Why take healthy uterus

Hi sisters

Can anyone here please help me. I have been told that I will have to have a & p repairs due to prolapse, but also that I will most likely have to have a tvh as well. I haven't seen my specialist yet (next week) but this is what my doctor says and it also seems to happen to a lot of people on this wonderful supportive site.

Can someone please explain to me why it is necessary to have a hyst to repair a prolapse, sorry if this seems a dumb question, but I don't understand why a doctor would recommend such a radical surgical procedure on an otherwise healthy uterus.

Hope you can help me understand.

Amanda

Sorry but I can't understand your doctors reccomendations?
Is it just the bladder & bowel prolapse you have.
If you don't have a prolapsed uterus why is he even suggesting a hyst? An A & P repair should be all that is required.
Seek a 2nd opinion especially a UroGyn who specialise in prolapse and pelvic floor disorders.

Even though I had a prolapsed uterus, Gynae said a TVH.
UroGyn said TAH and sacrocolpexy which basically resuspends pelvic floor & vagina to tailbone to prevent vagina from possible prolapse in future.

She even offered to find me a Urogyn who would do just a uterine resuspension if I wanted to keep my uterus.
There are other options out there, seek a 2nd opinion.

Never substitue anyone's judgement nor experience for your own. You have several things to consider for yourself before I share my story because your situation can be totally different from mine. I am 32, have 5 children and do not plan to have any more. Do you have stress incontenance? Do you also have a prolapsed uterus? Is sex uncomfortable? Do you have pain in your lower back? Do you feel pressure, pain or buldging when you sit? All these things only get worse as this condition progresses.


I've don a TON of research here so I will answer your questions the best I can. One of the things I learned is that this is not life threatening so the option of surgery is generally up to you in how long you are willing to live with the side affects.

I went to my doc about stress incontenance. My nurse practitioner had only mentioned how "loose" everything was but never indicated a problem I should be real concerned about (she and I are both always pretty optomistic about things). She referred me to a urogynocologist who recommended a TVT sling for the bladder and tying my tubes because pregnancy would tear the heck out of my insides. The thought of dealing with periods again and not being able to ever have another child was a very bad idea to me. They would take my IUD which prevents periods right now and I was having very heavy bleeding before they put it in, so that was NOT what I wanted to try. He asked if I had tried biofeedback, but mentioned that it would only be minimaly helpful in the same breath...so why bother.

I went home and did a little more research and learned that the real problem is the prolapsed uterus. The uterus will eventually pull the bladder out of position again and the success of the surgery cannot be guranteed wit a droopy uterus anyway. Again I felt it was worthless to do any surgery if they would have to go in and fix things again soon. I called my nurse practioner again and got a referral to another OBGYN with a great reputation.

This time we talked more about TVH with a&p repair. This guy seemed to have a bit of a GOD complex like I should just trust that he knows what he is doing and that's all I needed. Wham, Bam, Thank you maam - why bother with any questions. I scheduled another apointment just to ask him more questions...this time I felt much better and more confident in him as my doctor. His approach sounded more sensible with all the research I had done so I scheduled the surgery...then cancelled because I did not want to be laid up during the holidays.

This gave me even more time to research options. I bought a Kegelmaster thinking that would help. It did with the stress incontenance -- as long as I used it regularly. I didn't want to still be squeezing away at that thing as an old lady just to keep from dripping any time I cough, sneeze, lift, run etc. so I stuck with the surgery date.

Still I waivered in my resolution as my mother in law told me it was the worst thing she ever did. Healing was fine, but emotionally she was a wreck. So, again I reconsidered. I had decided I would cancel the surgery and wait another 10 years or so. I picked up the phone to make the call and ended up scheduling an appointment with my nurse practitioner I have seen for the past 14 years. She was totally surprised at my decision and proceeded to fill me in on the nasty truth she has glossed over the past several years.

The prolapsed bladder is holding my uterus up where it is, but even still, she said she has examined 70 year old women who are not in as bad of shape as I am. She laughed when I suggested that perhaps in 7 years or so things might be better and I could maybe have another baby if I wanted to. The progression of a prolapsed uterus is to have it literally outside where it gets dry and cracked - oh joy of joys!

I know from the research I had done before that resuspending the uterus is not usually successful for very long and even still, I don't think it is wise to get pregnant after having your a&p repairs and uterus resuspended.

In my opinion, the benefits FAR outweigh the risk of surgery or of prolonging my misery. I want to be able to be active with my children without worrying about how I smell or if I will have an *accident* like a two year old...lol!

For me the bottom line to the decision to go forward with a TVH over having my tubes tied is WHY deal with periods if I can never have another child? This is a permanent solution to a permanet problem. I so look forward to just getting it over with and getting through the recooperation period.

Good luck to you. I have found it a little hard to find women who have had a TVH with a&p repairs. It seems abdominal surgeries for enlarged uteruses or endo are more common. Those problems are also very painful and the choice for a hyster is much easier than our situation where there is less pain and it is so easy to be in denial about the severity of the problem.

I also wondered why I need to have a healthy uterus removed,but I must keep reminding myself that even though it isn't diseased,it isn't where it's supposed to be. The uterine prolapse is dragging down the other pelvic organs,especially the bladder, dr.explained that she will use the ligaments and faschias from the uterus to help do the repairs to the other organs. I am tired of being uncomfortable. At my age,53, I really haven't any use for it anymore and if removing it and making the repairs to my bladder etc. will give me better quality of life,I'm ready.
Rebecca is right about it,not getting any better, it's just getting worse. I was ignoring the problem all last summer and in the fall I sought a GYN for what I perceived to be just vaginal dryness due to estrogen loss and she said, "do you realize that you have a prolapse?" So that was what that pouching out feeling around the opening of my vagina was? I had three what I thought were easy births,but apparently the damage to the pelvic floor catches up with you especially once you go through menopause. I ignored the 15 years of stress incontinence because that was a gradual process,but this feeling of everything about to fall out of me is something that I cannot ignore. My only sad feeling about all of this is that I'll never be able to lift my little grand-daughter again because my doctor has put a 15 pound limit on lifting.
anyway, she should be walking soon and that won't really matter.

I'm going into the castle, now in 33 hours precisely, to have a TVH with a & p repairs. The changes that my prolapsed uterus caused to bladder and bowel were slow and I did not connect them at first. Its only when the hyst was condisered that I realised these other problems were caused by the uterus. Taking away the inconvenience of constantly finding a toilet when out or on holiday even worse will make it all worth while. Like you, I had a hard time with this decision because the uterus is healthy. One doc. said that it could result in emergency surgery as the total prolapses can pull down 'your tubes' and then they in turn get twisted. This week I danced, which I love, but have not been able to do for a while. The prolapse poked out more than ever - it was a timely reminder of why I'm going in. The pictures on www.pelvicfloor.com show more advanced prolapses than mine, but I would not want to reach those stages.
I'll be back on this site soon to let everyone know how I get on.

Thanks for all the info sisters. Dragonfly, good look with your op. Let me know how you get on, I will be thinking about you.