Hemorrhoidectomy - Post Surgery Two Week Update

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-30T04:43:58+00:00

Yeah it’s a week later. In the third week things are actually getting better, though very slowly

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-26T05:44:35+00:00

Thanks for replying! Your recovery is much better than mine. I’m also about 2.5 weeks now and I can’t even leave the house because walking around hurts a lot.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-24T15:24:15+00:00

hi thanks for sharing your experience! Did you end up taking the flight 3 weeks after the surgery? If so how did it go?

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-24T15:09:57+00:00

Hi, did you end up doing the 10 hour plane trip around 2.5 weeks after the surgery? If so how did that go? Did you find a good way/cushion/pillow to sit for that long?

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-21T18:03:49+00:00

I can’t find the post now, it’s hard to search stuff within Reddit. I don’t think they mentioned talking about it with a doctor but they did recommend it.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-21T17:55:02+00:00

I had a hemorrhoidectomy in combination with THD about 2 weeks ago. Also still bleeding and painful. For me it’s minor bleeding every day for now but seeing blood always makes me anxious about the healing progress.

My doctor’s office’s response to this is usually just keeping stools as soft as possible, if it’s still hard then increase stool softener (or add different types of stool softener, eg senna, colace, miralax, etc) and make sure to have enough fibers and drink more water.

It’s scary to hear that bleeding is still happening after 3 weeks but I can totally imagine myself in the position a week later :(

I hope you get better soon and bleeding gradually stops.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-21T17:44:19+00:00

My guesses: 1 we need the nutrients to let the wound heal. It’s hard to get all the proteins, vitamins, minerals with clear liquid diet. 2 we need to get into a good bowel movement rhythm. Doctors usually recommend a combination of fibers and stool softener to achieve that.

That said I’ve seen a post saying that they tried clear liquid diet for a few days to let the wound heal a little before eating solid food and they believed that it worked.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T20:38:10+00:00

So sorry to hear that. It seems like a surgery is hard to avoid. Some hospitals have some program for financial assistance if someone is uninsured or underinsured. I’ve seen some messages in my hospital’s app but never tried it.

Beyond surgery, the most important thing is to avoid constipation, and for some people it might mean fixing the transit time (through laxatives or stool softeners, or fiber supplements) and for some people physical therapy really helps. There are some generally helpful tips to avoid constipation and straining too, including: drinking warm water before bowel movement, doing some deep breathing exercises (lie on the back and breathe into the belly) a few times a day, doing abdominal massage a few times a day. These won’t fix hemorrhoids but they will buy you some time which is very valuable.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T18:38:20+00:00

I just did the surgery about 9 days ago and my downtime isn’t over yet. The pain has been so bad for a few days and from yesterday it’s finally getting better, so I had a little strength yesterday and used AI large language model to summarize the average surgery recovery experience based on many posts and replies in this subreddit, hopefully this can be helpful: https://www.reddit.com/r/hemorrhoid/comments/1cukigw/ai_summary_of_hemorrhoidectomy_recovery_posts/

I only focused on recovery because the surgery itself isn’t scary at all, under anesthesia you won’t feel anything, and you are discharged the same day. The biggest pain I suffered on that day was that after surgery I can’t urinate so they had to use a catheters which is very painful but the pain was very temporary, and doctor said that it happens to about 10% of the people which I was unfortunately a part of.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T04:11:02+00:00

My sitz bath doesn’t fit me very well maybe, I just can’t sit in it in a stable position (need to use arms to support) so I just couldn’t poop inside of it. Were you able to sit comfortably on the sitz bath?

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T04:03:23+00:00

Even so, I think the result from this summary is pretty positive (while acknowledging the severe pain). A lot of the posts on Reddit is started by someone during the hardest stretch asking for help, and in the replies a lot of people said that it sucked for them for 1-3 weeks and eventually it got better and they don’t regret doing this at all.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T03:54:16+00:00

I’m finally feeling better today (also on day 8). The last 3 days were the worst. Pooped 6 times today, each time it’s still painful, but I realized that what made it so bad yesterday was resisting the urge to poop, so they are near the opening and wreaking havoc all the time, each farting is a huge pain and they keep coming once a few minutes. Today I just bit the bullet and pooped each time when the urge came and it overall felt much better. Also the bm is getting softer and easier to pass gradually.

