Hi!
I have been suffering back pain for the longest time now. When I was 14 and at school us girls had our spines checked by a doctor and he checked mine, then asked me to see him, I never did as I didn't think much of it. However this year my back has been worse than ever, the pain is down the left side of my back, most of the time it's there, however a lot of the time it can consume my whole back even my left arm and leg, it sometimes feels like a faint tingly numbness. I also get very bad chest pains, just the other day I was working and had to stop what I was doing as the pain just consumed my whole chest! At first I didn't bother going to the gp as I thought I would just go straight to the osteopath, but after six months it hasn't got better and even feels as if it is getting worse, at the moment I've got a horrible pain at the top of my thigh which makes it difficult to walk. I've been to the doctor recently and he sent me for an X-ray but it came back normal. Sorry for the long post I just want to know of anybody is going through anything similar as I'm really sick of being in pain as it is just constant.
Thanks x

Did you tell the doctor about your various pains?

As much as I could, but to be honest he was quite dismissive, didn't really listen and I was out of there in five minutes! I don't really want to go back as I don't really have confidence In him! I have a physiotherapy appointment on the 19th of December at the hospital and I'm really trying to hold out until then but I'm struggling

Why are you getting physiotherapy? What about calling a good chiropractor and making an appointment?

It's just what the doctor has arranged.

The same doctor who walked in and out of the exam room?

Yeah... I see what your getting at, but what can I do?

Go back to the doctors and tell him it's serious. Also tell him that it's affecting your social life. At the pharmacy you can buy gel for sports pains so like when your doing sports then you can apply the gel on the hurting sport so say if you have pulled a muscle and it sorts it out for you. If your doctor is a bit annoying go to the pharmacy and tell them I'm sure they are bound to give you some spray or gel for it. I have two bumps on my knees and it's a rare condition not bad but yeah and the doctor gave me like a sports gel for it, works so good! Takes the pain away straight away I use it every hour. Hope this helped x
get better soon x
lalaLOOPSYLOOK (Weird name innit? All I could think of, ha!)

How long ago were you 14? Can you track down that doctor, and what tests did he do on you? Back pain can be easy to find the cause of, or very difficult.

I went to the doctors today, he said that I would have to wait until my physiotherapy appointment and that there was nothing he could do, so I guess I have to put up with pain and wait

A little education can go a long way.

The back consists of a few things,
1). Bones, these protect the spinal cord and the nerves that branch off at each junction.
2). Discs, these are between the bones and allow for movement of each bone. Gives us the ability to move our upper body the way we do.
3). Nerves. Besides the spinal cord there are nerves that run out of the spine. The problem is that where you feel a pain might not be where the pain is.
4). Muscles & ligaments. These keep everything aligned and makes sure that everything stays in alignments.

Picture the entire structure like a stack of oreo cookies in a plastic wrapper. You can move the stack around but not too much. Each cookie is a vertebrae, the filling a disc, and the wrapper is the ligaments and muscles that keep everything aligned.

A lot of back issues are caused by two things. A disc is bulging and pressing against a nerve. This pinch will stimulate it and you will feel pain. The problem with this is that it is notoriously hard for this to show up on an X-Ray. You need a MRI for that.

The second problem is that the support structure for the spine has gone wonky. This has happened to be hard core. This allows the bones, muscles, and discs to pinch the nerves and cause spectacular amounts of pain. My Chiropractor aligns me every month or two. Takes the pressure off and there you go.

The physiotherapy that your doctor has prescribed will do you well. It will probably give you information about what is going on and how to correct this in you.

I have no idea what is wrong with you, but felt that this knowledge would benefit you. Ibuprofen has been a god send for me as well as muscle relaxants when things get REALLY bad. You will just have to tough it out.

Thank you so much! You have made ten times more sense than my doctor.