Emergency hemorrhoidectomy recovery 5 days after childbirth

Hi guys. This site has been so useful to me in my post op recovery.. I wanted to share my story in hopes of helping someone else. 

I'm a 30 year old female.. in relatively good health. I've  had some pretty gnarly internal hemorrhoids from the age of 22 that always prolapsed after every bm, but they've always been manageable and have only given me real grief about ten times. I gave birth to a child last Tuesday (first time) and while pushing.. it appears my internal hemmies exploded to the size of a full orange ( no exaggeration ). My OB kept insisting the swelling would go down.. but by day 4 of not being able to sit stand or walk.. one of the nurses at the hospital insisted I get checked out at the ER. I went just to see if maybe they could shrink it with some lidocaine injections as I also had a second degree episiotomy tear from child labor and was still in a lot of pain and on painkillers from that.

Instead.. the on call colorectal surgeon decided to come in from home because he said my hemorrhoids had turned necrotic and would turn into a severe infection sooner than later.. I went into emergency surgery not even 6 hours later at 1am on 10/29. 

At this point I had not had a bowel movement for 5 days due to the Percocet I was on for my episiotomy.. I was already severely impacted fecally but my surgeon told me he was able to remove what he could as well as removing all the necrotic tissue. To my understanding he removed over 5 large hemorrhoids all internal that had prolapsed and died.

Right after surgery.. I was given dilaudin as soon as the numbing agent starting wearing off.. the pain was excruciating... I begged the nurse to give me an additional dose of anything.. eventually she gave in and gave me a dose of oxycodone as well. While the pain didn't completely go away.. it did make me drowsy enough to get a couple hours of sleep.. only to wake up to excruciating pain again. I was literally counting down the seconds for the next dosage except this dose of dilaudin and ocycodine didn't alleviate anything and for the next 6 hours I was left to be in excruciating pain because they could not give me any other options in fear of overdose. After 6 hours.. they gave me a combination of Tylenol and tramadol and actually this helped SO MUCH MORE than the strong dilaudin. After getting sent home.. I realized that the combination of Tylenol and ibuprofen actually help a lot more than the oxycodone they prescribed me.. but in an effort to not feel anymore pain I continued to take Tylenol, ibuprofen, oxycodone and Valium(for the anal muscle spasms). THIS IS A BAD IDEA especially when you already have not had a bowel movement in over 5 days as oxycodone and Valium are both constipating narcotics.

Day 1. Taking all the meds I can take.. which are currently 4000g of Tylenol, 2400g of ibuprofen, 40g of oxycodone and 20g of Valium per day as well as a daily dose of miralax. Unable to do anything but without the meds pain level was an 11 out of 10.. with the meds I would say pain level was a 7. While not great, it's much better than an 11 and expected for day 1 Post op. Spent most of the day crying.. but even that hurt.. so tried to just lay there and sleep as much as I could. 

Day 2

Still taking all meds.. pain is slightly better.. maybe a 6.8 instead of a 7.. but still an improvement. No bowel movement yet, but again not able to do much. If you think you're gonna read or do any hobbies.. forget it.. just try to get some sleep and heal your body. 

Day 3

Feeling much better except for the uncomfortableness of not having had a bowel movement. Decided to cut out oxycodone and so now I'm only taking the other three plus miralax. My husband also went out and got recticare which I highly recommend. It's a lidocaine cream which you put on after baths, showers, or after bowel movements. It kind of numbs the area.. and makes you feel so much better. Pain level is 5 today even without the painkillers.. only real pain is coming from the stuck bowel movement that won't come out but is sitting in my rectum.

Day 4

Only took one dose of Valium and two doses of ibuprofen(1200g) and Tylenol (2000g). Pain level 4.5. By day 4 I was completely desperate.. I had been taking colace since childbirth, senna-s, and after my hemorrhoidectomy I was taking miralax. NOTHING WORKED. As someone who usually has a bowel movement everyday.. not having one for ten days is terrifying. I was determined to have one today. I got some milk of magnesia and took two doses of that throughout the day on top of the miralax. The problem with all these stool softeners/laxatives is they work from the top down. So while I could feel the rumblings in my stomach.. there was no action taking place.. I decided to take action into my own hands.. literally. 

This next section is going to be pretty gross.. but I'm sharing it for those who are truly desperate for relief.  So please skip over if you don't want to read.. I finally figured out that using my squatty potty was going to be the only way I would have a bowel movement. Previously I was not using this because everytime I squatted it felt like my stitches and anus were gonna drop out of my body. It won't. Make sure to squat. It won't help with the pain but it will help your movement come. The first bowel movement took an hour with only a quarter sized piece. Even with such a small amount.. I felt extreme success. I got into the groove of what I needed to do.. I would rock back and forth on the seat and then the urge came I would lean all the way back and push. For anyone that's been in child labor.. the doctor doesn't let you push until your uterus contracts.. this is the same concept. Let your body involuntarily strain first and you only push during these times. Straining at any old time will only resurface new hemorrhoids. The second bowel movement started not even 30 min later due to my newfound success. However, this one was about 8 inches of 2.5 inch wide feces that would NOT be coming out on its own. It took me 3 hours, a glove and lots of walking back and forth and pushing. I honestly felt like I was in labor again except worst because I had no epidural this time. I literally had to push and then remove whatever little came out with my gloves. Gross I know but I honestly believe that this piece would never have came out on its own due to how sticky and impacted it was. After 3 hours my butt was pretty swollen so I decided to call it a day. 

Too bad all the laxatives I had taken decided they wanted to work now. For the next two hours, I was running back and forth.. completely sore now.. having explosive diarrhea. Normally I would complain but at least my insides were finally clearing out. I'm not gonna lie though.. after this.. pain level shot back up to an 8. I don't know if this was also because of all my diarrhea.. but I immediately had to take a full dosage of Tylenol, ibuprofen and Valium again to ease the pain. I purposely left out oxycodone because I'm not trying to give birth to a poop again. 

Day 5

While I just woke up.. I do feel much better.. pain level is back to 4 with Tylenol and ibuprofen. 

I guess my point is.. that now while I'm completely sore from all the bowel movements.. it is only day 5 and I am feeling much much better. I have stopped oxycodone since day 3.. I only take Valium sparingly (once a day max) if I'm having a ton of spasms.. and I've lowered my Tylenol dosage from 4000 grams a day to 2000geams a day and my ibuprofen from 2400g to 1800 g a day. It does get better everyday and already I'm feeling hopeful. I can walk much better not without completely waddling.. and plan on going up and down the stairs at least once today. 

I am experiencing anal leakage.. but I have been religiously wearing pads and hopefully that will go away. Please feel free to ask any questions and I'll answer to my best ability. I hope this gives hope to people and I'll continue to update as I go. 

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