Tired of Back Pain

[Jack_Dawson]

I've had chronic back pain for 4 years and am very sick of it. The worst part is, I'm 34 years old. I know what you're thinking...waaaahhhhhh. But seriously, it sucks. If you've never had back pain you probably can't relate. Vicodin doesn't have the impact it used to, my doctor said in my case, with a ruptured L4 and L5 that surgery would probably be useless.

I mean... :wtf:

So I'm sitting here typing this...in mild pain but medicating with wine and a fleeting vike tablet. Is this what I have to look forward to the rest of my life? In the morning when I get out of bed, I have to walk around like a hunchback for about 20 minutes before I can stand with my back erect like a human being. The only time I feel better is when I swim, which is almost every day. Fuck it's depressing.

Anyone know any "other" cures I might try? Holistic stuff? I'm up for anything. Thx in advance.

Congrats Pats and Panthers!

[disenfranchised]

1. I hear you. Back pain is terrible.

Yoga and weightlifting have helped me. Be careful with the alcohol. It's supposed to make back pain worse.

[ScreamingMeemie]

2. Yoga. It has helped me a lot with pain from rheumatoid arthritis.

Good luck to you.

Hugs,Laura

[LTR]

3. Oxycontin

Worked for Rush.

Now he can spend HOURS on the golf course!

Sorry, thought a little humor might help.

How did you hurt your back?

[Bertha Venation]

4. Know how you feel, Jack.

See if your doc will prescribe a TENS unit (if you have insurance that'll pay for it).

Use heat liberally, whenever practical.

If you have a willing lover, his/her hands and some massage oil can do wonders for the surrounding muscles. (My pain frequently causes me to try to hold my body in strange positions to keep the bones from touching -- that wreaks havoc on the muscles, causing cramps & spasms.)

Best of luck, bud.

[NewHampster]

5. IBUPROFIN - Miracle Drug

I slipped a disk in 1978 after hauling 'taters out of my garden and sneezing in the car.

Spent the next decade or so going to the friendly chiropractor.

Also spent at least one to two weeks every year in bed taking pain killers.

Then Ibuprofen(advil) came along.

It is a miracle drug and I haven't spent more than 3 days total laid up since I started taking it.

The secret is to take the equivalent of the prescriotion dosage.
Before doing hard work I take 3 or 4 200s profilatically.

If my back is feeling like it might go out I take 800 3 times a day.

Sounds bad but in the early days I took it every day, now only a few days a month.

Ibups Rock

[spinbaby]

9. Yes, great stuff

It's an anti-inflammatory, too, if you take larger doses regularly. The trick is to take it regularly.

[Bertha Venation]

13. Welcome to DU, NewHampster

:hi: I have a friend who swears by Ibuprofen. Takes 800 mg 4x/day. He was a Marine, the only survivor of a helicopter crash during the Gulf War. What a great guy.

[Beaker]

24. and Vicoprofen is preferable to Vicodin.

Vicodin is hydrocodone and tylenol, vicoprofen has ibuprofen instead.
ask your doctor to prescribe it instead.

personally, I find Tylenol to be totally useless for anything, including headaches.

[Jack_Dawson]

40. Is it still 5/500 like vike is?

[Kolesar]

6. Abdominal exercises might help

Crunches, leg lifts, etc will strengthen the front abdominal muscles. That can only be beneficial.

I read that ab exercises are good for back pain in an abdominal exercise guide I bought 20 years ago. Do some reading in the library or internet, or find a doctor or therapist who knows something about abdominal conditioning.

[Sindu]

8. You got it. Right on the money

Increasing abdominal strength takes the load off the lower back muscles. I started working abs in 1994 and I haven't had back pain since. Oh and here is another weird thing. I used to drink TONS of Dr. Pepper and had back pain. I've heard a couple of doctors say it can affect the kidneys which can mimic back pain. Something weird in Dr. P. It's more than just caffeine in there.

