Cycling is Curing My Sciatica

Cycling is Curing My Sciatica

The Principle of Use It or Lose It!

Many of you that know me, know that I’m a cyclist. I pretty much have been for most of my life. There have been hiatuses along the way, including one rather long one after my kids Ashley and Luke were born. But, in 2012 I dove back in and have logged over 30,000 miles since.

For some years, cycling has been an obsession and for other years, just a mechanism to stay fit. But the enjoyment of setting goals, reaching for new PR’s, and pushing my body to limits I once would have never imagined, seems to fuel me in a hard-to-describe way.

Over the last few years, my tolerance for cold weather riding has increasingly become a challenge, and this year, a diagnosis of Peripheral Neuropathy was given after a nerve test at Sierra Pacific. That certainly has shed some light on the numbness in my hands and feet as the winter months set in. Early December 2023 I came home one morning from a mountain bike ride down in Sycamore Island and my hands were completely numb, and it was quite unpleasant as the feeling slowly started to return over 20-30 minutes. Linda asked me why I was doing that to myself, what she didn’t know was that was a frequent occurrence for me. After I pondered her question for a while, I decided to stop riding in the winter months as it just was not worth it any longer. If only I had known a new sort of pain was going to hunt me down only a few months later.

Fast forward to the April 2024 time frame, Linda and I had been at a Bible Study we attend each week and after sitting in a chair while there, I got up to leave and just about fell over. A pain so severe, coming from deep within my right buttock emanated down to my foot in throbbing waves. This was next-level pain which all of you who have dealt with Sciatica know all too well. The next few weeks specifically were brutal. Every position sitting down was torturous and driving was even worse. Laying down hurt too. The only thing that would bring any form of relief was standing up and going for a walk. It would initially hurt quite bad but after 5-10 minutes it would start to loosen up and the pain would completely subside, for a while that is. Linda being deeply concerned, made an appointment for me to be seen and I had an MRI shortly thereafter where it was determined that I had stenosis of the nerves at L4 to L5 and this was causing the Sciatica. The doctors prescribed epidurals and said my spinal stenosis was not yet severe enough to warrant surgery so I would need to “kick the can down the road a bit” as they said. They sent off the request to the insurance company for approval of the epidurals and I would wait a few more weeks. This had me a bit concerned truth be told.

Interestingly enough, I began to wonder that if walking had helped, I wonder if riding would also help? On May 9^th, I forced myself to go out for a mountain bike ride. It was my 17-mile loop through Sycamore Island that I've ridden 100's of times before. After 5 months of being off the bike however, the ride itself was hard but to my surprise, that movement didn’t bother the Sciatica at all. In fact, when I returned to my truck to load my bike, the pain was not even evident. It was gone and it stayed gone for the rest of that day. This was a very interesting development and quite exciting if I may add. I would have done anything to be rid of that pain and a result this good was unexpected.

Later that day, I charted out a training regimen to get myself back on the bike, back in shape, and to be rid of Sciatica for as long as I could hold it off. The next week, I had a follow up appointment at Sierra Pacific, the epidurals had been approved by the insurance company and they were ready to get them scheduled. Except, I was no longer in pain. I told the doctor what I was doing and we agreed, we’d hold off to wait and see if the Sciatica flared up again and then we would schedule the epidurals. That was in May and as of this writing at the beginning of August, the pain has not returned. I believe I have learned the principle of “Use it or Lose It” this year. We have just one body and if we’re not using it, it slowly starts to just shut down. At least that seems to have been the case for me.

I am now riding between 80 to 100 miles a week and the Sciatica has still not returned. It makes me a bit paranoid to stop riding and I will need to figure out a solution for this winter as I had just sold my indoor trainer prior to this experience and realization.

I hope this BLOG post may just help one of you who may be reading it. If you’re also dealing with Sciatica, just maybe, this can help you as well and I sure hope that is the case. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reach out to me, I’d love to talk with you.

All my best!