I have back pain but it's from Lyme disease. They're shoving a needle in my back soon but for a spinal tap. Cortizone shots HURT but help. Physical therapy is also a good bet. I did some (not just for my back, though) and it was helpful.

Good luck!

 

Bend over Devilish will give you a needle in your backside!!!!!!!!

Serious try and avoid the Chiropactor. They are a temp fix for relief. Long term they results dont show much after you stop going for real back injuries. You need to get a real therapy plan together with a real Dr.

With the money you have take a ride down to Brymawr Re-hab see real Dr.`s with cutting edge tech. and specialize. Most Chiroproctors specialize in pairing up with lawyers for law suits.

And another thing for massage go to the washy washy... Not talking real massage talking oriental eye bitches that can make the happy ending it will work much better than the Chiropractor... Thats coming from Dr.P

 

Back pain can be some of the worst pain out there.

Hopefully it never gets so bad that you'd need a backiotomy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7igFN...eature=related

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rq5iWuyuWkE

Ok Mods this is borderline. Dont know if kissing violates our somewhat broad rules but just trying to help a friend get relief. Remove if too vulgar.

 

another bad back here. I broke L2 & C7 when I was 6. But I did the most damage last year commercial fishing. I handled 200 80lb bags a day for 6mos til I moved wrong once one day, kept going ignoring the pain til it got to the point where I had to roll out of bed and could barely walk. finally got an MRI which showed 4 out of 5 discs were bulging in my lumbar.

I spent allot of time and money @ the chiropractor working on decompressing them and noticed improvement in certain areas, like it didn't feel like some one was taking a blow torch to my back when sitting or bending over and the aching/excruciating pain in my legs went away after a couple months..besides for one spot which I later found out from an orthopedic was a stress fracture on my femur.

Worst part was my PCP never took me seriously about any of it, she sent me 1st to PT instead of getting an MRI(which made things worse), never ordered any xrays even tho I complained about my thigh over and over and then said I didn't need any pain meds til she got the mri back(since I'm only 25) then she finally gave me 5/500vicodan which I'd have to take 5 of to feel enough relief to actually leave my house(originally). my mom told me I should keep a log of pain and meds so they have a better idea.. but soon as that quack saw I wasn't following the directions to a T she cut me off, and theres no such thing as a doc around here who accepts new patients with chronic pain issues(since I was at that stage then).

Truthfully last summer was the scariest of my life, constantly living in 9 out of 10 pain wise(haven't used 10 since I had a cerebral hemmorage) and maybe getting an hour or 2 of sleep a day. couldn't work, couldn't socialize since I couldnt sit or stand for long at all. and honestly if I didn't know where to get oxycodon off the street I wouldnt be here right now.

But actually the worst part is stuff is def still wrong and no one has a clue. I get sharp shooting pains down my leg strong enough to make your muscles twitch with each bolt or some times they shoot into into my manhood, it feels like some one is constantly hammering a small knife into my left buttock, my tail bone always feels broken tho its not, carrying weight causes allot of pain on top of my left femur, but I can now manage to sit for as long as I want but it increases the frequency of the shooting pains..

I went to a back specialist who told me to see an orthopedic, went to an orthopedic who told me to see a back specialist. I've tried doing PT twice and exercising on my own but it only makes the pain worse later on, even if I just flex my abs while standing not completely straight the pain will almost bring me to my knees.

And I simply cant afford to take any more time off so I started fishing again dec 1, but a much easier fishery now. I also dont take any narc's or Rx NSAIDS anymore besides for when I'm working, altho the temptation is always GREAT just to pop an oxy only just to live pain free for awhile, but I dont want to be a zombie, dont want to kill my liver and hate how I feel about myself when I'm forced to get them off the street..you just feel wrong, even if your not abusing them. everyone living day to day pain free never realize how good they have it... I know I didnt

 

If someone has any vertebrae out of position, a chiropractor is the only treatment that can realign them into the proper position. There's no way a doctor or any amount of therapy can do this. When I was younger i hurt my back playing hockey. I spent 2 weeks in bed at the doctor's request along with taking pain killers and it didn't get any better. After 2 visits to the chiropractor I was back out on the ice again. If you have a herniated or broken vertebrae the chiropractor can't help, but if a vertebrae is shifted and pinching a nerve they can realign the spine to get you back on your feet.