[Liberal Christian]

7. I hear you!

I compressed L2 in a car accident 12 years ago. It was fine for a long time, but a couple of years ago, something shifted and I have more chronic pain. I know what you mean about it taking 20 minutes in the morning to get upright. I have that problem and also hip joint problems when I sit too long.

I see a chiropractor regularly, which helps keep me more in tune, but doesn't "fix" me completely. I'm going to call and inquire about acupuncture; there's an acupuncture doc at one of the clinics near here.

My sister has been seeing a naturopath and says that she has less back pain when she eats the way the naturopath recommends -- cutting out wheat, dairy, sugar and getting rid of the yeasts in her body.

As soon as I get a new swimsuit (mine has become practically transparent), I'm going to join the athletic club and start doing water aerobics and lap swimming/kicking again.

[LateToTheParty]

10. here's a great book: "Pain Free"

I have had success with the static exercises in the book "Pain Free" by Pete Egoscue. His theory is that if bones are out of alignment, muscles must have moved them there, therefore retraining muscles (NOT rebuilding them) can get your body back to normal function. By 'static' exercises I mean getting into a position and holding it for a minute or two so that gravity can help a set of muscles relax. He covers the entire body and I have fixed problems in the back and other areas, too. Good luck!

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0553379887/qid=1074482413/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-8331128-9271343?v=glance&s=books

[Jack_Dawson]

16. Wow...thanks! Think I might try that.

[Panda1]

11. Back pain is underestimated

One of my relatives has chronic back pain and gets ZERO sympathy from most. Although he too has found Vicodin to be of little use he has developed a "therapy" of his own that makes it bearable. (L5) problem too. He takes regular Ibuprofen,(Naproxen) swims like you do, runs and does sit ups. He says the abs are helpful with the back. Some mornings he too has the tremendous stiffness in the mornings. Surgery isn't an option in his case either.
On occasion if he "tweaks" it just the wrong way he has to get Vicodins to help him over that hump and be really careful for a few days. His also started in his mid-30s and I think it's a matter of learning how to deal with it....rotten as that sounds.

I'm so sorry you are going through this.....as I said most people don't have much sympathy. All the alcohol does is potentiate the Vike temporarily and doesn't help overall.

Best of luck with it. :(

[Fridays Child]

12. Get a second (and third, if necessary) opinion on surgery. Here's why...

My husband was told that surgery probably wouldn't help him, either. MRIs and CATs showed some evidence of previous ruptures but nothing else. When it got to the point that he could barely walk, we demanded exploratory surgery. It turned out that the healing ruptures had formed adhesions, attaching the disk coverings to the tendons running along his spine. Whenever he moved, those adhesions would just keep tearing and reforming. Excising the adhesions--which never showed up in a single test--was all it took to relieve his pain.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

14. My brother is an MD specializing in occupational medicine

and he says that a lot of back pain is not so much the disks themselves but the surrounding muscles going into spasm.

He suggests going to a massage therapist trained in trigger point therapy. It may or may not work, but it's cheaper than either drugs or surgery, and much less traumatic to your body. Then, if that doesn't work, you can try the expensive alternatives.

A few Christmases ago, I threw my back out so that I was stuck leaning part way over, unable to either straighten up or lean over farther. My brother applied trigger point massage techniques, and they worked!

[pansypoo53219]

15. i don't now for sure

but have you tried a chiropractor? and abdominal exercizes are good. help support the back.
i had a dislodged vertebra from a fall causing bad sciatica and my chiro fixed that and straightened my scoliosis too.
it might help put less pressure on your bad vertebra.

[dweller]

17. one question

Is the doctor who advised you against surgery an orthopedist?

dp

[tigereye]

18. used to throw my back out periodically

and eventually went to an acupuncturist. That helped a lot and it is wonderfully soothing. Agree with the ibuprofin,too, but you do have to take more than the one 200 mg tab you usually get. I also started to do tai-chi regularly and that has made a lot of difference. I have not had an intense spasm since I have been doing tai-chi for the last 10 years. The little twinges I get usually go away with ibuprofin.

