Setback! – BionicOldGuy

By last Tuesday my sciatica symptoms were feeling a lot better so I got a bit too confident. I went for a 90 minute ride, and for about 50 minutes I rode my upright instead of recumbent, including a good amount of standing pedalling. It all felt great. Then when I got home my sciatica had flared up considerably, pretty much back to day one. My doc squeezed me in for a virtual appointment, and prescribed anti-inflammatories, rest (abstinence from pretty much all exercise except stretching, for a week), and ice. I’ve also scheduled lumbar x-rays to rule out sciatica from the spine, and a follow-up with the new orthopedic doc my general practitioner found for me.

Here’s a quote from when the first flare-up occurred two weeks ago: “I think the lesson from this is that I should have taken it much easier and made sure I was fully recovered after my September 18 injury. Instead, as soon as I started to feel better I got cocky and dived back into long hard workouts, forgetting that it takes longer for us old people to heal!” It’s amazing how quickly I forgot this as soon as I started to feel better. Aerobic exercise is like therapy for me, “meditation in motion”. But that requires only about an easy 30 minutes. So this time as soon as I’m allowed I will keep to 30 minutes a day for at least a month or the symptoms are completely gone.