Cervical hernia - anyone walked this road before?

[Teazer]

Kinda wondering what to expect, things you found helpful etc.
Mine happened two months ago: the disc between c6 & C7 to the anterior right, with a pinched nerve.
Fun times ahead, no doubt

[GrahamB]

Bummer.... Are you having surgery?

Joe Rogan has similar and talks about it a lot on his podcast.

[Peacedog]

I've hade a few friends who had surgery for this. When it works well, it works very well. When it doesn't, you are screwed. Be VERY picky about the surgeon who does the work.

Obviously, try to exhaust chiropractic, etc treatment first.

[Steve James]

I agree that you should go to the best neurologist that you can afford, so that you can get the best diagnosis. After the mri and/or ct scan, it'll be possible to determine whether you'll be able to have "minimally invasive" surgery as opposed to having a discectomy or whether you'll be able to avoid surgery altogether. Ideally, avoiding surgery is the best option. However, a lot depends on how your condition presents. Some people have pain; others have partial paralysis; some have both. It's absolutely best to treat the condition as soon as possible. Surgery is not necessarily to make things better, just to keep them from getting worse. So, if you wait until the condition is debilitating, it's possible that you'll have to live with it that way even after surgery.

Minimally invasive surgery (with the laser) results in less trauma to surrounding areas and offers a speedier recovery with little rehab. It's not always possible, though. If not, and you need surgery, be sure to let the doctor know what your hobbies are. For ex., if the surgery is done from the front, it can affect your vocal cords. Again, the best thing is to treat it early, no matter what you decide. Limit the damage. I've had the surgery, btw.

[TrainingDummy]

I have disk compression on C5-6 and C6-7, been maintaining it for about 10 years now.

I response quite well to gentle traction, stability training, a stretching routine to keep upper thoracic and cervical tissues soft, and bodywork by people who really know their stuff.

I was very lucky that my neurosurgeon sees operating as a last resort, but it still may be an option if I continue to degenerate. I'm keeping an eye on some stem cell trials being used for disk injury and suspect the technology may come of age in the next 5 years or so.

Hope it heals quickly for you, some people recover very well.

[windwalker]

http://www.spine-health.com/conditions/ ... nt-options

hope you can find the best treatment for your needs.
was this something that just happened or the result of an injury?

[Dmitri]

Hope you heal well, esp. if possible without surgery...

All the best!

[emptycloud]

you probably seen all this. http://www.cervicalherniateddisc.com/non-surgical.html

Alexander tech can work miracles..

best

Rich

[Teazer]

Thanks for the input and good wishes.

Bummer.... Are you having surgery?

I'm going to do whatever I can to avoid surgery, so long as things don't detereiorate. So far over the 2 months the pain has reduced a lot, and now is just right near the disk, so that's manageable for the long term. I've cut back on all my dynamic martial arts for the time being though which sucks but hopefully pays dividends in the future. Working on posture throughout the day is a big help. Still got muscle weakness + numb fingers on that side though. Did the MRI last week. Kinda fun to see the pictures.

you probably seen all this. http://www.cervicalherniateddisc.com/non-surgical.html
Alexander tech can work miracles..

Actually I hadn't, so thanks for the link! I know someone who does Feldenkreis, plus have had some recommendations for great physical therapists. I'll see how that goes and if necessary keep working down the list.

was this something that just happened or the result of an injury?

So in retrospect I think there was already a problem there from exercising with bad posture which I'd ignored. So then I'd already messed up my lower back muscles digging the garden and figured I'd sit out of the last rounds of stand up clinch/pummeling drills to be careful. I started messing round doing some kind of peng/ward off kind of thing on the heavy bag and playing with structure and stuff, extending the shoulder forwards etc. with the weight of the bag pushing down on the wrist. Felt great at the time. Really comfortable. So good that the next day when I woke up all kind of messed up it took me a while to work out what must have caused it!

[Ian]

Halfway down the page, download Trunk Stability Program.pdf
http://www.gymnation.co.nz/topic/18401-training-with-cirque-du-soleil/page-2#entry371164

Pay special attention to the intro i.e. coordinated trunk strength, core stabilization technique, return to sport.

Here's the About section of the clinic of the guy who designed the program:
http://watkinsspine.com/services-list/athletes-spine-center/

Here's an example of the program in action:


Your injury's in your neck, but treat it as a spinal injury, and figure out how your herniation relates to the whole of your spine.

Become a student of the neutral spine at rest, e.g.





...all the way up to the neutral spine in action.

I had a posterior lumbar disc bulge (different from your injury, of course), and now I'm getting stacked in grappling, no problem. Took a while and consistent rehab, but no surgery, and my back's stronger than before.

Just my non-medical 2c.

Good luck!

[windwalker]

So in retrospect I think there was already a problem there from exercising with bad posture which I'd ignored. So then I'd already messed up my lower back muscles digging the garden and figured I'd sit out of the last rounds of stand up clinch/pummeling drills to be careful. I started messing round doing some kind of peng/ward off kind of thing on the heavy bag and playing with structure and stuff, extending the shoulder forwards etc. with the weight of the bag pushing down on the wrist. Felt great at the time. Really comfortable. So good that the next day when I woke up all kind of messed up it took me a while to work out what must have caused it!

The stresses that taiji can put on the body are not always so apparent and can cause damage if not understood or ignored. Been down this road before in my own training.
Hope you find the best way that works out for you. I agree the surgery is not always the best option but sometimes there's not much else left.

yep,,,good luck hope it works out for you

d

[Steve James]

If the mri shows what the problem is, then you can decide on the best treatment. Most people wouldn't even get to the point of having an mri until there was an obvious problem. That problem might be the result of injury (immediate or long-term), or the result of ageing, or a congenital defect that one may have had all one's life, but never caused any difficulty. Avoiding surgery is clearly the best goal. Otoh, as windwalker said, sometimes there's no other choice. You will know it that's the case, especially if there's pain --as in a sliver of bone sticking into your spinal cord. The problem is unnecessary surgery.

[Teazer]

Thanks for all the input, guys.

Halfway down the page, download Trunk Stability Program.pdf etc etc

tasty stuff. Looks like a great project