Hello,
I've been browsing a while, this is my first post. I have read other's histories, and mine most closely resembles Neuropathicguy.
I had a chronic fissure, actually two, posteriorly for about 9 months before I had surgery last March.
I had tried Diltiazem ointment, then I had botox. All just seemed to help for a little while, then failed.
I had the surgery and everything went down hill from there.
About two weeks after the surgery I developed severe anal pain. Disabling, worse than the fissure. Prior to that, I had a lot of burning and soreness all around the area.
Then I developed prostatitis symptoms and they thought I had acute prostatitis, which is bad also. Working diagnosis at the time was that I had an infection (turns out I probably did not!).
So, I started on antibiotics. Two of them. For a long time.
Big mistake. I got C Diff. If you don't know about C Diff, you can look it up and you will never want to take antibiotics again.
Anyway, my C Diff experience wasn't as bad as some, I'm a month out from that treatment which was Flagyl.
My bowels are pretty screwed up, I have solid- loose- solid. Sometimes it takes a while to recover from a C Diff episode.
AND I still have a lot of anal and perianal pain. The prostatitis symptoms come and go.
When I read about abscesses, fistulas, anal cryptitis, that all sounds like the type of pain I have which is sharp, burning, and sometimes dull. It is sometimes not terrible, just there, and othertimes very bad. It can come on after bowel movements, and at other times, just from sitting for no reason.
I have been checked multiple times. I just came from the CRS today and had an anoscopy. It hurt terribly. Back in May I had an EUA. They never find anything and tell me the fissure is healed.
So, I have been given a diagnosis of chronic pelvic pain syndrome- which is an umbrella diagnosis. All the alternative treatments are used, accupuncture, physical therapy and the like. I think there is also a neuropathic pain component as well, maybe some pudendal nerves got crushed by the retractor during surgery.
So, the good news is, they can't find anything wrong, the bad news is, they can't find anything wrong because the pain (although it comes and goes) can be as bad as a fissure and there really isn't any good treatment.
So goes my life.