currently I’m way better than I was Memorial Day weekend. My foot drop which was moderate is now prob back to about 80-85%. Pain is essentially gone, although I still have little stuff here and there. Tingling and numbness is a definite come and go threat, but it as well is getting better. I’ve been on two rounds of steroids spaced out and I did have an epidural injection about 3 weeks ago that didn’t do much.
After speaking with my doctor surgery is an option that is still on the table if I deem it necessary now I do not want surgery, but if surgery is the only thing that’s going to get me back to where I was before then I want to consider it. My question is to you guys at what point should I definitely say yes I need surgery.? also if I decide not to do surgery, how long of a window should I be looking at here until I’m back to where I was before this injury? Also, how long does the tingling last?? I had a l4l5 disc extrusion idk if this matters my my doctor acted like this was better than a herniation because it would absorb quicker. I don’t know about that either. Maybe I could get your advice on that as well. Thank you for all your help.

Today is my last day on a five day course of prednisone and I am actually relieved because it did nothing for me but I wasn’t able to layer on ibuprofen because of the risk of stomach ulcers.

For those of you who had no success on prednisone, did you feel like you had better luck with large doses of ibuprofen or naproxen? Because I think I may have gotten some relief from them, but I am not sure because my sciatica has become progressively worse since I started the prednisone. ( I don’t think the prednisone worsened my sciatica, I just think it was getting worse along the way and now I am wondering if NSAIDs will help anymore. )

5 months in. Mri showed 9mm herniation at l4 l5 into the nerve root. First 3 months were brutal. Id wake up in extreme pain but after moving for a few hours the pain would come down to a 2 and I’d only have a slight limp. With PT and getting a standing desk, I was finally pain free for 2 weeks end of may.

I then maybe got cocky and lifted a case of milk at Costco and immediately felt the shooting pain down my right leg. Woke up next day in agony and I’ve had a heavy limp ever since, every 15 steps I have to stop cuz my right leg seizes up. I feel like I’m 90 yrs old. It’s now been a month no improvement. I can’t work and essentially now bedridden for the last week. I can’t even lay flat to PT. Standing up causes pins and needles and cold sensations, Losing hope after these 5 months. I have ESI coming up and neurosurgeon consult on the 17th. But in this condition I truly can’t push thru work. I do freelance with no fallback.

I hear different warnings about the surgery, people say it leads to lifelong surgeries. My body did heal this once maybe it will do it again, but i haven’t been able to break this flare for the last month, heavy limp needing breaks every 15 steps. Maybe i made it worse cuz it’s never been this bad or disabling.

So just a light hearted post. I visited the physio for the first time, it went really well. But does anyone else absolutely hate the term nerve flossing. The thought that you're running your nerves through your bones like you're flossing? I dunno it just grosses me out! Helped though.

I'm 35, generally healthy, and reasonably active. Before all of this, I walked a lot—around 10,000 steps a day on average. I also did full-body workouts one to three times a week and enjoyed dancing and fitness classes, though I was never an intense athlete.

The acute inflammatory phase resolved for me within about three weeks, and after that I started improving week by week.

Now I’m at the end of week 7, and I’m no longer in pain—just some residual sciatica sensations remain.

At the beginning, I couldn’t stay in an upright position for more than five minutes, and the pain was around 6/10. Lying down, however, wasn’t painful at all.

The support of my family and friends helped me a lot, as well as the fact that I didn’t have to work during this period and could fully focus on recovery. I distracted myself with TV shows and stayed in positions where I didn’t feel any pain.

I moved as much as I could, but only up to the point where I felt I might be doing harm to myself. For me, it was especially important to stay in touch with my own body and sensations. Never do anything that feels harmful to you. If you have a sense that something isn’t right for your body, then that feeling is usually valid. It doesn’t matter if it was recommended by the best doctor or a physical therapist—if it doesn’t feel right for you, it may simply not be the right approach for your body.

Personally, walking helped me a lot. By the end of week three, I started going outside 3–5 times a day. At first it was just for about 5 minutes, and then I gradually increased it based on how I felt—but never through pain.After each walk, I would immediately lie down and rest. The more activity I slowly introduced, the more my nervous system seemed to release the muscle spasms.

