Has anyone had a facet rhizotomy procedure?

[AnastasiaBeaverhausen]

Just wanna commiserate with you @Spring Day.

Pain management in this country is a joke, especially if you're a woman with pain.

I had severe tailbone pain for 1.5 years after giving birth to my kid. Every doctor's like, well yeah, childbirth hurts, duh! Eventually they recognized that my level of pain was not normal. Plus, my issue with my tailbone had started to cause me pain in other areas, because I couldn't sit correctly. Finally I was referred to 2 specialists who through months of PT, etc. I'm doing much better now. I still have residual pain/numbness at times.

In the end, I'm just glad I didn't have to go the surgical route (yes, apparently cutting off part of my tailbone was a possible solution?? *shiver*).

But I'm still a little miffed that I had to suffer for almost 2 years just because doctors didn't do the right thing in the first place. Blah.

 

[luv2sparkle]

@Spring Day , the exercises that my husband has found most helpful are in the book by Jim Johnson, PT called 'Treat Your own Spinal Stenosis'. He has spent a couple years in therapy and didn't get as much help from any therapist as he has got from this book. Jim Johnson also has another book called "The Multifidus Back Pain Solution" that is very good. Multifidus refers to the group of muscles that strengthen your back. On the surface these books seem pricey but they are less than the cost of one visit to a therapist and they are very effective. We own many of his books. My husband has both shoulders worked on and has the shoulder book and it has been of great help too.

I am so sorry you had such a bad reaction to the epidural! That sounds awful. They were able to pinpoint the facet joint with the epidural for my husband so that is why we were inclined to try it. He will not do it again though. He may do another epidural but so far he is able to mitigate a lot of the pain with walking and doing strengthening and stretching exercises. I hope this helps you and I really hope you find some relief. It is a hard thing to deal with on the daily. There are quite a few days that he has to sit for a while on a heating pad.

 

[SparklieBug]

I have TMS, and although my pain is gone I feel like it's something I will always battle. I had MRI's, nerve tests, went to acu, PT, massage, yoga. Nothing worked long term until I learned about what it was and how to retrain my brain. Within a couple months my pain was completely gone.

I know it sounds crazy and I sound like a commercial. I don't want to push it on you but If you are at all interested let me know and I can point you in the direction of a ton of free or inexpensive resources where you can learn more. I'm super passionate about this because it literally changed my life.

Good luck!

@Decision_Decisions Are you willing to share the modality or method(s) that you used to retrain your brain? I am so very interested in this!

This request also goes for anyone else who may have information.

 

[Spring Day]

Yes, well, hmmm.

I didn't get the vibe at all that @Spring Day wasn't prepared to travel, but I have to say, the only person who relishes the idea of traveling to have back surgery is the person who's never had it.

After back surgery, one has to get *home* - and I found a 20 minute trip in a car after a double laminectomy/discectomy not much fun. The idea of being hours away from home after spinal surgery is downright daunting. I'd *definitely* be...er..."looking under every rock" for a surgeon closer to home. If there wasn't one - fine - travel. But I'd be making sure first that one wasn't available locally. That's just common sense.

Spring Day, as someone who has had a very bad back for decades and who had mixed experiences with the orthopedic / neurological surgery fields, I wish you the very best of luck, whatever you do! For what it's worth, I've had most success from building the strength in my core, and I (much against my will!) took up yoga over a year ago, despite being bored out of my ever-loving whenever I do it (about 3 classes a week). I'm more of a cardio kind of girl, and I dislike yoga in general, but persevere due to the overall advantages I've experienced. I just find it deathly slow and boring and have been known to write an email while in a full forward fold position....

Good luck!

PS Re finding a good doctor - I'm with you on this; it's tough! I need another round of back surgery and am trying to hunt down someone I trust. I initially went to one woman who was Harvard trained and is still a lecturing professor there, while also on the Beth Israel surgical team - generally considered to be not so shabby. However, I was pretty severely put off when I read her report a couple of weeks ago and she persistently referred to the pain running down my left leg. Since it's my RIGHT leg, this was news to all of us. Had she followed her own report, she would, literally, have done the surgery on the wrong leg. If that doesn't give a person pause, I don't know what would!!

Gah! You’ve been through so much with your back! But I totally agree that I’ve had to think about the trip back home after surgery.

Man, what if you had just went ahead and she would have totally done the surgery on the left leg! I know that doctor's see a lot of people and its hard to remember everyone but that would have been very bad. My friend actually had her appendix removed because wires got crossed when she went into surgery for something else so it happens!

 

[Spring Day]

Just wanna commiserate with you @Spring Day.

Pain management in this country is a joke, especially if you're a woman with pain.

I had severe tailbone pain for 1.5 years after giving birth to my kid. Every doctor's like, well yeah, childbirth hurts, duh! Eventually they recognized that my level of pain was not normal. Plus, my issue with my tailbone had started to cause me pain in other areas, because I couldn't sit correctly. Finally I was referred to 2 specialists who through months of PT, etc. I'm doing much better now. I still have residual pain/numbness at times.

