Conor:
Pack in driving. Trust me on this. I had lumbar spinal stenosis with two discs in my spine. If you do have the op and continue to drive there is a high risk of damaging the spine again and you’re always going to have issues.Vertical compression of the spine is the problem and with truck driving we have plenty of that, especially from the drivers seat as the truck bounces down the road. Even strapping down loads with ratchets puts vertical compression on your spine unless your ratchets are like ours and tighten on a down pull.
Read my reply to Steve here. This is what you could be facing.
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=128593&p=2007482#p2007482
Most of the reason I’m a miserable barsteward is because I suffer the symptoms 24/7/365. I’m sat here typing this with a stabbing pain in my left hip. It’ll be somewhere else and a different pain this afternoon and in various places throughout the night depending on what nerve gets the pressure as I’m driving.
Thanks Conor,sobering reading indeed,seems opinion is very divided as to go for the op.I don’t do much in the way of physical graft with containers and opening stiff doors is easily remedied with a large alloy tube,plus truck seats tend to be good at absorbing the impacts of the road compared with cars I would venture,but I will be using your post when I next try to challenge a recent request for surgery that seems to have been rejected,probably due to cost but my condition seems exactly like yours -stenosis with two bulging discs.Thanks again for the response bud.