Another thing that I think helped me was an online program Core Balance Training. I’m not sure it would be for everyone, but after the free trial period I decided to continue with the subscription and keep doing it. It mainly focuses on core activation and strengthening exercises, and I personally find this kind of format works well for me. In the early stage of recovery, it was physically too difficult for me to travel anywhere for in-person physiotherapy.

As I started to feel better, I gradually reintroduced normal daily activities: cooking, cleaning, and a bit of sitting (in a way that felt comfortable for me, like sitting on the floor with crossed legs).

I also tried adding other exercises besides core work, but based on how I felt, it didn’t really help me. So instead, I focused on gradually increasing everyday movement, walking more, listening to pain as a guide, and taking regular breaks when I felt tired.

I usually try to follow a healthy diet, but during this period I paid extra attention to it. Here’s what I changed:

• Cut out sugar, white flour, alcohol, and smoking.
• Didn't take any medications (not during this recovery or before).
• Gave up coffee while I was recovering.
• Avoided processed meats (sausages, ham, deli meats, etc.).
• Ate plenty of vegetables, berries, leafy greens, fatty fish, beans, and lentils.
• Took turmeric, about ½ tablespoon of fresh ginger juice daily, and magnesium glycinate. My appetite wasn't great, so I probably wasn't getting enough magnesium from food alone.

I focused on eating as clean as possible, at least during the acute inflammation phase.

I'm originally from Ukraine, where herbal medicine—like in many Eastern European countries—is considered a normal part of healthcare rather than something unusual. So I decided to give that approach a try as well.

These are the herbal remedies I took. I'm sharing what I personally did, not making a recommendation for anyone else.

• 5 g each of burdock root, couch grass root, and dandelion root. Add the herbs to 500 ml of water, bring to a boil, simmer for 5 minutes, then let it steep for 2 hours. Strain and drink three times a day, about 30 minutes before meals, for three months. A fresh batch needs to be prepared every day (I usually made it before bed and stored it in the fridge).
• At the same time, I prepared a tincture using marsh cinquefoil (sabelnik) root: 50 g of dried root soaked in 500 ml of vodka. I let it infuse in a dark place for 21 days, then strained it. I immediately started a second batch so there would be one ready when the first was finished.

I took it together with the decoction of the three roots, about ½ tablespoon, three times a day, 30 minutes before meals. After finishing the first batch, I took a one-week break and then continued the cycle.

I’m not sure how much it actually helped, but I applied ice to my lower back for 10–20 minutes several times a day, especially after walks or any activity. I still do it for peace of mind.

I didn’t keep the ice in one place the whole time—I moved it along the lower part of my spine every few minutes, always keeping it at a comfortable level.

What didn’t help me:

Reading scary stories on this forum. It made me feel very low, I became extremely anxious, and started believing that this would last for months. I truly feel sorry for everyone going through this, and I really hope you all recover soon.

Also, stretching and certain exercises—even though they are generally good—did not help me during the recovery phase.

So since suffering since Dec 3rd 2025, I have an L5 root nerve block booked in for Tues 7th July. Even though I’m taking Gabapentin 400mg 3 times a day, I still have an echo of pain down my left buttock, thigh and calf, my last 3 toes are still not moving when I try and still have pins and needles and some numbness. The pain in my lower back is still quite nauseating. Just hoping I get some relief at this point. I have only taken 2 days off work following the injection is this feasible?

I've had sciatica for almost 2 years and been in a relationship for last 1year. My partner is the kindest person who never complained about accommodating to my pain and adjusting our activities and plans according to it. From choosing plans that don't involve too much of a walk to even sleeping positions in bed, alll for me. We were also Long distance for a decent amount but are going to be dating in person soon.

As I go through my pain, I see how it affects them as well both physically and mentally and it's put me in a state of moral dilemma. We're really in love but my condition has often been an hindrance especially with regards to mental health and recently I've been feeling guilty of dragging them down this path with me. I feel guilty of robbing a normalcy from them and have been wondering would letting them go and explore their life without this baggage be a wise decision?

Recently I've spoken to them opening up how I would understand if they wanted to leave. However, they've expressed how this could have been an easier choice early in our relationship when we weren't close compared to now when we are so emotionally connected and they can't live their life without me and neither can i without them, but at times I can't help but feel like a selfish person dragging them down this path of unknown recovery time. I really care about them and want them to be happy in life and as much as I would love for them to be with me I'm scared they won't get to enjoy life with these restrictions and that i'm holding them back. We're only 22 FYI

I would love to hear yall's thoughts as fellow sciatica patients

I was told I have a disc bulge 6-7 months back. It happened when I did rack pulls on the Smith machine, after I learnt from the internet that I was not doing enough back work. For eg., bench and squats i could do 1x bw 15 reps but no deadlift and couldn't do a single pull up. Went too heavy first day as it was easy. The soreness didn't go away for weeks and had light pain when bending and sitting.

