by MidwestJen » 03 Nov 2016, 19:35
Hi I am Jen 36 year old female and been reading this site for about a couple of months and thought I would share my story. I posted this in the new person section at first but I think it should be here instead lol. June of 2016 is when my pain started. Wasn't too bad at first, I had started riding a bike in the spring and as the weather heated up I thought it was just a heat rash that kept coming back. It started as a mild, itchy and burny kind of pain, completely tolerable. Progressively got worse over the weeks. End of July is when I think the pain really kind of started to take over my life. The pain was more frequent and more intense. It got to the point that 20-30 min after my morning BM the pain would start up and I couldn't function for sometimes hours if not the rest of the day. I now know it was the spams that were the cause of my debilitating pain. I had no life, my only life was dealing with the pain. I was missing work, the only time I would get any relief was laying on my left side on the floor, I was puking from the pain daily....literally could not do anything but lay there. The days I did go into work I spent most of the day laying on the floor. I was so embarrassed to tell people what the problem was. I convinced myself it was hemorrhoids and was treating it with creams and stuff. It just kept getting worse. Ended up in the ER end of August cause I wasn't eating, puking, in the worst pain I could ever imagine...I thought I was dying. They did CT scan and said it looks normal, did an anal exam and said it's not hemorrhoids. Gave me fluids, an rx for tramidol and a referral to a CRS. Went to CRS the next week. The only thing out of the ordinary she saw during my exam was a small amount of puss coming from the lining inside my ass. She scheduled me for an EUA with a possible fistulotomy for sept. 27th. I suffer from horrible anxiety especially when it comes to medical situations, for me having to have a surgery was like a nightmare coming true. I was a disaster the morning of surgery, I was scared out of my mind. I did have to do am enema before I went to the hospital that went better that I thought it would. Got to the hospital and could not make myself go in, I was dry heaving in the parking lot I was so scared. My sister had to go get a nurse to come out and convince me to go in lol. They gave me something to calm me when I got in there, after that everything went smooth. The procedure itself took 40 min then I was in recovery for I think about 2 hours then sent home. The dr said I had gotten a tear that developed an abscess then developed a fistula. Stool getting in the fistula is what would cause the horrific pain/spasms. She cut open the fistula, drained the abscess and put a couple dissolvable stitches in. The pain from surgery itself wasn't bad at all, never took more than ibprophen. I wore a pad for about a week because I bled very lightly. I had a panic attack the right before my first BM but all went well. The first two days after surgery I had the same intense pain 20-30 min after my BM's as I did before the surgery but they didn't last as long, about an hour. This improved drastically starting the 3rd day after surgery. It has now been just over a month since my surgery and I am doing really well. I still have a brief spell of pain in the morning but is absolutely no where near the intensity it was before and only lasts a couple of minutes. Some days hardly any at all. Sitting at work all days gives me a pretty sore feeling down there some days. I also have had a couple of days here and there with zero pain. I think diet plays a role...when I don't eat so good, the next day I get a little more pain. My follow up was this past Monday and my CRS says it looks good but just not completely healed yet, she said that's why I still get a little pain. She has assured my that my bike riding did not cause this, that a hard stool did and told me at this point I can start riding again. I am not convinced that my bike was not the cause. I had been riding 5 days a week a few hours at a time (lost 70 lbs which is a good thing as I am over weight)I am addicted to the thing lol. I went for a 20 min ride on Monday after my follow up and an hour ride on Tuesday and now my butt is hurting more than it has in awhile. I am not at the end of this nightmare yet but for the first time during all of this I actually have hope that I will soon be back to living my life like I used too. Just FYI I still do sitz bath twice a day, i use hemorrhoid cream before a BM just to try and protect it, for the most part I am eating healthier, I am down to only taking 2 IBprophen a day, only wipe with baby wipes and walk about 3 days a week. I still have anxiety about what my BM will bring every morning as well as having to go when I am not at home. I also worry about injuring it again, I never, ever want to go through this again. My next follow up is Dec 3rd. If there are any other cyclists that have gone through this I would love to talk to you or hear your story. Thank you.