I'm a 39 year old female and have always been very healthy, happy, and active. I am a marathon runner and have run 17 marathons and hope to run many more. In addition to running marathons (including qualifying for, and running the Boston marathon), I am a competitive runner in shorter distances and have won the odd 5k/10k/half marathon. I am used to running every day and being very disciplined about eating a healthy diet (50% of my diet is fruit and vegetables, everything else is low fat/high fibre and NO junk food). I consider myself to be very strong mentally; I am always happy/positive/optimistic, and lead a low stress life due to my ability to be optimistic, as well as running every day.
Because of the high-impact from running every day for years, throughout 2013 I suffered several nasty overuse injuries, and last month decided to take 2 months off from running and just let my legs heal up 100% once and for all. I have been swimming and biking every day, as well as strength training.
In May I started getting chronic diarrhea; sometimes only once per day, sometimes 8 times per day. Finally in September I went to my family doctor who referred me to a GI specialist. Around this time, I developed the fissure.
I've had the fissure now for about 6 weeks (nothing compared to many of you) and like many of you, I am starting to feel like it's taking over my life. On a "good day", I am able to forget about it unless I have a BM. On a bad day, I am in constant, terrible pain 24/7. Everything hurts; walking, moving, sitting, standing. This week I have had 3 bad days which really sucks. I am still forcing myself to go swimming or water running, but honestly I can't even kick my legs properly and sometimes I wonder why I bother. Some days I feel like I should go home from work, but then at home I'd have no distractions from the constant pain I am in, so I stay at work and suffer there instead. I had planned to get back into running full time in the new year, but I don't see how it's possible considering I can barely walk, some days. I've been given some creams by doctors to help the pain but they don't do ANYTHING.
Unlike many of you, because my fissure has been caused by diarrhea, my bowl movements aren't that much worse than the pain I'm in the rest of the day because even though I'm taking Metamucil, I am still getting some diarrhea. Actually I can't remember the last time I had a hard stool, and for that, I am so thankful. But I've been told by 2 different doctors now that I have to stop eating all fruit (except for bananas), no more salads or whole grains.
I have some real fears about this fissure. I am afraid of having to resort to the surgery and then suffering from incontinence. I am afraid that it will be another year until I can run again. I am afraid of getting a colonoscopy, which still has to be done to get to the root cause of the chronic diarrhea, and most of all, I am afraid of becoming depressed because of this, because being sad is not in my nature, but I can totally see how this condition can destroy your soul.
One of the terrible things, as you all know, is that you can't talk about this to anyone. I've pretty much had no choice but to tell my boyfriend, and he tries to be understanding, but otherwise, I feel very isolated. Therefore, I am so glad about this website. I thought I had tried everything to get rid of my fissure, but I've read about a hundred new ideas on here, and I plan to try everything before resorting to surgery.
I am also SUPER thankful that there are many people on this website who have had their fissure healed for a long time; you give the rest of us the HOPE we are so desperate for.
Thanks again for reading this!
