What to do

[Jimbo]

Hey folks, me again, and I am not doing well. Today my lumbar pain was so bad I had sweat rolling off my forehead. Also had this numbing and tingling sensation down my left leg, boy, that feelling is terrible. I just dont know what else I can do. My surgeon sent me a letter from my appointment 3 months ago stating that he believes surgery would not offer me any reliable pain relief and on that basis does not recommend surgery unless all other options have been exhausted. I am not sure what else i can do now with alternative therapies. I have been swimming heaps and getting remedial massages plus chiro treatment, all with only brief relief. This lumbar curve is baaad, the muscle on the left side is constantly rock hard, swollen and very sore and from my waist to the top of my head is always aching. I dont see how any therapies would help with that.
I really dont want to keep hassling my surgeon, but he did say in his letter that if i get a worsening in my pain to go back and see him. I just think he will think that I have not given the recommended therapies enough time to work, but I know my body and can tell they are not going to work because they havnt in the past and are not now. I feel my pain is getting worse, evident aswell as i am popping constantly codeine for some relief. I put up some pics of xrays, feel free to check em out and tell me what you think.

I think i am losing my mind with all this, I am worried what it might come too, any advice, as usual, will be much appreciated.

[Qikdraw]

Jimbo,

Sorry to hear you are having problems. :(

Have you had an MRI done to see if there are any pinched nerves? The tingling down the leg makes me think that is a problem there.

For the rock hard back, do you have anyone that can give you massages? I need a massage every 2 or 3 days or the knots in my back start causing lots of pain. Its kind of a circular problem, my lower back pain causes knotting, which causes further pain, after the massage we rinse and repeat constantly.

Brad

[augemac]

I am 32 have scoliosis and had four surgeries. But I also had a friend with scoliosis who is 60 and she was having similar problems they found it to be associated not with her back but fibromyalgia. Just an idea to look at a specialist that deals with fibromyalgia. They helped her tremendously.

Auge
T4 - L4 fusion 1999
66 degrees thoracic
58 degrees lumbar

[debbei]

Jimbo,

I'm sorry that you're having so much pain. Maybe you should go back to the surgeon since he said to do so if you were in more pain. I hope you can get some relief in the mean time.

[LindaRacine]

Hi Jimbo...

Since your xrays were taken on a short cassette machine, I suspect that your doctor may not treat a lot of scoliosis patients (although it's possible that things are done differently down under). If your surgeon isn't listed here (or maybe even if s/he is):

http://www.srs.org/find/index.php?mode=results&first_name=&last_name=&title=&institution=&address=&city=&state_province=&zip=&country=Australia&specialty=

... you might want to consider getting a second opinion.

Best of luck.

Regards,
Linda