 

Carlo I doubt you have any muscle issues with your problem but if you do let me know.
I'll get you the number and address for my massage therapist... They aren't like Mikes Washy washy girls but they did what all the PT,drugs and other Drs couldn't... And they aren't too hard the eyes either

 

Man, any kind of injection of that sort scares me. Hopefully they can get you straightened up short term for now so we can get to work.

As we discussed, we're going to need to define you a routine composed of many of the following - I mix a combination of these 2-3x a week into my regular stuff.

-Hyperextensions on 45* bench or roman chair (personal fav)
-Barbell or dumbbell good mornings
-Lying leg lifts
-Hanging leg lifts
-Straight leg and decline situps
-Medicine ball work (pushups, crunches, leg lifts)
-Decline ab board leg raises
-Rope pull downs

Core/Ab/lower back strength for the win. I know I'd be crippled years ago without doing this stuff. Let's try a few of these this weekend if you feel up to it.

 

oyea another thing about injections some may not know about, they weaken your bones so older guys, people with osteo perosis or osteo genesis(like me) should put some extra thought towards it. its all the pain clinic wanted to do for me because of my age, apparently you only have a right to pain relief if your older.. course my job has the highest injury & death rates and I need my body to work so I'm not doing anything to make my bones any weaker.
and tho I've never had injections they cant be as bad as spinal taps

I've also found some homeopathic remedies to take day to day since I dont like the idea of taking 800mg of ibprofen & 4000tylenol everyday just to take the edge off:
hypericum- helps w/ nerve pain if you have burning, tingling & numbness &/or esp when the nerve is injured
ruta- helps w/ nerves, sprains and cartilage and tendons probs
kali carbonicum- helps pain and weakness in lower back
bryonia alba- helps muscle and joint pain improved by rest(theres a dif one for 'improved by activity)
arnica- helps sore muscles, strains, sprains, bruises arthtitis and nerves a bit too
symphytum officinale- which helps healing bone traumas and works wonders, when I broke my femur I was supposed to be in traction for 6mos but got out of the hospital right at the end of the 4th.
and I also just came across "traumeel" which is a brand unlike those latin terms^. it has some of those things like arnica, symphytum, hypericum, and except for echinacea I'd have to look the rest of em up to know what they are, but now that I found this theres 3 less of the remedies listed that I need to buy individually.

and if your muscles get tight/sore kava helps allot with that but its also a mild sedative fyi although your head stays clear, and it also a anaesthetic, anticonvulsive(sp?) and helps social anxiety and promotes a good mood but shhhh I dont think pfizer etc wants us to know about homeopathics. no it doesnt work as good as the 40mg of flexerol the docs had me on back when I was still going but it doesnt make my heart beat a mile a minute and I know its allot better for my liver.

 

A friend use to get cortisone injections in his pitching arm when he was in school.. Years later he was at a company softball game pitching and his humerus snapped mid pitch... Pretty nasty

 

I'll bet that wasn't too humorous....

 

yeah that aint fun! when I broke mine off it was floating around up by my tricep and the nurse I saw before the doc was a TARD! he was moving the piece around real curious like and kept asking 'you sure its broken?...how do you know its broken? and thats when I lost my patience with him

 

Back pain is no joke. Get that **** taken care of Carlo. Good luck boss!

