That Sucks
I jacked up my L5 in 1997 in a car wreck, and now it's back to visit me, like a visit from my mother. It shuts off feeling and proper movement in my left pinkie, ring finger and middle index. As I type, I can only use my index on my left. As your injury is lower, it's screwing up the sciatic nerve tree. Guys who inject in their rear, if not careful, will nail this bundle of nerves, and will literally jump through a wall in pain.
As was mentioned here, get in the tub, go to Sam's and buy an inversion table, and call an osteopath.
I got my inversion table for like $150 at Sams. It is big as a freakin jungle gym, but inverting your body will help pull the discs apart, as you compress them together in lifting and normal, everyday, upright activity.
Don't start squatting. This will NOT force the disc back into place. It will exacerbate the problem, making your recovery a long way off. Your disc is pressing against a nerve in the spine that corresponds to the wonderful sciatic tree, causing constant pain.
Isn't the body a wonderous thing...
In my case, and this is gross, the ribs next to my L5 dislodged from their socket, which causes pain in the front corresponding region next to my sternum.
Again, it is simply a matter of time, and you'll wake up one day and it'll be gone.
My osteopath is a enormously fat farm boy who fell asleep in his chair after drinking too much beer, and his head dropped forward, pulling his ribs out of alignment. It took him about 2 months to fix it, and he woke up with no more pain.
He isn't a lifter, so his healing will arrive faster.
If you don't stop lifting, you may be looking at a year of this crap. It will only slow the process of rectification, and could get worse.
Believe me, you don't want someone cutting open your back to fix this as you can fix it yourself. Back surgery can be VERY risky.
Sorry, but this is really your only option. I know how it is to just STOP lifting. It sucks and you fear you'll atrophie into nothing.
You won't.
Steroids, also, won't help. They will simply mask the pain, and you'll keep hammering away at the inflammed site, and when the cycle is done, you're going to wish you were dead. A steroid will not fix a bone. It only interacts with muscle fiber, and this is why my osteopath wouldn't shoot my back full of drugs, to my dismay.
You need to get the muscle that is in constant spasm to relax, and once you accomplish this, the disc can then slowly move back into its correct position. If the muscle is constantly tense, it simply holds the disc out of place.
I bought a book to help my neck. The author has one also for the back. Go to Amazon and buy it because it WORKS ENORMOUSLY WELL.
Treat Your Own Back (Paperback)
Robin A. McKenzie
http://www.amazon.com/Treat-Your-Ba...9238/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_b/002-8370681-6869600
So, off to the tub, you...and do really look into getting an inversion table. You have this issue with your disc for life, and it will revisit, I promise. And since Dracula has spent an eternity hanging upside down, he's probably got the best spine in history, I swear.
http://www.samsclub.com/shopping/navigate.do?dest=5&item=373743
Oh, and go to the grocery store and buy big boxes of EPSOM SALT. Dump that crap in the bath water, and with the high salt content, you'll free float, as you would if you were to wade into the Dead Sea. You can't sink, and it takes off all the weighted pressure...like what they do in those isolation tanks.
You'll live to lift another day.
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