Hi everyone, I am new to the board and wanted to get some advice.

I developed a fissure last summer. My primary initially thought it was just a hemroid, and I had those too, but my hemroids usually clear up over time and this did not. Combination of bad diet, not enough water, too much sitting at work, etc. He perscribed me some hydrocorstine suppositories (basically just Prep H with hydrocortisone) and referred me to a colon/rectal guy -- that appointment took forever to get filled and I have it slotted for the end of this month.

However, the good news is over the last month, my symptoms have basically subsided and recently gone away almost completely. The various creams I tried didn't seem to do a whole lot. However, when I cut out chips/crackers/cereal pretty much altogether -- which I did about a month ago -- that actually did work. I've gone from a lot of pain during bowel movements (and for hours afterwards), to minimal pain (just during the BM itself), down to being pain-free and just some "itchiness" for an hour or so after I have a BM. I can now sit and be pain free again, really for the first time in months. It happened gradually but eliminating the "hard stuff" out of my diet (along with taking a stool softener and drinking a lot more water) has really done wonders.

I can still feel the lump (I assume it's the fissure?) when wiping, but it's not as "hard"/noticeable as it was before nor does it seem to be protruding out as much. Again it's been a gradual process but over the last 7-10 days especially I feel like I've finally gotten over the hump from this -- for the first time. It's not as if I was getting better and then it would get worse...it was pretty bad from summer until early December, but it's steadily improved ever since.

So my question is -- do I need to keep the appointment with the specialist? The guy has a good rep (Dr. Schechter out of Providence) and he got rid of a hemroid of one of my wife's co-workers in his one and only appointment. Is it worth having it looked at still? On the other hand, if what I'm doing is working, I don't want to go through anything that's unnecessary or could make things worse after reading stories about people's bad experiences.

I would appreciate any input!

Lucky you!

While we can't tell you what to do, I think with my own experience I would suggest still going. Sometimes you have periods where it gets better and you think it's gone, then all of the sudden it's back. Not trying to dissuade you, but I'm just speaking from my own experience here.

Good luck!

Thanks, I thought I had it bad, but its nothing compared to a lot of what I have read. I suppose it cant hurt getting checked out!

Hey Rihn, remember that you feel this way due to the softeners that you take as well. There will come the time when you will want to reduce and eliminate them - be very carefull then, it will be your most critical period of time.
You can see that doctor, no problem, but don;t jump with joy when he will tell you that you are healed - this is only apparent as almost everybody here can confirm. Keep doing what works already for a very long time and slowly, slowly, cut back on the medicines/supplements that you take. I am talking months here, just so I make myself clear.

Hi rihn I have good periods and bad periods as I think 99% of fissure suffers do if it was me I would go to the appointment just to get the ball rolling if you need to do more in future this first step has already been done and any treatment should be faster. Also it only takes 1 hard BM to set you back I've had my fissure on and off for 5 years I had Botox for it 10months ago which has helped but not healed it I would recommend people to try Botox first if it comes to that. Good luck

Abu wrote:Hey Rihn, remember that you feel this way due to the softeners that you take as well. There will come the time when you will want to reduce and eliminate them - be very carefull then, it will be your most critical period of time.
You can see that doctor, no problem, but don;t jump with joy when he will tell you that you are healed - this is only apparent as almost everybody here can confirm. Keep doing what works already for a very long time and slowly, slowly, cut back on the medicines/supplements that you take. I am talking months here, just so I make myself clear.

Understood Abu, thanks. That's exactly what I want to know. I'm going to stay on what I've been doing and keep my appt. I'm prepared to do this for the long haul, it took months for me to start to feel better at all.

Also it takes a year of no pain for the fissure to be strong enough, and you want your anus to be able to have normal bms check the Bristol chart for what's normal if you only have soft bms to heal your fissure you'll need to have soft bms for ever because your anus shrinks it's a muscle that needs natural stretching by natural bms

Totally agree with Missy here with one remark: going from soft to normal must be done extremely slowly and controlled. no rushing with this!

Abu I've had soft hard and normal bms an the fissure is fussy it gets annoyed by alsorts depends on something else but not sure what is it

I know what it is: your diet and lifestyle. Put these in order first and the BMs will follow suit :)