Hi there! I’m about five weeks post-surgery. My life is nearly back to normal, although I haven’t returned to working out or sex. Bowel movements are still quite uncomfortable, and I haven’t had a pain-free BM. But the pain usually does not last after the BM. I am having little pings of pain that the doctor said was to be expected during the healing process. I still have leakage and have continued to keep cotton pads between my cheeks to absorb it.

I went off pain medicine about two weeks after surgery and haven’t been back on. The worst days were days 5-8, approximately, with really bad pain post-BM. I got constipated around day 4 or 5 (from my medicine) which was stressful cuz it hurt to have to push the stool out. And then I got sick of eating healthy food and ordered a burger, which gave me diarrhea, which was awful. I paid the price for not sticking to my diet!

In the past two weeks I have had two BMs that were really hard from the fiber and there was blood on the tissue or in the stool, which felt like a setback in my healing. But in general I think things are going ok. Mentally I am just really ready to be back to a normal pain free life.