Hi! I'm new in this forum. I'm just so thankful to find all of you guys. I had my fistulectomy June of 2011. Up until now, my wound isn't fully closed yet. Is this normal? just today, I pooped and I was so nervous because it went bleeding again. I hope this isn't that bad. I need your help guyzzz.... thanks!

Hi feistypris: I'm new to this AF ordeal, hopefully, someone else who has experienced this can come and inform you.. Hang in there sweetie..

Thank you grannymaria!!!! I'm just hoping that it's just because I drank some slimming coffee on those days. I'm just worried why it didn't close yet. It has been 6 months after my surgery.

Hi Feisty,
I haven't had a fistula, but I had an infected episiotomy that took almost 4 months to heal.
Have you talked to your CRS? You should probably get it checked out to make sure.
Try PMing someone on the forum who has had a fistula to get a quicker answer. People here are glad to help as we all know/remember how much is sucks and how scary it is.
-woi

Thanks a lot woi... I'll try to find someone who had a fistula in this room....

Hey feistypris - I had a fistulotomy in late June 2011. It took about four months before it healed, and possibly longer. I bled with BMs up until a week ago. Not a lot of blood, but there was some on the TP with just about every BM. It gradually slowed down, and it seems to have stopped altogether now (but i don't want to speak too soon!).
How do you know that your fistulotomy wound hasn't healed yet? The reason I ask is because my doc told me that I wasn't actually bleeding from my fistulotomy wound - that had healed quite well after a few months. Instead, I was bleeding from some irritated hemorrhoidal tissue that was still recovering from the trauma of my fissure, fistula and two surgeries. He called it 'nuisance bleeding', which is a good term because there's no pain and nothing sinister about it. I'm going for a colonoscopy in April just to check, and if the tissue is still irriated and bleeding, he might just band it.
I really think you should get checked by your doc, just to be sure. It may turn out that it's nothing serious; but if it is a recurring fistula, it would be good to know that and possibly get it fixed. There was boardie here who had to get their fistulotomy wound re-opened. It does suck a lot, but, from what I read, it seemed that it wasn't too terribly horrible because it didn't seem to be quite the same kind of surgery as the first fistulotomy (maybe a bit less traumatic to the butt tissue?).
I don't know if any of this is remotely helpful! But I can say that healing from a fistulotomy can take a LONG time. And I wonder if it's possible that your bleeding isn't from the fistulotomy wound after all. Also, it can take quite a long time for the butt tissue to settle down and get stronger, and occasional bleeding isn't too uncommon after surgery. I think you'll feel a lot better if you let a doc take a look and tell you what's going on. I sure felt a lot better after I asked my doc. :D

thanks for the information hopetoheal... I'll do that. How long did it take for your wound to close?

Hey feistypris - I think it took about 5 months or so for my wound to heal over. It didn't really "close", but rather it healed from the wound bed up (the wound was pretty wide, like a ditch). At about 4-5 months, it would still bleed a bit sometimes along the bottom edge of the wound, but that seems to have stopped now. The wound really shouldn't 'close' - as in 'stitching' back together like a wound you would get from a knife cut. Fistulotomy wounds are wide, and have to heal from the wound bed 'up' (more like getting 'filled in'). That can take a good long while.
I hope you're able to get some useful information and help from your doc. Keep us posted and let us know how you're doing. :)

I just had another follow up today from my fistulotomy/hemorroidectomy(sp?)/skin tag removal in July. Of course I can't speak for your situation, but I, like Hope have had problems with bleeding as well. I think the way her doc put it was pretty good 'nuisance bleeding'...I like that. lol Anyway, I asked my doc today about it, and he said the surgery site has healed up pretty well. Just one place he put some silver nitrate. He thinks the bleeding is from a small tear/crack in the skin, but since it's not very painful, he says we will just keep an eye on it. So long story short, it's kind of a long process, so don't get too scared yet. I know I get nervous with every twinge or pain or unusual thing now in that area, but usually it's nothing...easy to get nervous about though. Hang in there and don't get too discouraged if the healing is slow.

Thanks Summergal!!!! After 2 days of bleeding, now, it's ok. I was trying to check it out if it's from drinking coffee or tea. I try drinking different beverages everyday. Sometimes, I drink milk tea / coffee / green tea. I don't know which is the best one to drink sometimes.