Sophia Brooks50 said:And honestly, I can't stand those hospital visits. I've had two gastroscopies done myself. I was terrified both times, but once they were over, I felt so proud of myself that I kept telling everyone how it didn't even hurt. It really doesn't, but I couldn't convince my friend—she ended up going under anesthesia... and now, believe me, even though years have passed, if it came up again, I wouldn't go back. I've totally forgotten the feeling, but the fear is still right there...
If I remember correctly, I had to have a rectoscopy (up to the sigma, mind you) a few times after ending up in the hospital, and I don't recall it being a traumatic experience at all.🤷 Don't let it scare you; you'll get through it. Dealing with actual pain or, say, sudden bleeding that makes you collapse (which actually happened to me) is way worse. Just stay brave.
Sophia Brooks50 said:Did the colonoscopy hurt? I had mine under anesthesia. My doctor told me my intestines are super twisted, so he said doing it while awake would have been brutal.
Same here. I went under general anesthesia too. The doc actually praised me for insisting on it because of how tangled up my guts are—he said the pain would've been unbearable if I were conscious. Honestly, it was a breeze this way.
Karen Thompson10, I eat tons of veggies, drink plenty of water and green tea, but things are still just... sluggish. 😠Naturally, now I’m terrified I’m going to end up with more hemorrhoids. :Paranoik: 😁
Karen Thompson10, which nuts are we talking about—almonds, walnuts, or cashews? I’m obsessed with cashews; I lived on them all last year while I was dieting, but man, they are pricey.😁 I'll give those a shot too, thanks.
I can't remember if I mentioned this, but I had a colonoscopy back in July. Everything came back totally normal ("thin, long, and winding intestines"). So, it looks like all that stuff was just my imagination playing tricks on me.🙂 🙂
Here I am again, just scrolling through all your posts.🙂 By the way, my bathroom situation is still a mess—constipation is still hitting me hard, and everything is just too firm. I’m being super careful about what I eat (back on that anti-candida diet again) and I’m slamming water constantly, but honestly, nothing is working.🙂
On a better note, my blood work finally looks decent. I've actually managed to put on about 10-13 pounds in the six months since I got discharged from the hospital. I think I’m finally starting to feel like myself again. It feels normal. And I've completely pushed that whole hemorrhoid episode out of my mind.😁
copperangler8 said:From what I can gather from all these threads, there are two solid dentists in Washington, D.C.: 1. Azinovic for laser tooth repair 2. Pelivan for prosthodontics What I really want to know is how long their work actually lasts. For example, has anyone had a crown fall out or a filling fail after seeing them? Anyone here had a bad experience with them? Looking at their websites, they seem pretty young. That’s a double-edged sword—they're likely more open to modern tech, but they might lack the decades of experience older dentists have.
I've seen Azinovic mentioned before... but Pelivan?! Where did those two names even come from?
Tons of dentists get brought up in these discussions, but I definitely haven't noticed these two being the big names everyone talks about...😕
Laura Mendoza said:Hmm, alright, that’s pretty rough. Thanks for getting back to me. I think I’ll just extend my vacation by a few days and wait until I’m back home to deal with them—what else can you do? 🤷 So, how many days does it actually take for them to show up if, say, you extend things by a week? Does it happen right after you stop taking them, or is there still a gap of a few days?
It’s the same as when I drink 21. It hits about 3 or 4 days after the last one.
Laura Mendoza said:If I were you, I’d play it safe and use backup protection until the pack is finished.
It's just standard blood work, nothing else.
It depends on the specific pill. For some, a week is enough, but honestly, it's probably smarter to use extra protection for the entire first pack.
Are you done with the pink pills or did you go all out with everything? You can push through on Sunday, but make sure you take extra precautions then. You’ll likely end up having to deal with Sunday and Monday anyway, so it ends up being the same thing.
So, basically anyone:
😁
One year, I downed two whole boxes—42 days straight—just because of summer vacation. We're talking Diane-35. I tried stretching out my cycle, but man, the side effects were brutal. The PMS was off the charts, constant bloating, my breasts felt massive and painful, and I was just constantly pissed off at everything.😁
Now, I don't push it past a week or two. I’d much rather just add one extra week every few months. I'm not going through that mess ever again.🤣
Checking in. I went for a follow-up at the hospital yesterday, and the doctor said my exam was totally normal. Everything looks fine on his end. I told him, "Look, we still don't actually know what happened or why," and he basically just brushed me off like, "No, you don't need to worry about that."🙄Now, apparently, my issue isn't hemorrhoids—it's anemia. He told me I need to focus entirely on fixing my blood counts and getting my strength back up.
