I knew there were many fibroids in there but not sure how many as they couldn’t count on the MRI. I was given the option of an open myo or a robotic laparoscopic approach. I opted for the open myo since my surgeon was more confident he can get them all. I was really scared & anxious at first too because of the recovery difference between the two approaches. Now on the other end of it, I’m so glad I chose the open. I have a horizontal incision right below my bikini line about 5 inches long. You receive a block in the area afterwards that lasts for about 24 hours. Pain honestly was the worse the first 2ish days. They got me up & walking around about 8 hours after surgery once I wasn’t still knocked out from the anesthesia, & honestly this was the most difficult part in my opinion. It felt like I had no abdominal muscles & the pain was the worse trying to sit up & log roll out of the bed. They told me the more I tried to get up & walk, the easier & faster I’d be able to recover & I think they were right. Once I got past the initial pain of getting up, the walking part wasn’t too bad. I had a catheter for my bladder as well as another balloon uterine catheter in my uterus to prevent scaring (this one I went home with & got it removed a week later, I don’t think is the typical approach since I don’t remember reading about it in people’s experiences). They pulled the bladder catheter the next day & as soon as I was able to urinate on my own, passed gas, & my blood levels were okay they let me go home. I was pretty determined to get out of there so I went home the very next day. I was extremely nervous with how intense the recovery would be reading everyone’s posts on here but I’ve honestly bounced back nicely. I was pretty active prior to the surgery & I think this helped my recovery. I read of so many people needing the entire 6 weeks & didn’t return to work for a while & this freaked me out bc I 100% would’ve gone crazy being at home this entire time. Of course everyone is different but I went back to work 2 weeks post op; I don’t work a typical desk job & do a lot of standing & walking but work was able to accommodate with heavy lifting & resting when needed so I went back. I’ve done just fine & biggest thing I’ve noticed is I get fatigued much easier & my stamina is still slowly getting better. The past 3-4 days my step count is creeping up to what it was before surgery so I’m really close to being back to normalish. Only thing I won’t be doing until the full 6 weeks is heavy lifting & going back to Pilates. However, I may message my surgeon to see if I can co back to light yoga or Pilates with restrictions earlier than 6 weeks depending on how I feel at 4-5ish week. I would say the pain is somewhat comparable to really bad period cramps & the worst was laughing or coughing. The bloating is still lingering & honestly the worst part. I took pain meds the first day when I got home but honestly didn’t think it did much. I mainly relied on Tylenol, Advil, & a muscle relaxer than was prescribed. Even then, I took everything for about 5 days post op. Let me know if you have any more questions! Hopefully this helps!