Hello,
I wanted to emphasize with you on the SI joint pain. I get bouts of that and have found the only thing that helps me is daily stretching. My pirifomus muscles were extremely tight, my SI joints were excruciating and in addition I had pain and tightness in my iliospoas muscles. These all seem to be connected issues and everything was just tightening up. I saw a very good physical therapist who helped me learn stretches to safely loosen this area up. I went from being almost incapable of walking to only having pain on some days. I have never stopped doing the stretches and the pain has stayed manageable. Once I addressed these issues I was able to increase my muscle mass by slowly increasing activity. This may not be possible for you and I’m not implying I know your particular situation but I was so skeptical about physical therapy. I could hardly walk so….how was increasing movement going to help pain? It hurt. But I had been suffering for two years and would have tried anything. Within a few weeks the pain began to decrease and I felt relief like nothing I’ve ever experienced. My thoughts were not consumed with constant, unrelenting and endless pain for the first time in years. If you have not already done so, I recommend asking about physical therapy. If you have already done so, ask again. Not all physical therapist are great at everything. I am still in pain but I was able to increase my body mass (I was 102lbs, I am now 115lbs) by drinking protein shakes and increasing my activity levels over the span of 5 years. I took this slowly, it was hard, it was painful, but I kept at it. Please do not think I am assuming everyone can do this. Some people have things much worse than me. I’m simply sharing how I improved my pain because perhaps there is something that might help for you. I know I appreciated every piece of advice I received as long as it wasn’t judgmental or the person wasn’t pretending they knew exactly what I was experiencing. I know very little about your situation. I simply want to offer what helped me in case that provides you with something that might help you. I hope things improve for you. Mine was so painful and it consumed every waking( and often sleeping) moment. Please keep hope and faith that there will be some relief from your pain. It wears so heavily on the spirit. Best of luck to you.