This is a vision of how I feel: !!! I am married to a 52 yr. old who went on a golf tour last August. He admits he was drinking way too much coffee and not enough water. Everyone on this forum knows what that can cause.....anal fissure, and it did! He weighed 240 lbs. then, now, he's 190, which is good since he had a fissurectomy on Feb.11th and then was down to 180. However, weight aside, he has done everything possible to fix this. His quality of life is the pits, he isn't able to work, plus due to his inactivity all winter he now has a sciatic nerve issue as well.
He saw a specialist a month ago who advised him to increase application of nifedipine to 4x/day as well as polysporin. He is keeping at his diet of only chicken/fish, veggies/fruits, takes metamucil 1x/day, lots of water. There has been no change. This coming Tues he sees the specialist again who will then suggest the sphincterotomy (he told him a month ago that if his advice did not help, another surgery is an option). We do not want him to have to suffer another surgery since the recovery from the fissurectomy hurt like hell! However, we may be out of options.
Of course this is affecting our entire family (3 kids 15, 18, 20), it's getting quite stressful. Is anyone able to share their experience after a sphincterotomy or advice to help us make this next decision? They say there is a 5% chance of incontinence after that surgery and that is scary.
Thanks so much to whoever began this forum! Most people don't even know what a fissure is until it takes over your whole life! I've been reading posts on here for the past # of months & that's been very helpful.

Hi Pj,
Welcome - It's great to see your support for your husband on this site and it's so frustrating when you have someone close to you going through so much pain and are unable to do anything more to help them...
It sounds (sadly) from reading through your husband's history that he has pretty much exhausted most of the conventional options, although Botox is possibly another avenue to explore? I didn't personally need to take the LIS route but after reading so much on this site, once the majority of people have this, they never look back and many regret they didn't do it SOONER. The procedure allows them to heal their fissure to the extent that they can pretty much go back to normality and eat pretty much what they want again. The op is very straightforward and recovery is as you would expect with any anal issue, initially uncomfortable, but as time progresses, people continue to heal and most, extremely successfully. I have never come across any post or story, which has reported a major issue with incontinence, although that is not to say, that it does happen. I can only assume it's not a common side effect. I think your husand has to weigh up ultimately what he wants out of his life - whether to continue with this roller coaster ride and his restricted quality of life or to take the plunge, have the surgery and truly believe that this is his way forward to getting his life back on track. I don't think there's much choice and wouldn't hesitate to consider the LIS route, if I personally found myself in his situation.
I truly wish you & your family all the best in helping him deal with this. It isn't easy and just keep up the encouragement and strong support you are evidently providing him......Keep nagging him about his caffeine intake and remind him to drink his water instead!!!
Good luck to you all :)

Thank you Ever the Optomist for your response! I was beginning to think that my situation was too normal for anyone to give a reply to!
I am beginning to feel the way you suggest that he really has only one of 2 options left; live with it or get the lis.
I can't see him living like this for the rest of his life and really want him to enjoy life again.

Hi there PJOctober, and welcome to the forum.
Just to add to what. ETO said, this is a link to a post that you might like to read, including a post there by Davo:
http://anal-fissure.org/t4689-sphincterotomy?highlight=sphincterotomy
We are here to answer any questions and lend a shoulder to cry on, so to speak! I have a husband who is so patient with me, and one glance of the area concerned convinced him of the pain too! Hope it all works out for your hubby and he is soon back to playing golf, etc.

I want to add a plea for you to be as patient as possible with this terrible problem. If your husband feels coerced into surgery and then has a long time healing or not the best outcome, that will also add stress. It is not an easy thing to accept needing surgery on your butt-hole. Some people who have surgery still retear or feel they are 'never the same.' Cudos to you for supporting your husband and just keep on......he will heal or figure out that surgery may be his best option. This problem requires time! Thanks for listening....

pjoctober
LIS no doubt has a very good success rate. n permanent incontinence is usually very very rare. there may b episodes of mild n temporary wind incontinence or fecal incontinence but that resolves in few weeks but that is again very rare. if ur husband is suffering a lot as his weight decrease is suggesting do go for LIS. it's a minor surgery. however recovery is different for every individual. but still I would say if he is suffering a lot then he should choose LIS cz worse would b few rough days but at least after that he will b recovering. every day one step ahead towards life. so weigh ur options n decide.