[Jack_Dawson]

21. He's a surgeon

and very well-respected. But I hear ya...I thought about that too. Last time I was in the waiting room there were out-of-state people waiting for the same guy. And the next state is Nevada, which is about 6 hours away. Anyway...seems to know his stuff and doesn't seem to have any particular interest in me having surgery.

[OneBlueSky]

19. I feel obligated to warn anyone with severe back pain . . .

about the potential consequences of herniated discs that may be impinging on nerves . . . I had the same kind of excruciating back pain years ago, and no one ever bothered to tell me that compressed nerves can be permanently damaged if not decompressed . . .

so I refer you to the following website, just as a precaution . . . if you develop any symptoms other than back pain -- numbness, bowel or bladder problems, bilateral sciatic pain -- to get to an emergency room pronto . . . when it happened to me, doctors kept sending me home with pain meds, and by the time I had surgery, it was too late . . . I've been disabled for the past 13 years as a result, and just don't want to see it happen to anyone else . . .

I'm not trying to be an alarmist or anything . . . just providing information that you probably don't have and hopefully won't need . . . good luck . . .

http://www.caudaequina.org/

[dweller]

30. I'm glad you brought this up

it is alarming information, and very painful when experienced. I too ended up with a permanent nerve loss from the rupture's affect on nerves.

I find it hard to understand a surgeon that recommends against a ruptured disk, herniated maybe. But new treatments are being perfected now that does not involve cutting/surgery, is a outpatient procedure and one can be up and about in 1-2 days. It's all done with wires,heat etc.

I was going to rec. a 2nd opinion at least, but you said what really needed to be said.

peace,
dp

[beawr]

20. Yoga and Massage

Just make sure that you get these things from well trained professionals...

[arewethereyet]

22. if your doctor was an ortho guy then see a neurosurgeon

the issue is nerves, need to see someone trained in that. because of the nature of where nerves are, they are also trained in the ortho aspects.

wife used to work in the neuro unit at a local hospital and she say so many examples of this its not funny.

not positive about the locations that various "L's" impact but in general terms ruptures don't make your back hurt. When she suffered a rupture it was the back of her thigh whose nervs were stuck on from the pressure.

in any event, you need a new doctor.

[Beaker]

23. boo-hoo.

I'm 42(43 in 3 weeks). I've been on permanent and total disability since I was 38 due to ankylosing spondylitis- a progressive disease that leads to total spinal fusion. It's extreme;y painful, and there is no "cure". My condition went mis/un-diagnosed for 20 years- I went to many doctors over those years, but they always attributed the pain to my job doing concrete construction work, gave me a script for vikes, and told me I was getting older(late 20's is older?).
I was finally diagnosed by of all things a chirpractor, who I consulted after a traffic accident in which I was struck from behind by an uninsured immigrant, totalling my car, and the car in front of me(that's how hard I was slammed into)...doubly unfortunately, I had just quit my job a month earlier to pursue a "career" of buying houses, fixing them up, and selling them...a dream that may have been the only actual casualty of the accident...
when the chiropractor 'diagnosed' me, I was uninsured, so I had to buy some health insurance before going to a medical doctor to get an "official" diagnosis...which I did.
and once I was diagnosed, the insurance company made it their goal to drop my coverage, which they were able to do by switching due dates around until one of our payments arrived a day late, and we were out of luck.
when my insurance was dropped, I had to switch from Oxycontin(expensive) to methadone(cheap, but effective). I'm back to having insurance, but I'm still on methadone(currently 60-70mg/daily) - have been for 4+ years, and probably will be for quite a long time...still, some nights I can't sleep more than an hour or two at a time until the pain wakes me up...when I'm awake, I'm constantly fighting my spine, which wants to be locked in a fetal position...sometimes I feel like there's a pipe vise on my spine, sometimes I feel like I'm on a rack...a lot of times I just want to die.

you're right- back pain sucks.

and people wonder why I can be grumpy from time to time...

[Jack_Dawson]

25. That's horrible

You've had some horrible luck, and my heart goes out to you. Fucking insurance companies.

