Monday, September 28, 2015

It's all in the breathing

I had a hysterectomy 12 years ago (I was very young... but had had my family).

My hysterectomy was to try and rid me of the evil that is Endometriosis.

I suffered with Endo for a long, long time.  I first went to the Doctor in 1986, because sex with my then current boyfriend (and subsequently my husband - Yay), was really painful.  Really , really painful.  The doctor decided it was Constipation, stuck her finger right up my arse, wiggled it around and said "Maybe".

That examination put me off going back for a long time.   It also put me off sex for quite some time too.

Eventually I returned to the Doctors, around 8 years later and this time, I had IBS.  I drank Fibregel every day, twice a day. To this day, I still hate the taste of Fibre, and Orange.

The pain did not diminish.  It increased.  Monthlies expanded.  I had Monthlies all the time.    I walked like a baby in terry toweling nappies, because basically that's what was happening.

The pain grew in area - not only was it restricted to my womb and lower back and cervix. It started to move down my legs.  Performing Number 2's at the wrong time of the month or day, would result in me having to lie down, sedate myself and recover from the pain.  The flow would make me drop to my knees.

Eventually I was referred for a Laparoscopy.

It didn't find anything.

The doctor suggested a hysterectomy simply as a last resort.

When I went into hospital, I think they considered that I was having a hysterectomy to "stop the inconvenience of periods".

When I woke up from surgery, the doctor apologised to me.

I did have Endo - it was hidden from the front view; hence no result with the laparoscopy.  My bladder, and ovaries, and cervix, and womb were tightly bound together with the endo scar tissue.  They had to cut everything out and stitch me back up again.

They scraped away what they could of the Endo, but as is the way, they couldn't remove it all.  My cervix was too tightly welded for them to remove it, so not only am I without Womb - I still have to undergo smears.

The pain subsided.  It hasn't left completely, and it is impacted by what I eat. I think because my bowel was affected, some foods digest differently and struggle to move thru an adapted bowel.  Depending on what I have eaten, No 2s can still cause me gross pain.  

Like today.

Yesterday I did something which made me howl in pain on the loo.

I had to lay down for a good while after to recover from the shock of the pain.

It's never going to go - i just have to learn to deal with the pain as best I can without resorted to sedating myself.

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