Tuesday 4 April 2017

Sciatica, or: welcome to another personal hell

Today while at work I had my right leg suddenly go numb again. It's the same thing as the previous times, basically: the leg turning wooden, being unable to move it voluntarily and only being able to wobble around on said leg as if it's a prosthetic limb, pretty much. Sensation is reduced to a numbness, with occasional sharp pains and tingling.

Earlier someone on Twitter recognised the symptoms as I described them and asked me whether it could be sciatica [1]. Unsurprisingly it's a good match. Essentially it occurs when the root of the lower lumbar and/or lumbosacral spine become irritated. This can happen for a variety of reasons, including pregnancy [2].

This diagnosis also gives an explanation for the pain in my hips, which is how this all started, about 5 years ago now. Back then it was mostly the pain in my hip, with occasional pain in my right leg. Over time this has become worse, to the point where there are now days when I simply cannot walk properly, and am in pain the entire time.

Another constant which I have noticed over the past months is that whenever I have these sciatica symptoms, I also experience pain in the lower abdominal and vaginal area, including the at times excruciating pain during a toilet visit. This is all indicative of there being something in the lower abdomen which is irritated, swollen, inflamed, or a combination thereof.

I have already contacted my GP about this and hope that I can get some kind of diagnosis now of the underlying cause for these symptoms. Most likely it's due to my period, the associated hormonal changes and my unique physiology as a hermaphrodite. Most worrying about it is that the symptoms are becoming more severe, which warrants immediate medical attention. Hopefully that will work out for once, and I won't be still writing about it in ten years, while crippled and bed-bound, or something.

Can my life please get boring yet? :(


Maya


[1] http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/sciatica/basics/definition/con-20026478
[2] http://www.webmd.com/back-pain/guide/sciatica-symptoms

2 comments:

Unknown said...

hello ,Well let me tell you im not a doctor but yes what you described ,could be sciatica. And is strange because according of what i heard people who suffer from this ill are very obese,or old persons or they suffered a trauma in his back...

you should consult with your doc asap. maybe he/she recommend some excersises to relieve the pain in that area. in my personal experience i caused a lot of pain trying to lift a barbell over my head in military press workout, basically i almost
snap my shit up!. it was painful and it took me like 4 days to recover, i was scared because i dont want an hernia in my intervertebrae disc lumbar area.

i hope you get well soon

Sheila Nagig said...

Another possibility worth looking into is your iliopsoas muscle and hypertonic pelvic floor muscles. The abdominal muscles are where we store emotional trauma, for lack of a better way to describe it. It can cause a lot of problems because when those muscles tense it reduces the room in your abdomen for things like the bladder and bowel to function properly and the muscles are connected to other muscles and attached to bones, so when they're tight they pull on where they're attached and put other things out of alignment. Pain in a leg or the hips can come from it and since the psoas is connected to the lower spine it can cause back pain there. It's actually something a physiotherapist can help with. The solution to this particular problem might be simpler than you think. It's worth checking just in case it is.