Did my blood work this morning. Iron and red blood cell counts are low, obviously (thank God for that transfusion at the hospital, or I'd be in real trouble right now). So, starting today, I'm hitting the iron supplements hard and eating way more protein.🙂
Honestly, I feel okay most of the time, except for being super pale and getting exhausted out of nowhere. I feel like I need to lie down every five minutes.😁I'm technically on medical leave until May 31st, but I'm actually thinking about heading back to work this Monday. The worst part seems to be over, though I really hope I won't be stuck recovering for months.🙂 I have an appointment coming up soon with the surgeon who operated on me, so maybe he'll actually be smart enough to give me a straight answer when he looks at the results.
Here’s the short version: I had my surgery on April 13th, and everything was totally fine for the first 10 days. Recovery was smooth—no pain, no bleeding. I had some minor digestive hiccups, but that cleared up quickly. Then, on Holy Saturday—since I was feeling great and had been laying around too much, I basically overdid it. I spent the whole day cleaning the house, got exhausted, and then sealed my fate by forcing myself to have a bowel movement in the evening (it’s just how I’ve been since birth, I don't know any other way). I went to bed thinking everything was normal.
On Easter, I woke up feeling like I was in a scene from "The Godfather" 😲, though there wasn't any active bleeding during the day. I managed to get a hold of Dr. I., who was actually on vacation (he wasn't back until Tuesday). He told me bleeding could happen up to three weeks after surgery, even though my gut was telling me otherwise because, honestly, there was A LOT of blood. He said to just rest and head to the hospital if things got worse. So, I spent all of Easter without any bleeding, until about 10 PM when I noticed a little bit during urination—just fresh, bright red blood.
By Easter Monday, I woke up early, went to the bathroom, and realized I was bleeding heavily again. I went to wash my face, got dizzy, and blacked out. Thank God my dad heard me collapse. He and my mom rushed me to my room and called 911. The paramedics took me to the local hospital here in the city where I live, and I waited to be seen. They checked me out and claimed nothing was bleeding. They tried to start an IV in the ambulance, but they completely botched my veins in both arms.🙄 Basically, they were going to send me home. Since there wasn't "acute" bleeding, they figured it was just an isolated incident. My mom wouldn't budge, insisting they look at me properly, so they sent me to the internal medicine unit. I sat there for two hours waiting to be seen, felt another dizzy spell, and finally got an IV started around noon.🙄 They did another exam—no blood visible, and they performed a rectoscopy (basically the start of a colonoscopy)—but they couldn't find the source of the bleeding. Then they sent me back to surgery to let them decide what to do. Those doctors were rolling their eyes at me, though. Apparently, the big joke in the hall was, "Oh, you had this done at a private clinic, so where's your primary surgeon?" If my mom hadn't pushed, they would have just sent me home. By 4 PM, I was finally admitted to the surgical ward. They ran blood work—it looked a bit worse, but since they didn't see active bleeding, they just kept me under observation. There was zero bleeding through Tuesday, and they wouldn't give me a transfusion because they clearly didn't believe me about how much I'd lost (every time they checked, everything looked clean down there).
Tuesday morning comes, no blood. They tell me I might be able to go home, and I'm all happy about it. I show up for my 9 AM exam, and wouldn't you know it—blood on the gauze again. Not a massive amount, but enough. The doctor examines me and says, "I can't even see the surgical site, let alone the source of the bleeding." I'm like, "Great." Then he says, "Go upstairs, we're taking you to the OR to figure this out." A theory popped up that this had nothing to do with hemorrhoids or the surgery itself, but was something higher up in the intestines or stomach. They were terrified of internal bleeding or sepsis. For context, I hadn't eaten anything on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday (they didn't give me breakfast until Thursday). But, since there was no room in the OR, we had to wait until Wednesday. On Tuesday night, I had to use the bathroom (pressure from a BM), and blood leaked out again. I blacked out again. Finally, they got their act together, pumped me full of IV fluids, and gave me blood.😳 (In total, I got 2 liters.)
