It happened in 2003 believe it or not and I was in hospital for a week with a suspected broken back BUT because I was very fit and ran marathons, the Drs said that my fitness saved me and they merely x rayed me ( no MRI) and I was released with soft tissue damage as my diagnosis. Over the next 5 years until June 2008 ( happened June 2003) I struggled with back pain and had to take more and more pain relief until it got to the stage where I could hardly walk . Anyway, I got up to go to work in June 08 and fell to the floor, paralysed.
Medical diagnosis was spinal cord compression- the jelly substance in my discs L1-5 had come out and had wound itself around my spinal cord, compressing it and causing nerve damage. So 16 years of pain .
I was retired in 2010 after 22.5 years service and I was devastated but I am very lucky because I can walk and I get a police medical pension so that I can stay home with my children and watch them grow up, they were 18 months old twins when I was paralysed.
So I am very lucky really albeit I miss it tremendously even now x