oh! my aching buttocks....

[percy hipkiss]

...hello

I was diagnosed with OA in both hips six years ago. I'm a lorry (truck) driver in the UK  - luckily I've not yet lost any time off work with the condition. Today I finally put myself on the eighteen week waiting list for re-surfacing - the Birmingham Hip.  They will do them consecutively and I should be okay to work after six months - optimistically anyway.

What I'm wondering is does anyone else suffer from  a constant nagging ache when lying down? Both buttocks are affected . I of course get much stiffness, and aching plus occasisonal stabs of pain if I'm not careful how I move my legs but the aching is the most wearying I think. I try not to take too many painkillers but a couple help me get through the night.

I also have OA in the base of my spine but I'm hoping the re--surfacing willl ease the aching bottom  - anyone else suffer this.
I'm 57 by the way, and I grimace a lot 

cheers
percy

[wayne-0]

Hey Percy,
I have pain almost all the time,walking, sitting, laying down. I have the stiffness and the extreme stabs of pain you are talking about when I move my legs a certain way( isn't it just a joy to have those). I work construction so I know all about the aching legs. I need to sit for a little while at the end of work to feel better. I'm 47 and surgery is set for nov 7th and hopefully I will be on the road to recovery. The only drug I was taking was 440 mg of naproxen(alleve) daily. Hope your waiting list goes rapidly. Good luck.
                                              Wayne-0

[percy hipkiss]

Hello Wayne,
you having much longer to wait - good luck.
I do get days when the pain and aching is not so bad, but if I wlak say a quarter of a mile then it down for ten minutes I am stiff as a stiff thing and wlak hunched for the first few steps.

The nagging, clawing buttock pain at night has been aorund for two years.

Those 'stabs' of pain are similar to what I'd imagine an electric shock might be like - only worse. They are mercifully fleeting but tend to knock me sick. A couple of times my young grandaughter has 'run into' my left leg forcing it inward . the attendant howl of pain has put the fear of God into her! (poor thing).

Year on year the holiday movies we make see me getting more and more 'bowlegged' ! We have a saying here 'he couldn't stop  a pig in a ginnel' that now applies to me. My leg shape has changed - the left knee now tends to face outwards !

I can walk into work feeling fairly okay - sit in the truck for half an hour and get out of my cab like a ninety year old. Ho-hum...such is life.

An hours gardening has me in a hot bath and written off for the rest of the day. I tend to pull myself upstairs with my arms - thus resulting in some muscle loss - I used to have quite  a big backside!! now it's smaller.(every cloud etc. )

I'm five ten and never weighed more than 13stone...I'm also a diet controlled diabetic these last two years.

I take up to three Ibuprofen 400mg & Co-Dydramol painkillers (codeine based) the best p/k was paracetemol based Co-Proxamol but these have been withdrawn because too many were using them for suicide - very effective with half a bottle of whisky I'm told. I'm not that desperate yet but although I'm dreading the op. I need to get my life back and enjoy a walk once again.

Once again Wayne good luck, I hope all goes well. Please update via the forum as your progress unfolds.

regards
Percy

[Pat Walter]

Hi Percy

Welcome to Hip Talk.

Many of us had so much pain that we could not sleep at night - even with the good meds.  That is the miracle about hip resurfacing - normally the bad pain dissapears right after surgery. Of course, your body is very sore from the surgery, but it is a different type of pain.

You will feel much better after a short period of recovery after surgery.  It is becomes difficult to remember the bad pain we all had before surgery, many months after surgery.

Good Luck to you.  Keep in touch and let us know how you are doing.

Pat

[decooney]

Pat,
Even though I had a setback in my surgery, I am essentially experiencing right now what you just described. I'm sore from the surgery I had a week ago, but just don't seem to feel the nagging toothache type of pain I used to have in the lower area of my back. 

Percy/Wayne,
i'm a novice here... but if it helps to know...I too could not sleep well before surgery, or when I did for 10 minutes here or there lying down... just a slight twist or move would jolt me and wake me right up only to try and slip back to sleep again.  When it started to impact my sleep more and more each month, I finally gave in and set my appointment to get it done.  I did on 10/21/08.  My buddy is telling me I don't really know yet what to feel for my lower back since I'm still on Norco for a few more weeks, but I don't sense that tiring/aching feeling from my lower back which eventually included my buttocks and other parts of my lower half, and especially my groin muscle area.  Thought I was having a hurnea all over again.  For the last three months, it use to feel like someone had driving two icepicks in there, and was prying down on them most of the time.  For the last month up to my surgery, my lower back was in constant muscle spasm, which was causing me numbness which started in the bottom arch of my foot, to the back of my leg/hamstring, and one week before I went into surgery, the muscle/tendon just below my knee cap started aching like me knee was going to go out.  Most of it has subsided now since my surgery just one week ago.  I too am keeping my fingers crossed.  I'm not healing nearly as fast as others are here on this board, but some of the ways Percy and others described here was me just over a week ago.  My muscles got so tight, it was pulling my lower back out of alignment, then things got really bad and painful, just waiting for my date. For example, before surgery, I would force myself to do 45min of yard work and would find myself hunched over the next day taking 5 days of recovery for the 45 minutes of attempted yard work.  Each day I'm becoming more of a believer.

[wayne-0]

Thanks Decooney for the encouragement. I would love to wake up and have that deep bone pain gone. I will know for sure in 9 more days.
                                           Wayne-0