Anyway, since Tuesday night, there hasn't been a single drop of blood. I'm recovering, though my blood counts are still low. My blood pressure is sitting at 100/60, I've lost weight, and I'm pale, but they concluded I'm okay to go home. In the end, they scrapped the OR plan (I was too weak for anesthesia anyway) and abandoned the theory that it wasn't related to the hemorrhoids (because if it were something else, I would have had fever or sepsis). Still, nobody knows what caused the whole mess. And the big question is whether we'll ever actually find out.
Karen Thompson10Look, don't apologize. You didn't do anything wrong. We still have zero clue why this all went sideways—these kinds of complications are incredibly rare, though maybe I just have terrible luck 🤣. I’m not pointing fingers at anyone. I keep telling myself it isn't the end of the world when I think about what other people deal with—you know, actual cancer or debilitating pain—and I keep spiraling into thinking I somehow caused this myself. So now, even though I feel like absolute garbage and honestly don't want to move, I'm just lying here trying to focus on rebuilding my strength and boosting my immune system (honestly, being 130 lbs at 5'10" is way too thin 😁). As for the doctor, I haven't quite made up my mind yet. I know nobody likes "cleaning up someone else's mess," and clearly, they couldn't even agree on how to handle my case. It makes sense, really, since none of them wanted to take responsibility for me. I'm still torn on what to think about the surgeon, and while I'm not looking to blame him, he definitely let me down in a few areas (I'll be dealing with him directly about that later).
Just checking in quickly. After all that bleeding over Easter, I had another episode on Monday, passed out, and ended up at Mount Sinai. They couldn't even pin down the exact cause of the bleeding. They kept me under observation, and I actually collapsed again while I was in the hospital. I lost a massive amount of blood—my counts were terrible. They had to pump liters upon liters of fluids and two units of blood into me. Thankfully, there hasn't been any more bleeding since Tuesday night, thank God. They finally let me head home today.
Honestly, I’m just fed up with Dr. Ivanovic, the whole medical staff, the hospital, everything. It's exhausting. But the main thing is that I'm okay. I'll write up the full story tomorrow.
I finally got off the phone with my doctor, and honestly, he managed to calm me down quite a bit. He said there’s no need to panic. Apparently, bleeding can still happen up to three weeks after surgery. I asked him if it was normal for it to be this much, though. He explained that the stitches are likely just breaking down or being absorbed by my body, and since I’ve been dealing with some harder stools lately, they probably just nicked a little piece of mucous membrane. He thinks it should just stop on its own.
The thing is, nothing actually hurts, and I’m not really "bleeding" in the traditional sense—it only happens when I’m on the toilet straining. I feel a little more relaxed now, so I’m going to hold off on heading to the ER for the moment.
I woke up this morning in a literal pool of blood.😲 My underwear, my pajamas, the sheets—everything was soaked. I didn't feel any pain, and since I’m on my period right now, I just assumed it was that. But there was this massive clot on the pad.
Then, a little while ago, I had to rush to the bathroom and realized I'm bleeding rectally too.😲 It's bright red. I tried calling my doctor, but of course, nobody is picking up (it's Easter, for crying out loud!).
Has anyone else dealt with this after having surgery at General Electric? I had my procedure about 10 days ago. Please, someone tell me I'm going to be okay. This isn't supposed to be life-threatening, right?
Day 8 post-op, and honestly? I feel great.🙂 Yesterday and today I’ve had to hit the bathroom a few more times than usual. I actually talked to my doctor about sipping on some herbal tea every night—my gut is clearly still playing catch-up—so I’m being strict about what I eat and staying super hydrated.
The pain is totally gone, and I’m even heading back to work this Tuesday. All things considered, the whole thing was surprisingly low-key; not nearly as invasive or painful as I expected. Thanks for all the help and the quick answers here. Dealing with the Hemex situation turned out way easier than I thought it would. Now I just hope these issues stay gone for good.🙂
Michael Diaz4 said:You probably shouldn't have been holding it back. Look, once you feel that urge, just run to the bathroom and let nature take its course. Don't go straining or sitting there for thirty minutes. That’s just going to irritate things further. You need to stick to light stuff—broths first, then maybe some thicker soups the next day, then soft foods until you're back to a regular diet. But Linex is a non-negotiable. And stay away from those "detox" teas. You can't afford to have diarrhea right now either. Your stool needs to be mushy...
So, it hit me again around 6:30 PM, and I finally had a big movement. This time, it was actually mushy at last.😉 Hopefully, I got most of it out because I definitely feel lighter. I don't have the urge anymore, it just hurts from the irritation now.
