I was reading a post on here about degenerative disc problems and thought I'd share my experience. I've been battling what I thought was some form of disc problem for over ten years now. I've had the text book symptoms of sciatica: pain in lower back, hip, buttocks, pain running all the way down to feet at times, and its been progressively getting worse. Well, after countless attempts with chiropractors, spinal physicians, physical therapists, x-rays, MRIs, and so on I was never able to get a diagnosis. Spine looked fine, discs spaced perfectly, no injuries, nothing. Needless to say I was beyond frustrated. At times I could barely walk, couldn't sleep, struggled to work out, missed work, depression; its been horrible. Through my own research and speaking with the last physical therapist I'd been seeing, its been recently determined I have Piriformis Syndrome. This results in pain virtually identical to sciatica caused by disc problems, but it is actually the piriformis muscle (a gluteal muscle in the area between your hip and tailbone) that becomes irritated/inflamed and presses on the sciatic nerve. Now that I actually have a definitive problem, I feel I can work to fix it. There are numerous stretches that can be done, a lot can be found online, that target the piriformis muscle. Also, hamstring stretches are supposed to be very beneficial for this too (I have extremely tight hamstrings).

Anyway, I have been working with these stretches and am for the first time cautiously optimistic that I may be able to work towards relief. I'm just curious if anyone else has had to deal with Piriformis Syndrome and if so what helped. My main fear is that since it has been going on for so long with virtually no treatment (since no one could pin-point the problem) that the damage has been done and I may not be able to correct it by simple stretches alone. I have read where if there is too much nerve or muscle damage, it may require surgery, which obviously I want to avoid if at all possible. Also, I wanted to bring this up for those that may be suffering from similar issues and are unable to figure out what's wrong. Until very recently I myself didn't even know such a condition existed.