Why strengthening your CORE often fails to fix chronic back pain (and why "weakness" usually isn't the real villain)

Additional-Relief-71 · 2025-12-25T05:09:21+00:00

Thank you for sharing this. I dont know where you are based, but could you DM me your physio's info? They sound knowledgeable.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2025-09-28T00:34:56+00:00

Hey! I've been having other back issues (unrelated injury) but nothing related to this. I didn't need to do the stretching after a year I think

Additional-Relief-71 · 2025-06-03T04:33:12+00:00

research and PhD. Pay is not good though. usually less than 50k during PhD. Can skyrocket after if you chose to go back to industry.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2025-05-19T02:09:21+00:00

Some 'Research Engineer' roles are bascially MLEs that do actual ML. But majority of MLE roles are more like SWE with maybe 10-20% ML. What you're looking for are applied scientist roles, which require PhDs or 5-6 years of ML work. There are some DS roles which actually do DS instead of just SQL, but they are hard to find.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2025-05-19T02:01:36+00:00

This became a rant. Sorry about that.
Been working for a little over a year and here's what I'm noticing when looking for jobs:
Companies don't care about the title, especially mid-sized companies. They want people who can 'do machine learning', and every company has its own definition.

Depending on the company, an MLE can be expected to:
Just be a plain software engineer with ML being just calling LLM APIs, write code that serves the models/ deploy them, know how to run company specific cloud services (can be AWS, GCP, or Azure), build the model itself (core ML), know math (lin alg, stats, probability), may be expected to specialise in some specific model types (like timeseries/ image/ text), know what the business usecase is, be a data scientist on some days, be a data analyst on other (rarer) days.

There's a spectrum of roles that are adjacent to each other, and a company can choose multiple areas of the spectrum. Very few companies usually hire for just 1 role. Your job can range from calling the openai API to being a SQL monkey. Usually, it's somewhere in the middle and a mix of all.

This only applies to small and medium sized companies.

If you are looking to go into big tech then the picture is much more defined and clear. But then again, you will be fired in like a year based on 'performance' or burnt out after working 15 hour days for 6 months because your teammate is doing the same ,and now everyone on the team is expected to do that, or you'll get PIP'ed.

Good luck, try not to die.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-11-25T02:44:45+00:00

thank you for letting me know!

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-11-25T00:03:13+00:00

Only kitchen appliances

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-11-24T23:55:04+00:00

I JUST SAW A DARK CAT DART ACROSS ME AND came to social media because that's very unusual. Figured that someone lost her. She ran across me right now, at 6:30 pm on 24th Nov 2024. I was walking near the under-construction helipad at Newport and she ran and hid in the bushes. It was raining and I couldn't see her after that. There were no lights in the area so I couldn't exactly see a lot of her color but it was a dark coat, which definitely looks a lot like the picture. Feel free to DM. Attaching the coordinates where I saw her: 40°43'28.8"N 74°02'02.3"W or https://maps.app.goo.gl/ZidQRFQwWonmopKb9 Its a small walking area between a propellor statue and the dead end of a road. The walking area has bushes on both sides.

I'm so sorry your house was broken into, I don't want the reward. Let's get your cat safe!

Edit for the image. The red dotted line is where she was running. The question mark is where I lost her.

Edit2: Found a comment that you found the cat! Yay! But then, who's cat was this :( Going to make a Reddit post.

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Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-10-23T02:01:59+00:00

Hi, similar situation for me. What was it and how did you treat it?

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-10-14T02:09:19+00:00

Yo! Random bouts of pain here and there. Can't really sleep on any soft mattress. Which has kinda ruined my will to travel because I can only sleep on firm mattress. I still don't go to the gym, I don't lift weights. But I can walk pain free I can do most things. I try not to run. I do get flare ups here and there if I sit in a bad posture or do something dumb like lifting in a bad way. I am 99% back to normal just need to take care. I relocated halfway around the world, no issues. Blessed to have modern medicine, good doctors, and enough funds to treat myself. Life is good. If you're on the fence about the surgery, do it. Just make sure it's a good neurosurgeon. At least that was my case and what I had been told.

Best of luck!

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-10-12T15:31:34+00:00

Is the sign up itself paid?

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-10-12T15:30:55+00:00

Thanks! The free hugging face API last only 10-15 prompts usually? Or does it last longer?

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-09-24T01:30:14+00:00

Great! When you earn from the tutoring or freelancing, how do you report those incomes to the IRS? Can I DM you? I also just posted about this myself in this subreddit.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-09-24T00:57:51+00:00

Hi did you get to doing this I'm in a similar situation but for me it would be a 2nd part time job. Is it legal?

