Wow Adam, you're very tough! Having no anaesthetic and no pain meds - have you got a superhuman pain tolerance???
You've done really, really well, and you're also very brave to look at it. I had my fistulotomy on 15th june and I still can't look at it!
I hope things continue to improve so well for you!

Thanks so much Dawn :) I have had maybe 3 short, hard jabs of stings so far since the bm. I hope I do clean it enough and I will try harder for my next shower. I think with all our problems, we all don't have the problem in the se exact area of our bottom. Therefore the surgery may have been a little different than others, and it co-insidingly has different maintenance for healing.
Thanks Val :) I did have an anaestethic during the surgery (four freeze shots to my bottom that didn't hurt as much as the needle-thin instrument or his finger than he stuck in me :S). But no pain meds after that. I can take physical pain well usually, but in this case I just think my fistula/abcess/fissure wasn't as bad and I know it wasn't in it's prime for as long as most of the boardies here and yourself. It was only for 15 minutes and I felt almost nothing those whole 15 minutes. The freeze started to wear off about 12 minutes into the surgery, and I mentioned it to the doctor as I was trying to breathe properly in and out, and boy did he ever put the surgery in 6th gear, he's got fast and precise hands! I give all the credit here definitely to my crs, Dr. Rudd, for my great healing currently. And to think! I made this appointment on Monday, and filled myself in for someone who cancelled an appointment!! Incredible...
I am still scared though. I do have my doubts as we all do because we aren't a crs and I bet all of us here don't live with one that can help and watch us everyday. I do have a lot of faith in and love for all doctors though, and do understand mistakes may be made.
I did have a little blip in my healing today though. Like I said I do feel rare random short stings here and there, and also as I check my cotton ball there about every hour or so, I noticed maybe 6 hours after my bm I had a good amount of blood on the kleenex I put after the cotton ball. When I changed it right away, I checked the wound and it was just bloody, but at least stopped bleeding.
I did make soup from scratch though and maybe that caused it (standing, walking, cutting and shredding vegetables, crouching down for things). Because of that I'm not going out tonight or even tomorrow all day. I don't want the bleeding to get worse. It was the bm that caused the bleeding for sure, not right away, but left it vulnerable to bleed with little agitation.
I'm still very content though and will keep everyone posted

Oh, I knew you had the local anaesthetic - I meant a general one! Wow, still can't believe anyone could voluntarily go through that awake!!
Sorry you've had a blip. Shouldn't you be taking it easy and resting??? Even a couple of days of "downtime" would probably do wonders for healing. When I started to do too much, I ran into problems and it got infected. I dont know if it had anything to do with it, but even with my last surgery I bled more if I overdid things.
Be kind to yourself Adam and have a bit of a rest! Your bum will thank you for it!
Hope you feel better soon.

Thanks for the advice Val, you're totally right, I will take it more easy today. I am an inpatient person and I do sometimes count my chicks before they hatch. I just already feel so healed that I keep forgetting how serious this is.

DAY 2 POST FISTULA OP:
About an hour ago I had my 2nd bowel movement since the fistula surgery. The bm hurt less than yesterday, if it even hurt at all! The anxiety and nervousness alone makes it seem worse I think There was suprisingly no blood on my stools, and less blood on the damp kleenex I use to dab the area, pretty much seemed like less than a 1/4 of a teaspoon.
I proceeded to clean the area in the shower with a lot of water to rinse it, and used a little soap on a wrag to gently rub and wipe it well while I spread my cheeks pretty hard. When I did enough cleaning I grabbed the mirror to check it and seen some more of that recurring white stuff so I held the mirror with one hand, a soaped wrag in the other, and used my forearms to hold my cheeks open, and made sure I got rid of that worrying stuff :) I then dabbed it once with dry kleenex to get most of the water, then blow dried it on cool for 5 or 6 minutes and felt it completely dry. I mirror checked it again and happily seen no white stuff so I stuffed it with a cornstarched cotton ball and put another one just to be sure.
If anyone uses cornstarched cotton balls, I suggest to smother the whole cotton ball in cornstarch because when it is damp and you have to change it, if it is not completely cornstarched, the blood makes the cottonball stick to your skin and hair and is painful to take off. The cornstarch doesn't let it stick at all.
The pain today is much less than yesterday but is probably because right after my bm and shower yesterday I was up and making a big homemade chicken vegetable soup. Today I went straight to bed and I'm still here and will be here all day until I need to use the washroom or eat :)

Great news, Adam! I'm so glad the pain isn't bad today. You're right that the anxiety is sometime worse than anything else! The cleaning really is a chore, and your routine sounds particularly elaborate! It sounds like you are doing everything right, according to your surgeon's instructions. I'm so glad you are planning on taking it easy and having a nice, restful day. I hope you will do that for at least a week ... after all, how often we any of us actually get to relax for such a solid chunk of time? :D
I suggest finding some good movies to help pass the time. I've declared a few "Godfather Days" and just watch Godfather 1 and 2 all day long ... I'm not a fan of the third one :) but I could watch the first two over and over again. Or I'll watch back-to-back Coen brothers movies. I'm a really impatient person too, so it's hard for me to just goof off on the couch all day. But with practice, it gets easier! Recovery from butt surgery requires a LOT of patience, as I've learned myself, and you really don't want any complications during the healing, like I had.
ok - enough nagging! I'm actually trying to be sympathetic and supportive! Take good care of yourself! (there I go again with the nagging! )

Hey Adam,
Sounds like you are doing great. Do relax and try to be patient:) I know it's hard but if we don't , it could postpone and drag out the healing process when it doesn't need to be in many cases. There's one thing I have learned about my butt while healing, if I wasn't good to it, it had the power to stop me in my tracks and make me,Lol.... What you do now could speed up or delay your healing. I say be lazy and watch some movies as Hope is! Lol :) :)

Lol thanks Dawn and hopetoheal.. I'm not a big movie fan but I guess I will be for the next couple days lol... I'm watching the Jamie Foxx show right now and it's the funniest episode I've seen I'm literally laughing. There's also a lot of sports on tv like the women's world cup, the south american soccer cup, baseball, and pre op I watched all the wimbledon tennis. But I probably will fit in some movies though

That's great news that you're resting Adam!
All that sport sounds like a nightmare LOL! I like a good chickflick! Enjoy your downtime!