Hi everyone! I’ve been lurking on this community for the past 10 months and always told myself once I was finally healed I would come back to write my success story! It has been a longgg ten months but I feel so blessed to finally be at the end of this!
In August, I first noticed a large lump like the size of a baby carrot and it took about two weeks for it to become painful. I went to the ER where they drained it and it was diagnosed as a perianal abscess. This was honestly the WORST pain I’ve ever had! And that night was even worse and I had to make an emergency visit with a local colon rectal doctor the next day.
I was told to give it about a month in order to see if it was a fistula or not since it’s a 50/50 chance. During that month there was still a lot of drainage so things weren’t looking too good. I went back and it was diagnosed as a fistula. The whole thing was really scary and emotional. Earlyish October I went in for surgery and they didn’t know what surgery they were going to do until they got in there. I ended up getting a seton placement and having that in for the next two months. I took a few days off work for this but overall the pain wasn’t that bad. I just took things super easy for the first month.
I was finally able to have a modified LIFT surgery on December 30th! Goodbye Sally the Seton forever!!! Apparently the modified LIFT has a higher success rate so I was really happy that’s what I was able to have. The pan was pretty awful for the first week and I spent most of the time in bed reading, watching TV or sleeping. My Fiance was my rock during this time and did everything for me and I’m so blessed to have him. After about 2 weeks I could move a little more but took it really easy for the first month as I didn’t want to risk anything. Even month two I took it really easy and didn’t start returning somewhat to normal until about 8 weeks. My doctor started doing silver nitrate treatments every two weeks and I think I had that four times.
Today I am about little over 5 months post surgery and finally for the news that I am 99% better and don’t need to come back for anymore follow-ups and can resume all normal activity! I started crying tears of joy right there in the office!
If you made it this far you may be feeling like there is no light at the end of the tunnel but I’m here to say there is!! This has been the hardest year but it’s made me stronger and I am finally through it! God is so good and I’m so thankful for my support system and AMAZING surgeon who got me through this!