Checked with ortho surgeon, used meds and did PT. My MRI showed mild bulge in L2-L3, L3-L4, L4-L5 and that I had LSTV (a common problem in the spine from birth). In between, around 2 months back I also found I had severe vitamin d deficiency (\~11.5) and also always had sleep issues. Took some meds and good on that now. Maybe that also slowed my recovery.

As of today even the mild pain is gone and I never had sharp pain or strength loss in legs. I can do my day to day activities without any restrictions, bending and picking up stuff at home. But there is minor tingling / numb like sensation on the underside of one foot. It's on and off and sometimes there's a light burning sensation. I'm continuing my PT exercises - glute, dead bug etc., and stationary bike, treadmill. But scared to go back to weights. My Dr said it might need surgery if it doesn't recover. I want to avoid spine surgery. In the morning I usually wake up completely fine without anything.

I'm 29M, 175cm and 81kg. I used to be \~72kg. Took 2 years off gym because I had a tfcc tear and surgery. Then this happened after I came back to gym and neglected core and in hindsight was over eager to catch up. I was reading online that each kg weight around mid section puts 4kg load on spine. So that's the thing I'm targeting right now. My extra weight is mostly around that area.

I want to understand if I'm on the right track and if there's any advice for me. Will losing the extra 8-9kg help ? I don't know anyone personally who's gone through the same so I have no idea how serious it is and if it is normal for the issue to remain for this long. Another issue is I'm completely avoiding weight training since the injury and its affecting me mentally.

I’m not sure if anyone has had a similar experience, but I’m honestly feeling really discouraged and could use some hope.

I’m a 23-year-old female, and I’ve been dealing with an L5-S1 disc bulge and an annular tear for over 2 years. According to my MRI, I have very minimal nerve compression, but my symptoms have gotten progressively worse instead of better.

I’ve tried just about everything: 6 months of physical therapy, chiropractic care, medications, and most recently a steroid injection, but nothing has helped.
When I first injured my back, I actually didn’t have sciatica. About a year later, I developed severe sciatica, so I had another MRI. Interestingly, it showed that my disc bulge had actually gotten a little smaller, but it also showed an annular tear. That made me wonder if the tear could be causing my symptoms.

I’ve been reading about chemical sciatica (chemical radiculitis), where inflammatory chemicals leaking through an annular tear can irritate a nerve even without significant compression. My orthopedic surgeon basically dismissed the tear because he didn’t see enough nerve compression to explain my sciatica, which left me feeling like I still don’t have answers.

To make things worse, I had an epidural steroid injection last month, and instead of helping, my sciatica went from about a 5/10 to a 9/10. I don’t know why, but it made everything significantly worse.
Has anyone here dealt with something similar? If you had an annular tear causing sciatica, did it eventually heal? Did anything actually help, whether it was time, physical therapy, or another treatment?

I’d really appreciate hearing any success stories because I’m starting to lose hope

I have been dealing with sciatica for a while now and I started thinking about how sitting might be affecting it. I spend most of my time at a desk and I realized I was slouching a lot without even meaning to.

Making an effort to sit better and take breaks to walk around has not been a complete solution but I notice less stiffness after long periods of sitting. It seems like there could be a link between posture and the pain but I am not totally sure how big of a difference it makes. Walking breaks seem to help me the most so far. I think small changes like that are what stand out.

Other people might have seen similar things and I could be oversimplifying it. That part about feeling less stiff is easy to miss at first.

Well, last night was 4th of July and I threw a firework (those spinning ones I think called the flower ones) and I got scared cause it looked
Like it was coming my way so I booked it. Well, being that I was stuck in bed for 99% of the time before surgery, Idk why my dumb ass thought it was a good idea to run 13 days post op when I can barely even walk right now without a walker. Anyways, I took a hard fall and scraped my elbow and hurt my right knee pretty bad buuuuut…..I don’t feel any pain from before surgery and I can actually walk normal still. I just have muscle soreness in my calves from stretching my legs yesterday after getting up from bed in the morning. By the grace of God or some divine being, I don’t think I re-herniated. I was told by my surgeon that he made a lot of room in my back. I’m taking pain meds and muscle relaxers again and those seem to be helping immensely.

