Hi there. I am 38 years old and was admitted to hospital for 6 days because of some parethesia in my arms that could be coming from my neck, and in my hips that a neurologist thought was just a lumbar disk problem. While in hospital, they did procede to mri my entire back, cervical, thoracic , and lumbar. Haven t gotten the results back yet. but had a terrible experience with the lumbar puncture, as a resident performed the procedure, couldn t extract any fluid after a few tries, and hastily called for another neuro resident to do the procedure which was don a bit higherm up and sucessful. I tried to explain to the girl originally of the one disk that hurt, but she ignored me. The next few days, I had excruitiating spinal headaches, with much back cramping and left leg pain. Teh headaches didn t go away after laying flat for a few days, so an anethstegiologist and another resident performed a blood patch, quite high up it seems. During the procedure, my right leg really hurt all the way to my foot and felt very odd, and they injected 20cc s of my own blood I think which I guess is alot, because I didn t feel the fullness they had described. I layed flat for half an hour, and they sent me home in a cab. Also prior to procedure, they gave me ketorolac via iv to see if that helped with pain, which it didn t. The spinal headace has abated for the most part, but the next day, I noticed my right leg and hip were extremely weak on the same side as the epidural. It s progressed to my left leg and now there is alot of pain radiating down my legs to my feet and toes, and some very odd sensations. I try to go for short walks to get some exercise, but my right leg feels very heavy, and both legs and feet hurt afterwards. My question is: is this primarily caused from the epidural, as my own blood is probably an irritant to nerves, could they have done permanent damage during the lumbar puncture, especially since the area was already sore or damaged. Could it be permanent, or can it get better, and how do I try to rehabilitate myself?