It’s been ten weeks now since my pelvic reconstruction surgery — basically hiking my insides back to where they should be and also getting a hysterectomy.
I forgot to share the results of my 8 week post-op check up.
First, I feel great. My recovery was a breeze. Ten days after surgery I was driving, and two weeks after surgery I started walking.
I waited exactly six weeks to start exercising, and on day 1 of week 7, I was back at it.
I’m swimming and running and doing everything I did before I had these issues.
The prolapse is gone. My parts are back where they should be and I am super reinforced with mesh.
But I am still having an issue which is kind of frustrating. Because this is one of the issues I really wanted to be totally fixed.
So before you have this surgery, you are made aware of all the possible complications, side effects, etc.
Of course you never think you’ll be the one to experience any of those.
Unfortunately I am.
It is not all that uncommon for women who have had prolapse surgery/bladder sling surgery to experience urge incontinence or overactive bladder after surgery.
And I am experiencing that kind of big time.
My peeing in my pants issues are actually worse now than they were before the surgery.
It seems like the stress incontinence might be improving. That’s the peeing in your pants when you jump/run/sneeze/whatever. I think my muscles took a serious beating, and they need to kind of strengthen themselves back up. But running down hill or jumping or any stress on my abs when there is anything in my bladder poses a bit of a challenge.
So Poise pads are my friend right now.
Then there is the urge incontinence.
If you don’t know what that means, urge incontinence is when all of a sudden out of nowhere you have to pee really, really, REALLY badly. Or you feel like you do, anyway. I don’t know if it’s the same thing technically as overactive bladder, but I have one or both or those things.
I didn’t really have that before the surgery, but I have it now.
It could be a temporary thing.
Or it could be a new development I’ll have to either deal with or address down the line with additional surgery.
But I have been referred to pelvic floor therapist for pelvic floor therapy.
I have no idea what the heck goes on in pelvic floor therapist. I didn’t even know there was such a thing!
Once I experience that, I’ll fill you in…
Until then, I do know there are two things that can make these symptoms worse.
One is extra abdominal weight. It’s not like I weigh 500 pounds, but I do have more weight around my middle than I should. So this is another reason for me to stay on track with the changes in my diet and losing weight.
The other thing that exacerbates the issue is coffee. Caffeine makes my issues worse. And I drink a lot of coffee.
A LOT OF COFFEE.
It’s the one vice I’ve still got left, and to be honest, I’m not ready (or willing?) to give it up.
I don’t even want to cut back on it.
But I guess that’s next on the list of things to address.
So yeah. Aside from the continued incontinence issues, I feel great.
If you are new here you may be wondering why the hell I am sharing this information.
I’ll tell you why.
Because so many of us are dealing with this stuff.
Since I’ve written this post I have had literally dozens of women contact me. I’ve had women stop me all over town — at the gym, at the library, and even in line at the grocery store to tell me they had the same issues and to share their peeing-in-their-pants stories or their hemmeroid surgery stories or their prolapse stories or their…
This stuff happens to so many of us. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. It’s just life and aging and childbirth and gravity.
And that is why I share this. Because you’d be surprised at the number of women affected by this stuff. If you think you are the only one, you definitely aren’t.
TRUST ME!
So next stop is pelvic floor therapy.
I’ve got my fingers crossed that I’ll only have to keep my legs crossed for the short term.
And I’ll be sure to keep you posted on how that goes.
Look cute while you manage the chaos. Click here.
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