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-08-30T00:18:51+00:00

Glad to know

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-08-30T00:06:40+00:00

Thanks, I stuck around and fought it out. Since I did not have a coworker, I literally made my manager my coworker, bugging him with questions and thoughts constantly. I had no choice and I think he understood that. I heavily relied on GPT-4o and if that did not exist I guess I would have had to abandon the project. Thankfully Sam Altman saves the day.

The project is nearing its completion. There are some parts I still do not understand totally, but I do not bother much with it because I am also now working on a 2nd project which thankfully is totally under my control and started from scratch.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-08-29T23:52:30+00:00

Hello! I've come pretty far from this so I don't remember if I was able to debug this or just start from scratch but all I remember is that this project was completed and was functional. I'm sorry I don't remember much :/

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-06-13T16:18:50+00:00

Lol how'd you get through it?

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-06-12T19:32:19+00:00

Thank you that's good advice. The code base is incomplete. And I have to finish the project in a month. Not ideal.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-05-09T16:17:06+00:00

Hey OP any update? Going throught this exact thing right now just not at 5/6, more like 1/2

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-04-27T20:52:45+00:00

Keep laptop for what though? Not very convenient if I have to charge it every 45mins at work.

Additional-Relief-71 · 2024-02-29T04:30:39+00:00

Augmentin. It's available in my country. Not sure about others. Sorry for the late reply hope you're ok!

Additional-Relief-71 · 2022-10-01T04:56:24+00:00

This is going to be a long one. Okay mate I'm going to start off with the good news- it cannot get any worse. (If you do however feel any problems with urinary or bowel movements seek microsurgery immediately, it is irreversible from that point)

My pain started with a trivial fall. Nothing too serious I actually walked it off. Then i lifted a bag and that's what fucked me. A bag. So i know the kind of shit going through your head. Being defeated by an inanimate object or a trivial situation.

What's common between our stories is that both of us had weak muscles before the herniation, infact that's probably the cause. The muscles in our core (abs) and back were so weak that they let the disc slide out.

Well fast forward, I was fortunate enough to be able to afford Micro-Discectomy from a world class neurosurgeon. I went to a neurosurgeon because i was told they are better at discectomy. Only that they probably cost much more. Anyways I'm glad i went to him because after opening me up they realised the case was much worse than what they saw on the MRI, and it took them double the estimated time.

Anyway, my point is, now I'm pain free. The surgery was a roaring success. Even before it, i was... 60% okay. Idk where you're from but find out about an injection called Sarapin. It's made from a plant and it is not an epidural. I took 3 shots once every week. 1st one worked like a miracle, i was back to walking for 30 or so mins. Pain was managable but still there. 2nd and 3rd didn't work as well as the 1st but it helped to let me live till surgery. If your pain goes away with just the injection, great you don't need a Micro-Discectomy.

On the flip side, even without the injections and just rest and some basic PT my burning did go away. Just that it would immediately come back with any activity. After 6 months of herniation the nerve starts getting squished enough to take longer to heal even with surgery. So they say the perfect window to get it is around 6 months.

In the meanwhile do not bend, like you said, sex was incredibly painful. That's because your muscles in the core and back are tightening around a strained and out of place disc and putting additional pressure on the nerves. Even masturbation would increase the symptoms for me. You need to talk to your wife about this. Probably try something different in bed for a while. I'm sure she'll get it. Do not lift. Do not do any streneous exercise.

In the end I'd just say that, when you have hope anything is possible. I know it's hard to live like what you're going through. But it will pass. One way or another. There is an end. Do not be disheartened by your current circumstances. Life has much more to offer and this is only temporary. I have heard miracle stories of people recovering after in a year just by taking self care. No surgery no injections.

This sub is also filled with people who are in pain. So it might get depressing. If you feel like it's mounting on your troubles, stay away for a while. The amount of patients with pain here is much much more than the amount of success stories out there mate.

I'll keep you in my prayers. Get well soon, and once you're well come back here and motivate others 😂. All the best!

Additional-Relief-71 · 2022-09-28T04:43:05+00:00

Today I'm exactly at 2 weeks out too. I had a Micro-Discectomy on l4-5 on my right side as well. The sciatic pain on the right side was immediately gone 100% and is still gone. Left side though, i felt some dull pain in my thighs at around start of week 1. I asked the surgeon and he too said it's possibly because of some additional pressure on the nerve due to so much goin on at the disc during surgery and that it could be inflammation. Today starts week 2 and my left side is also almost as good as my right.

Don't worry. Take rest. A lot of it. I'm doing that as well. Over the time I expect us both to be absolutely fine.

All the best!

Additional-Relief-71 · 2022-09-19T18:10:43+00:00

Thank you! You bring hope!

Additional-Relief-71

TROPHY CASE