Not to be Rush or anything, but was Oxy helpful? Vike seems to have worn out its welcome. And yes, am very mindful of the addiction aspects of both.

Anyway...again I'm sorry for what you've experienced.

-The Choir

[Beaker]

26. I'm probably an addict, but I don't care.

if I ever stopped taking the narcotics, I'd probably go thru withdrawl, so I don't stop...besides, I don't get any kind of a "high" from them, they just allow me to function/feel fairly normally.

BTW- I know what you mean by back pain, and I wasn't trying to belittle your condition with my "boo-hoo"...

do you find your pain to be worse from activity, or lack of activity? If you have a lot of pain/stiffness when you wake up, try taking 400-600 mg of ibuprofen before going to bed- I find that it helps a lot.

[Bertha Venation]

31. Beaker

Crap... :hug:

Have you a mate, family & friends, to help you through the days?

[Beaker]

36. thanks...yes.

I have a fantastic and loving wife who is very understanding...we met and married when I was 30, and she was 33. we have no kids, which makes things enormously easier- although I feel a little guilty about it, because I know that she would have liked to have one or two...BUT- even though I love her completely, I don't think that either of us would make great parents, and we're better off without them. Besides- if on top of it all, I had a kid that I had to worry about the future world for, the repukes would probably drive me to or beyond the brink criminal insanity.

[chicaloca]

27. This works for my muscle-related neck pain...

I don't know what's causing your pain, but if it's your muscles or joints, there are these strips made by a company called Tianhe that increase circulation to any area that you stick them onto and take away a lot of pain while helping to heal a lot of different injuries. I get them at a nearby Chinese grocery store (they're not very common here but are popular in China). They come in a package that's black on the front and light tan on the back. They have a web site at www.tianhe.com (I've never gone there, so I don't know if the site is in English or Chinese) and you can email them at [e-mail]

There are also some other, more powerful strips I get that are called Wu Yang Brand Pain Relieving Medicated Plaster. They smell really strongly of menthol or something, but they do help a lot. I also get them at the Chinese grocery store. They're made in Guangzhou, China, and are distributed by a place in L.A. called SO'S Co., Inc. The distributor's number is 1-888-222-3496. They come in a goldish-orange aluminum cannister.

Good luck!

[neebob]

28. How about a heavenly new bed?

And regular massages. Either would be worth it even if it doesn't help.

[Piperay]

29. Chiropractor

has helped me tremendously. Of course it depends on what your problem is to begin with, but I was in constant pain until I began chiropractic treatments. I have been going for about 8 years, I go once a month.

[Padraig18]

32. You need to consult a pain-management specialist.

You do NOT have to 'live with it', Jack. Get thee hence to a university-affiliated medical center and consult with a pain-management specialist; self-referrals are not out of the ordinary, and something CAN be done to help with your chronic pain.

If you're not sure how to find one, call your local medical society, or ask your orthopaedist to help you find one.

Good luck!

:)

[trof]

33. Naprapath

I had exactly what you describe at the same age. Saw MDs, orthopedist, neurologist and they could find nothing physically wrong. Told me it was psychosomatic and I should see a shrink. I KNEW it wasn't in my head.

I saw a chiropractor and got some relief, but he seemed to want me to keep coming back monthly forever. I eventually felt this was more for his benefit than mine.

A neighbor told me about her naprapath and I saw him. After some X-rays and a physical exam, lots of poking and probing up and down my spine, he said it would take about 5 treatments to cure me.

Treatments consisted some mild manipulations, much gentler than chiropractic, and a half-hour(?) session on a "roller" table. The rollers moved apart/together, apart/together, up and down my spine. TOTALLY relaxing. Bottom line: It worked.
Here's more about Naprapathy and a website. Might be worth a try.

Naprapathy is a branch of medicine, (manual medicine) that focuses on the evaluation and treatment of neuro-musculoskeletal conditions. Doctors of Naprapathy are connective tissue specialists.