35M here.

History

At age 19 I once injured my lower back by trying to lift super heavy furniture. Since then I've had sciatica that has been mild / moderate and easily manageable. I mostly only had pain down the right leg and no back pain. About 3 years ago when I first did core exercises religiously for 2 weeks, my sciatica completely disappeared for the first time ever and it was great.

Current state

But about 8 months ago, the latest "flare-up" started which has been very persistent and only gotten a bit worse. I can't walk more than 2-3 mins without the pain really building. I could play pickleball great but as of lately that's been tough too and for the past week sleeping has been painful and I've been sleeping 2 hours less per night even with advil. In general flexion helps but lately I've had this mild to moderate pain sometimes even in flexion, particularly behind my knee or on the outer/back of thigh, so there may be an acute sciatica component or some new nerve irritaiton, idk. The MRI this week vs 6 months ago actually seem to be almost identical, no clear worsening (but symptoms have improved, then lately worsened even more).

MRI

https://preview.redd.it/058zbsky3cbh1.png?width=2354&format=png&auto=webp&s=f5a29cf0d161dc01121b46b4006150501385ce7c

https://preview.redd.it/c80hkmfe4cbh1.png?width=2348&format=png&auto=webp&s=63b267485f4d375fc98ab6b4d52e556f6cfa44ac

https://preview.redd.it/qwvebujv4cbh1.png?width=2348&format=png&auto=webp&s=293a3b9b4bb63508963c713e71cc517ccb8dc81e

https://preview.redd.it/yrlwa1gw4cbh1.png?width=2348&format=png&auto=webp&s=6127949f886e8a79953d1d32992f583f59ec81b0

What I tried

Meloxicam didn't do anything. Medrol pack reduced pain a lot but made the numbness much more apparently; I guess I'd call it an overall mild to moderate improvement. ESI might have resulted in partial improvement but not more than 30%. I did PT here and there but honestly didn't do it properly or religiously because of a) pain b) lack of motivation / signal that it'll help and c) possibly aggravated nerve in doing so. Inversion table also seemed to help the very first time I did it for 10 mins but since then I haven't exprienced that improvement and it seems to just aggravate the nerve. In fact in the past 2 weeks or so most things seem to aggravate my nerve very easily, even things that might otherwise help, like inversion table or PT.

What to do next?

I can:

a) Get an ESI again, go see this new PT who's supposed to be more of a spine expert, and give that a month. But honestly my life is miserable right now - extremely limited and eating a lot and inactive and putting on weight. I still go and play pickleball and push through some pain / take breaks / alter my stance etc and can cycle and can workout at the gym with care. But the limitation sucks. If there is a real chance I can get to much better function without surgery (say 15 mins walking tolerance) after a month or max two of PT, I'd treat that as a win. But if it's unlikely, I wouldn't want to waste my time.

b) Get the decompression surgery.

What do you think? Is there a good chance conservative care will help?

tl;dr - 35M, mild sciatica for 15 years, major walking intolerance for 6-8 months, some up and down in symptoms but nothing clearly helped including ESI (didn't do PT very religiously). Is there hope for conservative care? Or should I jump to decompression surgery?

25M. I've had sciataca for more than a year now. It started off not that bad, so I thought it would go away. But over the next few months it's been getting worse. I was first screened on an xray where they didn't see anything. So I was just referred to PT where I had to do leg stretches. However after a month of PT it got worse.

I finally went to the doctor for MRI when my toe started buzzing and feeling numb.

My MRI shows a really small herniation and very slight narrowing canal (doctor didn't call it stenosis) so the doctors aren't sure why the symptoms are so strong. I got an epidural last week. But even with that, my leg pain is really bad. I'd say the epidural didn't do anything significant. And I'm almost bedridden or stuck in my home since walking and sitting is so painful.

It's really annoying I feel like there's something that's not being accounted for. I don't know if this is going to be lifelong. Since it's been more than a year and I haven't seen any indication of this reversing course or healing.

Hi all! I will try and keep this brief as possible.

