Low Back Pain Going into Hip and Leg

I am very familiar with what your issues are. Radiculopathy is what it sounds. Not one surgeon indicated that it was until I had to file for disability. My endocrinologist I had at the time described it to me. He had also studied chiropractic. My pain goes down my left side and down the leg which trips the muscle into spasm. It is no fun. Had surgery in L4-L5. It didn’t work since it extends to S1-S2 and into the sacrum. Good luck to you and wish you the best in your quest. I had some great physical therapist who were forth coming with diagrams from there books to help me understand which nerve and where it traveled from each disc. No surgeon ever gave me a true diagnosis. The just asked where the pain was and not fully evaluate to see how many discs are involved. Be cautious of those over anxious docs who just jump into performing surgery.

As I read through the posts here... uggh.. back pain has many diverse symptoms.. many things that aggravate it.

There are options for pain relief.. from pills to surgery. .. rarely a complete resolve of pain. It is difficult to sort out what might work best for yourself.. what works for one does not work for all. Often one surgery of the spine leads to another.. above or below where the previous surgery took place. Pills and injections.. can be good and bad. PT.. if with a good physical therapist can be excellent choice. Physical exercise is great if done correctly and not overdone. Mental exercises are also a great choice in overcoming pain.

I have had two back surgeries.. unusual.. in the same area.. the L-S joint. A few years back the back pain and sciatica acted up.. same area. I was seeng my pain specialist for my rib pain. He wanted me to try PT for my back. I told him it was my foot causing the back pain, but he wanted me to try PT anyway. After 3rd trip my back was worse and I followed what my back was saying and stopped.

The podiatrist that did my Morton's neuroma surgery a few years before kept giving me shots every 3 months or so and would say “next time you come I will order an MRI if it is still bothering you”. After 3rd time hearing this I decided I needed a different doctor. I chose an orthopedist specializing in feet. He gave worse injection ever that did nothing but hurt and never mentioned a MRI. One trip and I was done with him.

I asked a nurse friend if she knew of a good podiatrist in her town (which is an hour's drive from my home) .. or any town. She knew one in her town. I went to him. He said unfortunately I am required by insurance to give you another injection. He ordered a MRI. It showed I had another small neuroma. He said he thought I was a good candidate for physical therapy.. whew.. thought he was going to say surgery. It happens we have a great physical therapist in my town who knows all about foot PT. Within three weeks he had my foot where I was no longer limping which was throwing my back out of kilter. Point of this story it is not always our spine that is the main source of pain.. something else can be causing your back to not be aligned. Foot, knee, hip..even stomach.. . all plays a part.

For the past year or so I have been having excruciating pain at times... sometimes it is less. It is a bit lower than my spine surgery.. radiates into the groin, upper inner leg, and into the right buttocks. Dull, achy, sharp.. sometimes burning or electrical. Sometimes trouble starting urinating and emptying bladder. I went to my pain specialist. Once I got a couple of sentences out of my mouth he knew what was going on. He said sacrum disfunction.. also known as SI joint dysfunction. He said I need to undergo a couple of injections to verify. The first one gave relief for about two weeks and second one a bit over six weeks. I had SI joint fusion done this past Tuesday.. by my pain specialist... got there a few minutes before 9am and left a few minutes before 11 am. I was awake the whole time. Yes, they did meds to deaden area. I had some pain while he did the bone graft, but was given more pain med and it worked immediately. I have to heal.. let the bone graft fuse complete. (which should happen within six months) Behaving myself in the bending department is hard. No lifting more than a gallon of milk.. no twisting for two weeks... and walk.. walk.. walk. Our dog is getting a workout. 😁

I have tried to stay well. Covid was extremely bad in our county this time last year. I had thumb surgery January of last year and more in June. I wanted to heal from that before handling another physical problem.

My mom's health was deteriorating at the time.. she was in a nursing home/rehab center after a stroke. She was doing better until covid hit and we could not visit her. I called her every day, but sometimes the nursing home would not answer the phones.. three numbers, which one was my mom's phone which they always put out of her reach. Mama passed away in August.

