@A MySpondylitisTeam Member: I am
very sorry you are going thru what you are, and that you are unable to watch TV or have a face to face convo. It seems that you have to find a balance that works for you- If you are not getting help from
the physical therapist you are seeing, find another who sees you as you and recommends the things you need! I get very bad sciatica . I cannot lay on my stomach, right or left side because of shoulder injury to both arms, so
I almost always have to lie on my back but found I have to sleep with my torso inclined. The days I have woken up with very severe sciatica, I noticed a correlation to
my wearing certain pajama sets. The elastic or the cord that is used to hold the bottoms on, exacerbate the sciatica because the cord pushes on the nerves at night. When that happens, I go bottomless and then I don’t have anything that pushes on the nerves. I look further into it. If I have no bottom and still have sciatica, I try to evaluate what I
may be doing to bring about the increased sciatica pain. If its nothing I am doing, then I go to Chiropractor and have him Decompress my spine up to 4” with a decompression machine. That helps. ( The last time I had decompression, I fell. We weren’t sure if the compression assisted in the fall or if it was something with my heart etc. So i have been going thru a series of tests. Hopefully will find out soon and be able to get back to decompression. I also purchased a ReLiveX stimulation unit. Its stim effect goes down deeper than a tens unit does. I do get relief from
it. It is supposed to waken up the muscle that supports the spine. My spine has been deteriorating for well over 27 years. I am not sure the muscle is alive enough to be strengthened after all that time. If It does work on my spine I will let you know because the ReLiveX stim
unit may help your sciatica!

Mentioned Users

A MySpond...

Also with pain pills sleeping pills too much bread products , you can have a thiamine deficiency. Swelling in lower leg ankles. Then blood doesn’t go back to heart. You can have a-Fib.
I take B-1. 100 mg. Most multi vitamins are only 25 mg B1

Drew! It was me ! I call it the wireless Tens unit. I am wearing it now. I have had no sciatica pain for months. It helped me within 2 days. Deep pulse and then rain like beats. Real deep.
I went 10 yrs doing a Tens machine and dragging my leg.
Not more. Although I try to do too much. Bend over and I hurt. Walking is good now.

I agree. I think Drs have generally done me more harm
than good, because its all about the money, not the care a patient should receive. When i found a good Dr, I am
going out of my way to see him because he moved his practice 2-1/2 hours away. To me, its worth it!!
Many of the people on this site mentioned the biologics. Those people say they didn’t have success with them. I haven’t been offered them and probably wouldn’t take them if offered because I am not sure they would help!
The ReLiveX stim unit: I was skeptical at first. I thought it was another internet click bait thing. Them someone on this site mentioned using them and had success. Thats what sealed it for me to try. I tried on my lower back- the spine has an s shaped curve to it now. (They say unit awakens muscle that supports spine. mine has been deteriorating for over 27 years. I thought muscle might be dead. But the stim did help in conjunction with other things I do. It seems I am able to extend myself a little taller. I was in an auto
accident- to add insult to injury, a year or more ago. I have been thru PT but still couldn’t move my head further to the left. It would just stop. I tried ReLiveX on my neck, Once, and it loosened my neck up so that I could turn my head further to the left!
To me the ReLiveX works!!
I just met with gastoenterologist yesterday. meet with cardiologist next week to discuss my results and where we go from here. We had cardiac checked because of the falls. There were some abnormal readings but not enough to warrant surgery etc as far as I know.
Let me know if you want more info about the ReLiveX!-
to your better health- Drew

Also had falls and tests.  Balance clinic tested hearing and vestibular system which all checked out good.  So it is either spinal, or posterior brain ischemia. But no advice given how to proceed from here. 
 
Like you I'm also having cardiac issues.
CAD in the LAD, enlarged aortic root and ascending aorta, enlarged liver and spleen(non alcoholic, spleen injured in work related 20+ ft fall decades ago), atherosclerosis in abdominal aorta, vertebral and carotid arteries and brain.  But none of that hurts.  Had 2 ER visits for chest pain where they did 2 short EKGs and 2 Troponin draws, called it non-cardiac chest pain and released me without ever suggesting what the source of the pain might have actually been.  Turns out one of my meds is used to induce esophageal spasms in other contexts, and that, combined with something similar to, but not, costochondritis was the likely culprit.  I had to research that myself on the internet, and of course no doctor wants to hear anything a patient searched themselves on the internet.  But it was confirmed first by my PT and later by cardiologist who received the PT notes.  

Advice from my PT, for me, to distinguish cardiac from non-cardiac chest pain:
while on the way to ER just in case,
take Tums, try to burp, and move all my problematic joints systematically isolated one by one.  
If a pop in any joint is immediately followed by a reduction in chest pain, it is musculoskeletal and probably not cardiac.  
If chest pain remains by the time I arrive at hospital, check in.  
If not, think about the $39,000 they billed last time, have an actual heart attack, and check in anyway.

I'm seeing some of the same early symptoms which I had, in my boy. Which worries me more.  I'm HLA-B27 negative, Nordic Caucasian, diagnosed with AS radiographically by SI joints and bamboo spine at age 15 before biologics were a thing and have had uveitis several times and just about every other clinical feature of AS. Yet still had a fresh out of med school rheumatologist say I did not have AS and refused treatment because of a single good ESR taken on a day I was feeling well.  I've never been able to try any of the pharmaceutical biologic AS treatments because of that.  Just Tylenol for me.  I think doctors have overall done me more harm than good and I'm reticent to expose him to testing that may lead him down the same path. I still don't know how to tell a good doc from bad without a decade or so of hindsight.