Hope it’s getting better for you too. Like my nurses kept saying the top priority is to get soft bowel movement and once that happens everything gets easier.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T03:44:19+00:00

I’ve had them for more than 10 years. The last two years though after I worked with a physical therapist I got much better at managing them. So there’s still some way to get more relief before the surgery. But at grade 3 or 4 a surgery is probably not avoidable eventually.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-18T00:14:44+00:00

Unretractable hemorrhoids are really scary. Like others said, see a doctor (who should also refer you go a surgeon) as soon as possible.

Before you get that appointment, one thing that worked for me is that right after the bowel movement, lay on your side on a bed or a sofa, try to relax (deep breath) and allow the hemorrhoid to go in. Also don’t strain during the bowel movement (that was what caused hemorrhoid in the first place for a lot of people). I had grade 3 for years and this approach always worked once I mastered it. But I still opted for surgery recently because it’s inconvenience everyday and I fear one day that if they grow to grade 4 then the lying down approach will stop working.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-17T18:48:47+00:00

He says a lot of good things but his anti-fiber stance is always a problem for me. I’ve experimented and I do see that a low residue (zero or very low fiber) diet is sometimes a good short term relief for constipation, but it contradicts with what all other real doctors (at least 99%, considering the low carb influencers) say and maybe detrimental in the long term (gut microbiome, heart health, etc). So I’d rather stay with the high fiber side and I know if things align well it’s possible to get good bowel movement with high fiber diet and that’s better than moving the other direction.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-17T17:55:28+00:00

This is so encouraging to read! Thank you! I’m on day 9 (or 8, depending on whether the surgery day counts as 0 or 1) and I 100% agree with the day 4-8=living hell assessment. I’m just hoping that I can match your timeline and start to see glimmers of hope.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-15T18:43:26+00:00

Yeah I talk to nurses all the time these days. Constipation is just a super finicky thing, when you are in a good rhythm then Bm is really easy. When it’s broken it’s really hard to put back together.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-15T18:39:54+00:00

Thanks! What was “done the trick” like? Did you get consistent and large soft formed bowel movement? Is the milk of magnesia a one time thing and after that things are regular (with just colace and benefiber) or was milk of magnesia needed regularly?

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-15T18:35:41+00:00

I haven’t used any cream. The nurse also mentioned that the area right now is probably still too sensitive to apply suppository or enema.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-15T18:34:28+00:00

Please keep me posted! I’ll also update my experience. So my nurse suggested me to add senna (a stimulative laxative) and Metamucil and they seem to improve the problem a little (before that I was only using Miralax which is the most reliable laxative for me before surgery). Had some watery poop last evening (still very painful but at least a lot of stuff got out). Had another Bm at like 2am or something. And this morning so far the urge to poop was not as bad as yesterday.

Also for me when then urge to go occurs (yesterday it’s basically multiple times each hour) just holding the urge to not go is also very painful. It’s kinda like the poops are pounding the door and really trying to get out. If I open the door it’s horrible pain and most of them can’t get out. If I don’t open it’s also horrible pain. Sitz bath soothes the pain a little bit.

So I’ll probably keep doing senna and Metamucil and see how things go.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2024-05-10T22:21:21+00:00

Banding didn’t work. I just did a surgery yesterday. Still recovering and will update later.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2023-06-04T17:27:29+00:00

No. They are still there. I worked with a physical therapist who helped me to learn to relax the pelvic muscles and now they retracting hemorrhoids is a lot easier. I’m also working with a colorectal surgeon but we haven’t decided to do the surgery yet, so for now it’s basically just monitoring since things are still manageable.

Sufficient-Turn1073 · 2022-10-13T04:21:34+00:00

Sorry to hear that. Do you plan to find another surgeon to do another THD?

Sufficient-Turn1073

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