Emotional wellness has an effect on physical wellness. Covid has had an effect on us mentally. In a round about way covid took my mom. Loosing her has been emotional.. even though we try to push away thoughts of “we should have done this or that” they stay with us. We know in reality that there is nothing we could have done differently.

On deciding what to do with your pain.. keep journals of what makes it better or worse. Stay active and enjoy life despite your pain.. do not let it suck the life out of you!! Smile.. even when you do not feel like it. You will never know what your smile means to someone else. I treasure a smile I got way back in high school.. I will be 70 in a few months. How can one remember a smile from over 50 years ago. Easily. Thinking of that smile makes me smile. .. so I have thought of that smile whenever I've needed one. I told my classmate a few years back how much his smile meant to me.. he said he had no idea a smile could mean so much.

Don't Find Joy in your life... Make JOY IN YOUR LIFE!! My mother-in-law was always active and age slowed her down and she could not do much physically... her balance was almost completely gone. She was an artist, but lost her interest in painting. She was a fisherwoman.. but that was past now. She asked me for ideas on what she could do. I knew she liked to watch people and she loved boats. I told her to have dad (I called my f-i-l dad) to take her to one of the boat landings and watch the boaters come and go. They tried it and they both loved it. They did that almost every day for the last 3 years of her life. She said it was a good idea. It was not much, but she wanted something calming. She enjoyed her g-grands, but a quiet relaxing activity was needed with her husband. After she passed away my other dad focused on his g-grandchildren. He was always a child at heart. My mom.. no effort on her part to make joy in her life. She enjoyed watching her g-grand girls and loved her dog. I could sometimes get her to look at photographs and discuss some of her childhood. Mama used to love to read.. especially her bible, but her vision would blur. She did not want me to read to her.

Advocate for yourself .. if you do not feel you can have someone help you. I have trouble hearing and the problem of one word can send my mind off somewhere else (as you can tell by this writing that jumps everywhere) My husband .. oh my how I am blessed to have him in my life!!.

When you do have doctor visits make a list of questions and bring a pen to write notes on that piece of paper.. bring someone with you.. another set of ears is valuable.

My pain med has kicked in so bye.
ZeeGee

My only thought is that you m ight benefit from visiting the pain management department of your hospital.
To some degree, there is possibly a L4/5 compression which also compresses the L4/5 nerve causing the symptoms that you describe.
Good luck.

Pain Management does not mean no pain Its pills and injections and ideas on how to deal with the pain. Most of the pills are non-narcotic thanks to the dope heads and government legislation, so, the pills and creams don't help much. Pain is a miserable thing and those who don't have it think you should just suck it up and quit whining, I live it chronic pain, quality of life is bad, I can't do my old job anymore, trying to learn something new. Not easy

I go to the doctor in pain, usually leave in pain too. The pain can be such a distraction. If a whole lot of people start to say different things I often zone out. The pain and trying to calm it down is what I hear, everything else is there but just doesn't register. Kind of like the sound of the Teacher on the Charlie Brown cartoon. For this reason, if you have friend or family member who can go with you to the appointment. Yea, as they can help you both keeping on track while you're there and afterwards recalling the information provided.

Like you I had great PT. And a lot of it the past 6 years. It’s my go to. But I approach pain like an enemy position that needs to be eliminated. I force myself to walk, even if it’s just to the next house in the sub and back. I attack the pain. I worked with VA psych docs on mindfulness and how to compartmentalise ( my choice of word cuz I put it in a box and ignore the box) your pain. It helped me immensely. I now walk a few miles a day and am working up to 4-5/day. I use the walking, and yes, I’m very slow, to fight the back pain. But now this hip, thigh, calf thing is screwing that up. But I have found if I just take smaller steps and brute force the first mile, I can easily do the second, but slow.

I’m sorry for your situation,
Pain management is not intended to end the pain, as V you know, only to lessen it to a manageable degree, and to improve the quality of life.
I’ve had a number of back procedures with mixed results, And now finishing facet injections, with an ablation to follow. possibly a SCS!
The best I can do is managed my expectations.
Best of luck, C