I'll start off by saying that whatever I have going on with my left leg has not been diagnosed 100% and I have not had an MRI. I've been dealing with this thigh, hip and tailbone discomfort since around the beginning of March. First PT suggested I had a misaligned SI Joint. I did the exercises, no difference, my primary said they didn't feel that was what is causing my pain. Told me to go to new PT. That PT said that he believed it to be more of a strengthening problem, that my left leg is much weaker than my right leg and gave me a new set of exercises to do. They did not help. My Dr. referred me to orthopedics and I have an appointment on July 20th.

So! Where I am now... the pain has now gotten worse. It comes in waves. When I walk, at random, my upper butt OR hip OR left side of my leg will have pain. It doesn't "shoot" up from my foot, it only affects whichever spot it chooses to that day. It would at first go away within a minute or so but now it's lasted for multiple hours on varying days, although the pain will subside. I've never been able to NOT walk at all but it's made it very difficult when it really kicks in.

I've been calling my health provider every morning and afternoon, seeing if they have any cancellations. So far, no luck. I would truly prefer not to load up my body with weeks of pain meds and taking off from work to rest, in an ideal world would be amazing but like most, I have no PTO and would lose tons of money.

Silly question I know. But because it has not been fully or with certainty, diagnosed. Would urgent care even consider giving me a cortisone shot to help me get through until then? Do they even give them. Looking online some people say yes, others no, so I'm think it just varies.

TLDR; Does urgent care give cortisone shots for possible nerve problem / possible slipped disk to hold someone over until their appointment with an orthopedic Dr?

Thank you!

I need your help. My sciatica has gotten so bad that I cannot feel anything but pins and needles in my left leg and agonizing pain in my right. I don't know what to do. The medicine my doctors office gave me isn't helping at all and I called them yesterday to see what I should do and they brushed me off saying they'd get me an appointment in 3 weeks. Ive done stretches and walks and everything everybody tells me to do and there's no improvement and Ive been to the hospital for it a few months ago and they told me there was nothing they could do and sent me home. Please give me some recommendations or guidance. I don't know if I should just tough it out or if I need to go to the er again.

Has 2 microdiscectomies and one steroid shot, had three good years with all but I think it has returned in the most painful way, physically and mentally. This disease already took away a good chunk of my 20s and now it’s back again. I can’t deal with this anymore. I currently on Mounjaro to help loose weight to help with my sciatica but everything is going haywire.
I’m defeated mentally, physically and emotionally. I don’t know what else to do.
I’ve popped up gabapen, took my regular muscle relaxants but I can feel somwthing is not right. The pain in not going in my leg but is terrible enough that I can’t turn around in bed and having trouble breathing.
If this disease can’t get better, I’d like for it to kill me for once and all. I’ve lost too much because of this, I don’t want to anymore. It’s all too much. I’m sorry for the rant and being harsh but I just can’t today. It’s so painful.

Hi,

So 4 weeks ago I picked up my baby boy and felt the worst pain across my back. I was stuck in bed unable to move at all for 3 days and then the pain down my left leg started.

4 weeks later and the pain in my leg is just getting worse. My foot is now numb to the touch as is the outside of my leg. I have weakness in my big toe and if I try to do anything other than lie on my right side I'm in agony.

I have 2 small children - aged 2.5 and 9 months - and I can't even pick them up, or get down on the floor to play with them. So not only am I constantly in pain, I also feel like I'm failing them as a mother. My partner is working full time and then has to come home and do all the housework as well as looking after the children. My mum is having to come every day to look after the children while my partner is at work because I can literally do nothing other than lie down. But my mum is in her 70's and also needs to look after my dad too. So I don't know how we're supposed to cope?

I started off seeing a physiotherapist, who recommended seeing a specialist, which I'm now doing privately (I'm in the UK) but even that seems to be taking forever. The physiotherapist said he can't do anything at the moment because any movement causes so much pain.

I'm currently taking the maximum amount of co-codamol, naproxen and amitriptyline and I'm still in a lot of pain.

So any advice is welcome please. I'm feeling pretty hopeless and desperate right now.

I am having a bad flare up where I’m having trouble walking due to pain (diagnosed with siatica). Anyways, first few days my left side hurts really bad down my left leg. I can barely sit. Today I’m at work (on my feet, cannot be avoided), and I bent down and felt a horrible shooting pain and the pain I swear switched to the other side instantly. Now my left side is fine with no pain and right hurts badly. Never experienced this before, so weird. Is this common??