My favorite experience with this is going into the doctor and saying I have a severely pinched nerve in my back and like C5kid said breathing hurt. He told me "there is no such thing as a pinched nerve". I had to look at him like he was a idiot for a moment and just said uh ok. He said its just a pulled muscle. I found it odd when i moved certain ways when I felt the nerve pinching I could move enough to make it not pinch and then be ok. I could stretch a certain way and get really bad back pain. So he gave some pills I took them and its slightly better but easily agrevated

 

I broke my back in 2001 on my dirt bike. Compression T12, L3 and L5 and broke off the transverse process ( muscles attached to the vertebrae) the muscles contracted so fast, it snapped the bones. I used to have alot of pain but losing weight and also working out helps alot. It really doesnt bother me anymore.

 

That's not something I want to hear. I still ride my YZ250 and I'm 51 years old. It's amazing you're even able to walk anymore.

 

I injured my back by lifting a 50# golf cart battery at work back in 2000. Because of the nature of the "injury", it was assumed I had simply pulled a muscle. Turns out that wasn't the problem at all. Unfortunately due to many clueless doctors, it took 3 years before I got any sort of long term relief. Still not 100%, but manageable since I've had the issue so long I now know when it's ready to act up and simply work around it. Walking or standing for any length of time causes ache, then numbness in left leg.

When at my worst, I could stand in front of the mirror and actually see that my body was pulling down to the right side, although the left side is what I hurt. Doctor's agreed it was muscles trying to protect the back from further damage. Like a built-in alarm, somewhat. I kept telling them I thought it was a nerve issue, because I would sometimes be pain free for a day or two, then I'd twist, or move too quickly, and the spasms would literally cripple me. Been hauled out of my work, and my driveway by ambulance due to this.Ignoring the facts, they kept treating me for muscular/spinal problems. Don't recall the numbers but there's two L sections and 3 S sections screwed up, spinal stenosis, bulging discs, and arthritis in my back. That's my daily pain, managed by me with 800mg Ibuprofen most everyday, a $2500 Sleep Number bed, and a jacuzzi tub. The severe spasms went almost ignored. Said they had a process to work through...

I did the cortisone shots twice...lasted 3 days tops.
Went to PT probably a hundred and fifty times. Would feel OK for a day or so.
Chiropractor, who did nothing but crack my back, and actually fucked me up once by having the weight set way too high on the traction machine. Could barely walk for a week.
Had two nerve conduction studies, that's some of worst pain ever, when they find the trouble area.
Two or three different MRI's, telling me what we already knew about bones and muscles.
Hundreds of heat treatments, back massages, electrical stimulation therapy, even had my own "tens" unit at home to do at night.
Went to gym as much as I could stand it, trying to strengthen my lower back and abdomen...supposedly that was going to help. It did not.
Finally, after 3 years of various people trying their so-called best to help me, I went to a pain management center.
He gave me yet another cortisone shot.
I felt great for 2 days, then back to pain.
He said that was great, he now knew it was not a muscle issue, but it was a nerve problem.
He found that a rough area of vertebra was actually rubbing and irritating a nerve that went from lower back to left leg.
He did a procedure called a Radio Frequency Ablation, which was an outpatient procedure using a laser to actually sever the problem nerve.
Knock on wood, I haven't been hauled to the Hospital in 7 years now, and only have to deal with the daily aches and pains due to wear and tear of being a mechanic. My biggest issue now is trying to NOT lift heavy stuff and NOT overexert myself. I'm a big boy and still fairly strong for a 47 year old brokeback ****, so co-workers/friends/neighbors just "assume" that I'll help them move and/or lift heavy crap and I simply decline for the sake of my family. Can't pay the bills when I'm all crippled up in the bed, whacked out on Vicodins...

CLIFF NOTES:
Different people require different treatment.
Some things work great for one guy, but are waste of time for another
Best advice is to keep looking for a doctor who truly seems to be intent on making you feel better, and not just experimenting with you.

Those who have never truly experienced chronic back pain, have no clue what we go through, and how it affects every area of our lives. When someone says, "oh man, I got a back ache"...I kinda just laugh inside because I only wish that was what I have had for the last 10 years...

Sorry to ramble, but figured I'd share my experience like others also have done.