Can a slipped disk cause permanent nerve damage?

I had a herniated slipped disk in my lower back L4-L5, and went through almost 7 months of pain due to the disk pressing on the nerve which runs down my left leg to my big toe. I did physical therapy, which made the pain worse, then I went to a sports medicine doctor and he gave me a steroid shot in my hip, and sent me to a orthopaedic doctor, and at the time I saw the orthopaedic doctor, I felt fine, because the steroid shot helped a lot; so he didn't do anything for me but give me pain medicine. When my symptoms got worse, I went back to the orthopaedic doctor and he said that my condition was not severe enough to do surgery, so I just had to deal with the pain. I then couldn't stand the pain any more, so I went to a chiropractor, and he was able to loosen the muscles in my back enough that he could pop the disk back into place, and when he did, I felt great; until later that day. I was walking through the store, and suddenly I couldn't even lift my left leg to walk, and the pain was so severe that I hardly made it out of the store and to my car. I screamed out in pain all the way home, and I ended up in the ER. The doctor gave me a pain shot and muscle re-laxers and oral steroids and that helped, the pain is gone, and has been gone for about 5 months now, but now the nerve pulsates in the top of my foot and up my ankle, and today it started doing that in my left ock, and when I run my hand down my left leg, I can feel the nerve, it's like a tooth ache, and the top of my foot is numb so is the lower part of my calve...could this mean that I have nerve damage? And if so what could be done about it, if anything? I should mention that I am diabetic, I do have feeling on the bottom of my left foot, so I don't think it is diabetic neuropathology. I guess I'm just frustrated because I don't get any real answers from doctors, just lots of pain medicine, and I am tired of them because I can't function through my day normally.