In the end, I'm just glad I didn't have to go the surgical route (yes, apparently cutting off part of my tailbone was a possible solution?? *shiver*).

But I'm still a little miffed that I had to suffer for almost 2 years just because doctors didn't do the right thing in the first place. Blah.

See! I hate that some doctor's think that women just need to deal with the pain or we're making it up since we're so "sensitive' and "fragile" but we're far from that! So, when you give birth is this something that might happen to your tailbone or was this just a freak incident? I don't have children and have never given birth so I'm not familiar with the issue. I can't believe they wanted to cut off your tailbone!! I remember my dad was teaching me how to roller skate when I was a kid and I fell. My legs came up and my butt came down really hard on the cement and I have a sprain on my tailbone and that was painful so I can't even begin to imagine the pain that you went through with injuring your tailbone during childbirth!

 

[Spring Day]

@Spring Day , the exercises that my husband has found most helpful are in the book by Jim Johnson, PT called 'Treat Your own Spinal Stenosis'. He has spent a couple years in therapy and didn't get as much help from any therapist as he has got from this book. Jim Johnson also has another book called "The Multifidus Back Pain Solution" that is very good. Multifidus refers to the group of muscles that strengthen your back. On the surface these books seem pricey but they are less than the cost of one visit to a therapist and they are very effective. We own many of his books. My husband has both shoulders worked on and has the shoulder book and it has been of great help too.

I am so sorry you had such a bad reaction to the epidural! That sounds awful. They were able to pinpoint the facet joint with the epidural for my husband so that is why we were inclined to try it. He will not do it again though. He may do another epidural but so far he is able to mitigate a lot of the pain with walking and doing strengthening and stretching exercises. I hope this helps you and I really hope you find some relief. It is a hard thing to deal with on the daily. There are quite a few days that he has to sit for a while on a heating pad.

Thank you so much for the name of the book! I'm gonna go search for it now!

 

[Spring Day]

@Decision_Decisions Are you willing to share the modality or method(s) that you used to retrain your brain? I am so very interested in this!

This request also goes for anyone else who may have information.

Yes please @Decision_Decisions. This sounds so interesting and I would love to learn more about it!

 

[AnastasiaBeaverhausen]

See! I hate that some doctor's think that women just need to deal with the pain or we're making it up since we're so "sensitive' and "fragile" but we're far from that! So, when you give birth is this something that might happen to your tailbone or was this just a freak incident? I don't have children and have never given birth so I'm not familiar with the issue. I can't believe they wanted to cut off your tailbone!! I remember my dad was teaching me how to roller skate when I was a kid and I fell. My legs came up and my butt came down really hard on the cement and I have a sprain on my tailbone and that was painful so I can't even begin to imagine the pain that you went through with injuring your tailbone during childbirth!

Apparently tailbone injuries during childbirth are not uncommon. But I think mine was worse than usual b/c I was on my back pushing for 3 full hours and my baby was positioned facing sideways. So I pretty much had her head and shoulders pressing on my tailbone for a solid 3 hours.

With the surgical option, the doctor at the time said my tailbone may have actually gotten moved out of its usual place. So surgery would be to fix any nerve issues if that's what's causing the pain. Or "remove just the tip" of the tailbone if it's physiological. No thank you!

 

[Gabbycat]

@SparklieBug I think @Decision_Decisions was referring to a practitioner by the name of John Sarno. He has about 3 different books that discuss his methods. I read Healing Back Pain. He also has The Divided Mind and The Mind Body Prescription. I thought the one I read was worth the time and had interesting facts. I found it calming in that knowledge is power, and the knowledge I gained helped me feel more in control. But I can also see where it would only apply to a certain set of back pain sufferers and may not work for everyone depending on their specific issue.

 

[mrs-b]

Gah! You’ve been through so much with your back! But I totally agree that I’ve had to think about the trip back home after surgery.

Man, what if you had just went ahead and she would have totally done the surgery on the left leg! I know that doctor's see a lot of people and its hard to remember everyone but that would have been very bad. My friend actually had her appendix removed because wires got crossed when she went into surgery for something else so it happens!

I have a family full of doctors and the horror stories I've heard are just unnerving! Hoping nothing like that will *ever* happen to you or me, @Spring Day!

Please do share here what you ultimately decide to do - I'm interested and I'm *really* wishing you the very best with this. {{{Hugs}}}

 

[Decision_Decisions]

I just posted a new (insanely long) thread titled TMS for anyone that is interested in learning more!

 

[SparklieBug]

@SparklieBug I think @Decision_Decisions was referring to a practitioner by the name of John Sarno. He has about 3 different books that discuss his methods. I read Healing Back Pain. He also has The Divided Mind and The Mind Body Prescription. I thought the one I read was worth the time and had interesting facts. I found it calming in that knowledge is power, and the knowledge I gained helped me feel more in control. But I can also see where it would only apply to a certain set of back pain sufferers and may not work for everyone depending on their specific issue.

Thank you, @Gabbycat I'll go have a look at these books.

I just posted a new (insanely long) thread titled TMS for anyone that is interested in learning more!

@Decision_Decisions Great! I'll go have a look right now! Thank you.