Update
 

I can't find any threads here which provide the basics about who I am, so a quick repeat: axonal, length-dependent, idiopathic pn since 1996. In Feb, was diagnosed with a spinal cyst causing spinal stenosis and radiculopathy and had a laminectomy and fusion.

Since Feb I've been dealing with recovering from the surgery, and can say I've made great progress. I've used a lot of bodyworkers, and have found Feldenkrais, and deep muscle massage both very helpful. Yesterday I had my first acupuncture, and immediately was able to bend easily and put on my shoes to leave. My back had been stiff, and achy, and that totally lifted.

But I still have pain in my left butt, going down the left leg, which began several months after the surgery. I had an MRI in August which didn't show a cause, and a CT which showed I wasn't completely fused yet, but the rods and screws were okay.

Today I saw my neurologist, and he says that the butt pain is definitely due to spinal stenosis at the level of L4. He doesn't seem to think that this means surgical revision is the only answer, and tells me he thinks I'll be okay to take an active vacation with my kids in January. He thinks the MRI will show the docs where to put a needle for an epidural. But I can't help thinking that if it's spinal stenosis, there will be a re-do surgery in my future.

Yuch.

BTW: I am feeling very good. I've gotten back my flexibility and do not have unremitting pain. I just have pain with sitting (butt) and extension. If I'm a bit flexed, I'm okay. And my overall health seems good, so I am still optimistic. I think the healing from the surgery is near complete, and that's good.

If you can say you feel good (with all the stuff you have going on in your body), that is indeed a miracle. Way to go. Alan once had acupuncture treatments. He danced all the way to the car. I will never forget him doing the Teaberry Shuffle as we exited Coney Island Hospital. He danced right in the middle of the street. People were hysterical. He had had his first acupuncture treatment. He had been sceptical at first but it did work. So as long as he went, he felt good. Unfortunately his insurance changed and didn't cover it any more. But it did work, and that's the main thing.

Here's to continued feeling good!!!!!!

mel

Optimism vs Realism?
 

Well, My favorite-est ever fortune cookie had the wise saying: "Patience is the Art of HOPING". In case you all have missed it, well, I try very hard to practice that, keep all things in perspective and try to constructively challenge my DOCS to want to DO me GOOD!.

Sounds like you may be there, tho not quite yet. Don't get down with 'setbacks', they are simply PART OF THE D****####$$$$!!! process?
The last 7 characters in that 'above' word kind of say it All?

As for the pain in the butt aspect....well, you and I are far from alone in that quarter. While there are times when the grumps make me well, beyond, I'd like to think that the pain keeps me sharper in most quarters. I keep 'coming to terms' with my pain[s], but it keeps on changing. I realize I am not a lab rat, nor a hot-house flower [incubating], I like to pretend I've a life out there, albeit different from what I'd planned or imagined. But, It is there for the TAKING! I plan on grabbing as much as my dullard fingers can hold!!!

Hugs and all the pain free moments you can stand! -- j

Hi Liza, i am glad to read that you are making great progress, have you thought of trying a heat bag around the painfull area whilst sitting ? then followed with a couple of strong magnets right on the spot thats troubling you, they shouldn't affect those screws from the op' because magnets only attract to steel, and i pretty sure [but best to ask the doc] that they would be made up from stainless steel or titanium.
The magnets will increase circulation just like a massage will do, i have been doing the same thing with heat and the magnets because i am having a total hip replacement in about 8 weeks time and i get constant awfull pain that goes from my hip then right down the outside of my leg to my foot and i have had a lot of relief from just doing that, it might be worth a thought.
all the best
Brian :)

Hi NT
 

I remember your name from OBT, but not the detail about you, and I've just looked for your other posts here so I could reply more personally, but find that this is your first. Please remind me, I don't want to be rude, who are you from OBT. And, Welcome to NeuroTalk, it's a lovely, warm, inviting and safe place to post. What's OBG stand for?

Brian: I don't know much about magnets, well, I don't really know anything about them. I do use heat at night. You are thinking magnets over the painful site might help?

Liza,
Brian is sold on magnet therapy. For that matter. so is my wife. she wears 'em day & nite- swears by them as the relief from 24/7 pain from cysts on her spinal column (not operable-so sez the 'chief' at Hopkins).
Glad you are feeling better and BTW, magnets are non invasive.
I'd check with your doc, tho-I think even stainless steel is still a ferrous metal. If he says 'couldn't hurt' (he might be skeptical, tho) give 'em a try.
At least now you can tell people they are a 'pain in the butt'.....and mean it! ;)

Magnets
 

Liza Jane,
This post was to me from Brian and I think Nide. http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/sh...hlight=magnets

Go all the way to the end of the thread and then back up. There are several posts about magnets and how to use them.

Billye

Thanks for the info about magnets--I'll read it more deeply later.

For now, I just want to pass this on. After my doctor said there's something "anatomical" and it's causing spinal stenosis and radiculopathy, I was worried. But an old spiney wrote me, someone I met on the spine board when i was preop, and said that hey, everyone scars, and sometimes the scars are inconvenient and press on nerves or cord. Not to worry too much. Try some epidurals and if it doesn't get better, put off surgery a couple of years.

So I told my massage therapist that it was likely there were scars pulling on L4. And he spent an hour working deeply around all lumbar vertebrae, painfully, achingly deep, the deep that has you feeling something so deep inside the pain feels psychic. I went with it and just kept breathing, because at no time did the pain feel like a hurtful thing, just a hard thing.

He says L2 down are covered with scar tissue; he can feel it, so he's ripping it free and loosening the grip of the muscles. Will it last? Well, it's the nature of scars to want to contract, he said, and the nature of muscles to do that also. But if I keep working at keeping them released, I shouldn't have pain from them.

So here I am sitting at my desk all day, and my butt does not hurt one whit.

I'm amazed.

Yet again.

Glad to hear
 

you got a little relief.

A few random comments.

1. Are you absolutely sure you don't just have sciatica? It sure sounds that way from your sx.

2. The working-out-of-scars-through-massage is very real. I've had them in a couple of places. They're called adhesions, as you know, and if they are not very old or very enormous they can be broken up and reabsorbed by massage.

3. Whatever you have, therapies like massage and PT are proven effective in compression neuropathies like sciatica. Sometimes it's a tight piriformis muscle squeezing the nerve, sometimes its tight connective tissue, or something else, but in many cases the whole thing can be stretched, gently exercised or massaged away.

Man...
 

I would NOT be putting HEAT on that spine every night!:eek:

I'd do cold pack for 20 minutes. Heat aggravates nerves big time!