Hello there. I have been perusing this wonderful support forum for a number of weeks now after suffering from what I thought was a fissure. So many, many posts all mirroring everything I have felt.

To cut a long story short at this point, I plucked up the courage to visit my own Doctor last week, despite the fact that I was feeling so much better after 6 weeks of misery, although not completely healed I felt but getting there, however, I was concerned that I should have visited sooner just for confirmation that it was a fissure or possibly 'piles', I talked through the whole 6 week saga and the GP performed an internal rectal examination of which I had never had before in my life, this was obviously extremely painful and I suffered for the rest of the day and the following day but for 2/3 days after, I still felt reasonably okay. The Doctor said she could not see haemorrhoids or a fissure, although she said I could have had one but everything looked to be okay.
However, the last couple of days my bowel movement was not as good as it has been over the last 6 weeks, after I radically changed my diet, it was the first time that the movement didn't leave me easily, the first 'bit' did but I had to wait for the rest and felt discomfort and soreness whist it 'hovered', and then an hour after the BM, today and yesterday, the pain has felt like I am back to the beginning of this nightmare, the build-up of burning, stinging, dull ache, tightening etc which eventually subsides after 3/4 hours.

I was wondering if anybody would suspect it was perhaps the aftermath of the internal examination, albeit it 3/4 days later or the awkward bowel movement that has caused this?

I am still puzzled, however, that the doc said she didn't actually see anything? Could she have missed a small fissure perhaps?

Thank you so much in advance.

The vast majority of family doctors do not find fissures that are not mostly external, and many of them are inside and can't be seen easily. A colo-rectal specialist though, will know what to look for and where, and can make a far better diagnosis than your GP did. Unfortunately though, the exam could very well have re-opened your fissure, but because you're still in the early days, it could still heal up fairly quickly. It could also have been the hard movement. You should ask for a referral to a CRS.

Thank you very much chachacha for your sound advice and taking the time to reply, much appreciated.