MRI Machines and Crumbly Bits

I am in my third month of sciatica pain, the kind that makes you consider stomach ulcerations by taking All Of The Ibuprofen In The House over the course of the last twelve weeks.  

After two or three urgent care appointments and an orthopaedic doctor visit, I saw my primary care doctor and asked her what I could do.  I am no longer able to walk normally, lay down or sit.  It is a bit ridiculous how stupid this pain is, if I sit (like right his very moment) it takes me quite a long time to get out of this position and fix my hip, leg and back so that I can move at a decent pace.  If I stay moving, I'm okay.  It is unrealistic to stand and pace every minute of the day so I do get "stuck" like this a few times a day, particularly when this happens:

The primary care physician sent me for an MRI on my lumbar and sacral spine, and it's just a mess.  I already knew I had some degeneration, but it's gotten worse and obviously now there's a nerve root issue.

Super!  GREAT!  Fun!  Love it.  The problem here is that I want my normal range of motion and movement back (HA HA) and without pain relief that works, this is impossible.  Taking NSAIDS after gastric bypass surgery is asking for a bloody ulcerated gut death and I'm currently risking it just to lay down at night. 

I am not writing this for pity - there's a million of you out there with similar conditions, and I was told "GO EXERCISE, THAT WILL FIX YOU!" and yes, please, I want to, but HOLY HELL.  Exercising by just picking up a toddler's thrown breakfast is like being stabbed in the asscheek.  Picking HIM up?  YEEEOUCH.  

Forget pants.  Socks?  Nope.  

"Degenerative disc disease L3-SL L4-5 broad-based central and posterior paracentral disc
protrusion with mild to moderate indentation on ventral thecal sac centrally and
bilaterally slightly greater on the left, with contact on the descending left L5 nerve
root in the lateral recess.
Central and right posterior paracentral L5-S1 disc protrusion with mild indentation on
ventral thecal sac centrally and eccentrically to the right.
Minor L3-4 midline disc protrusion.

On getting old.

As many of you -- I have had lower back pain for years, and in my normal Beth way I have ignored it or (...don't tell anyone!) medicated it with NSAIDS off and on, and heat, and exercise, and stretching.  AND GOD DAMN IT, IT HURTS.

Source - Healio 

NSAID use is contraindicated in gastric bypass patients as it can cause serious ulcers.  I started popping them like candy recently.  No. good.

The back pain comes  in cycles and never really goes away.  It gets to the point where I cannot ignore it and I am currently in a Flare Of I Cannot Sit Down Or Sleep Or Lay Down And Nothing Feels Right EXCEPT getting on my knees in 'downward dog' position.  When I describe it to other people they chime in with "Yep.  I live this." 

I had my husband take me to the urgent care MD on the weekend for X-Rays.  They show disc degeneration. No surprise. I suppose after ignoring it -- plus a few years of massive obesity, plus four pregnancies, losing all of the weight plus eating haphazardly and vitamin-deficiencies, it shouldn't be a surprise.  

Hooray.

I was prescribed an anti-epileptic drug instead of a pain-medicine, at my request because I do not want to be sedated, and that I am epileptic.  

Although as the doctor was describing the medication's side effects to me, he explained that it might cause "sedation, dizziness," and I stated, "... that it isn't like I do anything important anyway, I'm not using heavy machinery as it is."  

I do not know that he got my seizure humor. 

I don't feel much relief from a few days of this added medication -- and I do not feel that it will be of help to the pain, but there are more options.  I think that I will need to use exercise somehow, because this, just isn't working.  

I can't sit.  I can't sleep.  

I have a broken ass.  I. am. old.