I’ve had 3-4 ablation’s done over the last several years. The first one’s I thought helped me more than the last couple. Just because I think my back was so bad by then that nothing was going to help. So if I was you I would give it a try just to avoid a surgery. Trust me, once you start down the surgery road, there’s no turning back. Hang in there! They use to give me what they called a feel good juice when I had injections. It would knock me out for about 20 minutes until the injection was done. It was a good way to have an injection. But now they don’t give you anything, because of the opioid crisis. Be good to yourself!