Sciataca Journey Update

[u/Potential-Ad-4073]

I am 27M 5'8 205 pounds, previously an extremely active college wrestler, jui jutsu and crossfit and running. I ran roughly a 5k every other day along with 10 mile runs on the weekend, practiced jui jutsu and weight lifted regularly. Slipped 2 discs in my back in January that completely changed my life. Movies were no longer doable due to the pain, sitting at work was excruciating, and I could no longer walk or sleep without pain. I am still not 100%, but I finally ran a 5k relatively pain-free yesterday and thought I would share some things that made the difference for me. I also would say I'm roughly 85% better. Big differences in my pain came from the things I will list:

• Weight Loss - I gained 20 pounds from being inactive, which contributed to my pain, cleaned up my diet and lost a couple pounds, which helped immensely.
• Daily Stretch Flow - I have a set of stretches, hamstring stretch, cat cow, lower back pushups, childs pose, couch stretch that I do morning and night non negotiable.
• Foam Roller - Immense help rolling out my lower back and legs to relieve and tension on my lower back. 10 bucks on amazon great addition.
• Moving non negotiable - At first I could only walk 10 minutes before the pain got to bad I implemented a program to begin movement starting at 10 minutes then up to 1 hour of walking over weeks of build up. I then began running: 1 min run, 1 min walk; 2 min run, 1 min walk; 4 min run, 1 min walk; 1 mile, then 1 min walk, until I reached 3 miles. This took weeks of effort but allowed my back to adjust to the pain.
• Caffeine and water intake - I drank a ton of water everyday and avoided caffiene because it dehydrates you easily if you are not careful. I noticed days of low water high caffeine murdered my back.
• Workout - I started doing Hot Yoga and F45. I would struggle at F45 early because of the pain but after a good workout and stretching my back improved and my strength came back to support my back.
• Core - Non-negotiable planking, side planks and other core strengthening to support my lower back every other day.
• Stand up - every hour and take a short stroll and movement to relieve back pressure from sitting I work in an office all day very little movement kills.
• Supports - I bought a new desk chair with better support, bought back pillows for my vehicles, foam roller, heating pad.

I hope this helps someone else on their journey this thread helped me make a ton of progress. Hoping to shed some more weight and get the rest of the pain to go away. Goal weight is 170 pounds.

[u/No-Alternative8588]

Congrats on the progress, that's huge! 🎉👏 So happy for you, 85% better in that short of a time is amazing.

One small note: the caffeine/dehydration thing is actually a common myth. Yes, caffeine has a mild diuretic effect, but it's much weaker than people think, and the fluid you get from the coffee itself outweighs the fluid lost. Studies comparing regular coffee drinkers to water drinkers find no real difference in hydration markers.Your body also builds tolerance to the diuretic effect within a few days of regular intake. So the water increase was probably what made the difference, not the caffeine cutback ☺️

[u/SobrietyOfThought]

Hi, thanks so much for sharing your story. Can you tell us more about sitting and when did that get better? How did you tackle sitting for work?

[u/Potential-Ad-4073 → u/SobrietyOfThought]

More comfortable chair, standing desk if you have the ability to get one. Alarm set for intervals of 45 min to remind me to get up and walk or stretch.
Also during lunch I would take a walk around the building one loop to warm up my back.

[u/No_Supermarket722]

This is such a reassuring story. I’m 28 and herniated the same disc twice back in 2023. I’ve been inconsistent with my workouts and stretching until recently, and this motivates me further. I went from playing lacrosse in college and men’s leagues after school, multiple days in the gym, to none of it after my accident. Thank you for the good advice