Dr. Ivanovic called me a bit ago just to check in and see if I needed to head into the hospital for an enema if I hadn't gone yet. We're planning to touch base tomorrow night to see if today was the end of it or if I still need help. Pretty thoughtful of him.🙂
It feels like things are finally moving, but I’m basically living in the bathroom right now—running there every thirty minutes or so just to deal with tiny little bits at a time.🙄 Now my skin is actually starting to sting from all the irritation. I haven't used a suppository yet :P, though I have downed two cups of herbal tea. Honestly, it never crossed my mind that getting my digestion back on track after surgery would be such a massive struggle.😢
Michael Diaz4isn't just foam, but it's not exactly the real deal either. Honestly, last night around 9 or 10 PM, I had what I’d call a "normal" movement—if you can even call it that, because it definitely wasn't enough. This morning, I woke up with that intense pressure right at the exit. I’ve been sitting on the toilet for half an hour now, but nothing is happening.🤷I think I'm actually going to listen to my doctor and use a Dulcolax suppository (which I absolutely loathe). I'm making a point not to lie down, even though it hurts; instead, I'll stay moving, keep drinking water, and just wait it out. I don't have much of a choice—I can't function like this.
I called Dr. Ivanovic, and he basically just told me to drink more herbal tea and/or take some Dulcolax. Well, I had the tea, but the pain and pressure aren't budging.
The weird part is that it doesn't even hurt when I'm lying down; the pain only hits me whenever I try to stand up or sit back down. So now I’m running to the bathroom every hour on the dot—it hurts like hell, and I barely pass anything. But hey, little by little, right? Hopefully things start moving along by tomorrow.🙄
I’m already pissed off.😠 I had some herbal tea the night before last, but absolutely nothing happened. So, I had more this morning. I constantly feel this intense pressure like I need to go, but it just won't budge. And it hurts.😢 I can't even eat anything because I'm so on edge, and honestly, nothing else would even matter right now if I could just finally use the bathroom.😢 I haven't had a single bowel movement since Wednesday (before my surgery).
Karen Thompson10 said:I was on day three after my surgery when I finally tried some detox tea. I just couldn't deal with that constant pressure, and honestly, it helped. That very first time you go after surgery is the absolute worst. I was also chugging water like there was no tomorrow.
Look, if I were you, I’d probably hold off on heading back to work for a bit longer. You might feel great right now, but sitting for 8+ hours straight this early on seems like a bad move. Then again, if your doctor gave you the thumbs up, I guess there's no real risk.
Did you happen to ask the doc when you can get back into sports or working out? 😁
I actually had some herbal tea last night too, hoping it kicks in. This constant pressure is exhausting, and nothing seems to be moving.🙂
Oh man, I totally forgot—I can't believe it.😁 Generally, he told me to just get back to my usual routine once I feel up to it, but he expects full recovery to take about 5 weeks (which is when my follow-up is). Definitely no working out this week. Hopefully, by the end of next month, I'll be back to normal.
Michael Diaz4 said:Don't rush back to work. What did the doctor tell you? When are you actually allowed to sit down?
He didn't give me any specific instructions regarding sitting or working. But I don't think I'm going back just yet. Sitting for long periods is still rough, and until things settle down, I'm not sure it's smart. The doctor mentioned I could get up to 21 days of medical leave for this (which feels like way too much), but I might wait until the end of this week. Or maybe even after Easter, once it's been nearly two weeks since the surgery. I decided I won't head back until I can make it through a whole day without needing Advil (today should have been that day, theoretically), but I still don't feel quite 100%, and this pressure is killing me, so I'm still on the fence.
Thanks to both of you for the help and the info. It makes dealing with all this a little easier.🙏
Just checking in so you guys don't think I've gone MIA on the forum now that my surgery is behind me.😉 I'm doing alright, mostly just resting. The pain and pressure come and go, but I’m managing with two Advil tablets a day. I actually managed to get some decent sleep last night after struggling through the first two nights. I still have this constant urge to go, but nothing is happening, and I am absolutely refusing to strain myself. The bleeding seems to be tapering off, though honestly, it hasn't been a huge deal for me.
I'm debating whether I should head back to work this Monday. It's an office job, so I'm not sure if sitting there for 8 or 9 hours is a smart move if the pain starts acting up again.
But I have to admit, since this was a real procedure (dealing with that thrombosis incision and all), I feel pretty great. Recovery is moving faster than I expected.🙏