i suffered a prolapsed disc right at the bottom of my spine, i was in absolute agony, for about a month it would take me 20 mins to be able to get out of bed and stand up and i had to walk everywhere taking baby steps because of the pain down my leg.
i went to a osteopath for referred me for a mri scan, this showed that the prolapsed disc had become trapped, its blood supply was cut off and the osteopath predicted that it would shrivel up and die and cause no further problems, this is what happened and although i get the ocasional twinge in my back which scares the hell out of me im really happy i avoided surgery.
my mate at my gym had exactly the same problem as me, he did have to have surgery and even though they tidied up the disc he is left with a limp and footdrop as the sciatic nerve has been squashed by the disc.