I've been struggling w/ a ton of nerve pain and poor circulation in my body in various places, it mainly started a few years ago but worsened to the point that I had to stop regularly exercising (which I'm sure only accelerated the problem) and has only gotten worse and worse from the fact that for the last 2 years I've had to work a sitting desk job full-time.
I have issues w/ my neck (some cervical disc compression?) as well as carpal and cubital tunnel on my left side, and these are issues I need to somehow fix also but I consider them lower priority, because the worst issue for me right now is my back from sitting. The back itself doesn't hurt that much but the problem is that when I sit it now INSTANTLY cuts off circulation to my legs/feet - my feet and knees start tingling/lightly throbbing and my feet become ice cold. This now happens practically within seconds of sitting no matter what kind of chair or how I adjust or pad it, including when I sit down to drive. When I stand up and walk around after having sat it feels great - I hear pops in my right hip/knee/leg, I instantly feel circulation returning and the nerve pain fades.
An MRI from April/May showed the following in my lumbar, the issues have gotten worse so an MRI might show up even worse now:
- The L3-4 level demonstrates low-grade arthropathy of the facet joints, fibrosis of the interspinous ligament and mild bilaterial foraminal stenosis.
- The L4-5 level demonstrates moderate degenerative disc disease, disc bulge, endplate spurs, arthropathy of the facet joints, mild bilaterial foraminal stenosis, central zone disc protusion, mild bilaterial recess stenosis and no central stenosis. Faint Modic type 1 reaction is present
- The L5-S1 level demonstrates low-grade arthropathy of the facet joints, central zone disc protusion with an annular fissure, and no laterial recess, foraminal or central stenosis
In addition a nerve conduction test I had done on my left leg shows I've developed nerve damage in my right knee, in the absence of any specific injury the doctors only seemed to surmise that this was an end result of the compression when I sit.
However after giving me these MRI results I've seen a dozen doctors and none of them have been able to explain to me what any of this means for me, if any of it is recoverable or fixable or what. Most of them just tell me to start taking painkillers then kick me out of the office. So since I got these results in April I've just been continuing to sit and the situation just continues to get worse.
Lower Back Pain
Facet joints
