By the time most people come to see me about sciatica, they've already been dealing with it for weeks, sometimes months. They've tried resting. They've tried painkillers. They've tried steroid injections. Maybe someone told them it would just go away on its own, but it didn't.
Sciatica is pain that runs from the lower back down through the leg, usually on one side, following the path of the sciatic nerve. It can feel like a burning ache, a sharp shock, or numbness that makes your leg feel like it's "asleep." The causes vary. A herniated disc, spinal stenosis, or tight muscles pressing on the nerve are the usual suspects, but the result is almost always the same. It changes how you move and function throughout your day. Sitting gets harder. Sleep gets harder. Some people stop picking up their kids because bending over becomes unbearable.
Here's the part I want people to actually hear. Rest is usually the wrong approach. People who lie down and rest, sometimes for days, often make their sciatica worse because the muscles around the irritated nerve tighten further, and the joints around it stiffen. Movement, the right kind, at the right pace, tends to help far more than people expect.
That doesn't mean pushing through pain or ignoring it. It means figuring out exactly what's compressing the nerve and treating the source of the problem. When someone comes in with sciatic pain, I want to know how it started, what makes it worse, what makes it better, and how it's affecting the specific things they need to do: their job, their kids, and their training. That shapes the whole plan.
Treatment of sciatica usually combines a few things: chiropractic adjustment to take pressure off the nerve where it's compressed, hands on work on the muscles that have tightened up around it, and, possibly most importantly, the part people often skip, a plan for enabling the patient to get up and start moving again.
If you've been suffering from sciatica for more than a few days and it's not improving, or it's already changing how you function throughout your day, it's time to get it properly looked at rather than continuing to guess.
This is general information, not a diagnosis. Every case is different. Talk to a healthcare provider about your specific symptoms.