What is connective tissue?
Connective tissue is found throughout the human body. A few structural examples include: ligaments, tendons, fascia, cartilage, and discs. Your body is a complex network of connective tissue which can become imbalanced: too tight in some areas (contracted), too loose in other areas (lax). These imbalances often result in pain. You may be totally unaware that you have a comprehensive musculo-skeletal imbalance until a build up of signs and symptoms reaches an unbearable level of pain and loss of function.

These imbalances can occur slowly and over time - causing your body's connective tissue to become 'tight' and distorted (similar to a 'wet dish rag' that has been 'wrung and squeezed' to excess). Some causes are:

Poor sleeping position
Faulty posture
Improper biomechanics
http://www.naprapathy.org/naprapathy.asp

[nuxvomica]

34. Homeopathy can help

Find a good classical homeopath, preferably one who also does chiropractic. If the pain is caused by the surrounding musculature, arnica montana 30X may give immediate relief but the underlying disase needs to be cured as well and for that you would need a professional consultation. Once there is some improvement, yoga or pilates may be in order. Even weightlifting would be good but in all cases see a professional trainer who has worked with your type of problem before.
I've had considerable improvement to my neck problems with homeopathy but it wasn't easy and took several months to find the right remedy (I consulted with the homeopath via e-mail). If you are fortunate to have a classical homeopath available locally, you can probably get faster results.

[CO Liberal]

35. I Feel Your Pain - Literally

I have two herniated discs in my lumbar region, as a result of a rear-end collision on the interstate in 2000, aggreavated by a low-speed rear-ending at a traffic light in 2002. I wear a TENS unit every day to try and control the pain, but it's not working as well as it used to. So I made an appointment with a Pain Management specialist last week - maybe you should see if there's one in your area.

[AngryAmish]

37. Please see another doctor

First of all, I am not a doctor. But through my job I have become familiar with and have known many people with severe lower back injuries. Do not take anything I say or anyone else says as gospel. This includes doctors. But please do not fall for anyone who claims magic cures or anything like that.

See another doctor, a neurosurgeon or orthopedic surgeon. Some doctors like to cut and some do not. If your current doctor is an orthopedic who does mostly knees and shoulders, he may not do enough lower backs to feel comfortable with it.

Who do you want as a doctor? People get too wrapped up in bedside manner, how much time to m.d. spends with you, etc. Just find out who does the most lower back surgeries in your area. He is doing the most probably because he has most cases referred to him by primary care doctors. In a big city there are many choices for surgeons. Rural areas are more difficult, but not impossible.

Do not go to a chiropractor if you have a ruptured disc. He may cripple you. Seriously.

Other forms of alternative medicine - napropath, homeopathy, acupuncture- do not work. All are based on placebo effect. Most people with muscle based, non-skeletal back pain get better on their own.

Previous posters mentioned some other types of medical treatment. TENS units work about 50% of the time, from my experience. The wires and heat surgery referred to is called IDET. I think it stands for intradiscal electrothermal therapy. It may or may not work. By all means look into it. A lot of insurance companies were not paying for it when I last looked into it about 3 years back.

Do not give up. Clauda equina is real and very serious. The last step for many people with chronic severe back pain (failed back syndrome) the last choice is an implanted morphine pump. Very expensive and you probably will not be employable.

Sometimes there are no good choices. But please become educated on your real options.


p.s. Pain management works and works really well. A lot of people are resistent because to the psychiatric aspects, but please look into it. It usually works.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

38. Also

don't rely entirely on an orthopedist or a neurologist telling you that "nothing's wrong." Each is trained to see mostly their own specialty, so that an orthopedist might miss nerve damage and a neurologist might miss skeletal problems.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

39. I agree. Try another doctor.

A board certified orthopedic surgeon. Even if yours is, get a second opinion but just realize if your back pain is greater than your leg pain, you might not ever be totally pain free.

Also if it is NOT leg pain but BACK pain..make sure you do Mackenzie stretches every day. One of the biggest reasons for back pain is poor conditioning of the back and abdominal muscles which can take a lot of strain off the discs and spine.