cystocele & recotcele surgery July 23

While a painful surgery to recover from, I fell like I am improving exponentially. But it was only day before yesterday I was in surgery. Did anyone else come home with a catheter? Doctor had it removed, so I had to be recathterized when they realized I can't go to the bathroom.

Hello 1958jenni...I am having anterior/posterior colporrphaphy (cystocyle/rectocyle) with Laparoscopy done 8/7/12. wondering what to expect pain wise, recovery time etc... any advice? Thank you

Hello 1958jenni,
I came home with a catheter after 3 day in hospital trying to pee with not enough sucess. I kept the darn thing for 10 days total, and was so nervous when the day came to try to pee again that I almost made myself sick. I was able to pee just fine, but had a UTI from the catheter. So I got a round of antibiotics, which made me really sick.
If I had it to do over again, I would have:
Not stressed over the catheter as much.
Not gotten constipated from the pain meds.
Not been afraid of taking the pain meds ( I needed them!)

Just a little note about constipation: If you are taking pain meds,
you need to make sure you don't get stopped up.
I finally used collace - 1 in morning, 2 @ night, and metamucil and
Cherry flavored milk of magnesia 2 tablespoons at night with the collace. Worked like a charm, did not give me any bad side effects.
As I took less pain meds, I took less collace and Milk of mag.

Thanks for the good, logical advice! I stopped the narcotic pain meds after 2 constipated days at home. I had to stop the stool softener Colace because it not only gave me frequent bowel movements, but it gave me headaches that came on about 30 minutes after taking. I resumed my normal, natural, high-fiber diet and 2 fish oil capsules about 10 p.m. So the BMs are back to their normal schedule.
Yesterday I went to the gyno again to have the catheter removed. My son dropped me off with a book and a bottle of water. Once the catheter was out, I made myself comfortable in the waiting room and read and sipped. Sipping was important because I didn't want too much liquid in the system at once. After about 90 minutes of reading and sipping, I felt the steady urge to go. The nurse gave me a hat to pee into measure output. Well ... it took about 10 minutes to pee a little. I actually put a damp paper towel on the tip of the urethra which did the trick!!! I took me another 20 minutes to dribble out most of the bladder contents. Success!!!
It now takes me about 20 minutes to empty my bladder, but the doctor and my friends assure me that it will get faster and easier. I hope so; I cannot tie up the faculty restroom stall at school this long once school starts.

Yes, the pee pee process is a little weird at first but will get better. One thing a nurse at the hospital told me was to go, stop, wait just a little and go again. That seemed to work. At 8 months post surgery I still don't urinate as fast or with the force I had before but it is so worth it to not leak! Good luck!

irish1970
Unlike many of our HysterSisters, my surgery wasn't too lengthy. The surgeon reinforced and sort of "took in" the walls of the vagina. I had to prep with an enema the night before. My surgical nurse was an older woman from church which made me feel comfortable knowing I was in gentle hands. I snoozed through recovery so I didn't experience the nausea I usually do after anesthetic. I was given morphine intravenously as needed, not on a pump. The second day in the hospital I stopped the morphine. The nurses had told me that the oral pain meds were more specific for the pain as morphine doesn't take the pain away; you just don't care anymore! Anyway, The oral pain meds worked way better than the morphine! I was walked around by 2 aides early the second day before the doctor showed up. This made me queasy as they were making me go faster than I wanted to go. Doctor removed the vaginal packing; this made me feel queasy! He said I could leave once the catheter was removed and I could urinate on my own. Well that was a problem. They removed it and then had to recath me 2 hours late since I couldn't go. So I went home with a catheter. (See my other posts.) I use the longer pantiliners since I'm still reclining a lot. One thing that bothered me was my eye lids peeling. They taped them closed during surgery; the skin peeled off for a week!
Advice: Buy some long pantiliners now for future use. Also, they will trim your pubic hair a bit even if you keep things fairly smooth and tidy down there. You may want to do some of this yourself. Weigh your purse/handbag/whatever you usually haul around. Pare it down to the minimum you really need for daily use. Mine is now a small, fabric, cross-body that only weight 2 pounds with contents included. (I'll never haul all that stuff around again!) Do EVERYTHING your doctors tell you to do. Ask the surgical nurse to put gauze on your eyes first so the tape is not directly on your eye lids. Have your ride home in the softest seats you can if you have a choice of vehicles. Relax as much as you can. I slept the 10 days on the sofa so I could have the back and close by tables to push off of. Relax at home--don't even pick up that tissue you drop! I won't lift anything over 2 pounds--I'm not having surgery again if I can avoid it! And I told the school I teach at that I cannot haul my laptop back and forth, so they found another computer, desktop, for me to use at school. Read my post about bowl movements. But everyone is different in that regard.
Best of luck to you! I'll keep you in my prayers!
1958jenni

Hello! I just joined and saw your thread. I had vaginal prolapse...bladder, rectum with intestine and uterus down and slightly out. I was given an anterior and posterior repair plus a hysterectomy. Like you I was so surprised at the amount of pain I awoke to after the surgery. Its been a complicated road and more pain since my surgery on 24 th of July. I had the catheter replaced when I couldn't pee in the hospital and then 2 times after (total 2 weeks with one)...I get to try again tomorrow and I am looking forward to being free of the darn thing. I ended up with a severe bladder infection from it. I also got constipated and then impacted which led me to the ER where they did xrays ...it showed how bad... I ended up being given a tap water enema and I honestly think I pushed harder and in more pain than giving birth to my almost 9lbs son. It was practically a day and a half of non stopnrunning to the bathroom passing equally difficult bricks. I stopped taking the pain medication that day because the anesthesia must have seriously slowed my bowels and I figured id rather bear the pain of surgery than continue this course. I was placed on three medications that treat constipation and also metamucil. I think the surgery alone was hard but the complications made it so much worse. I go tomorrow to check and see if the intense straining damaged any of the repair. I pray it did not!

I expected my experience thus far to be the exception but I see from all of your responses that this is error to think this and that it must happen more often...unfortunately.
Hearing this does not diminish my terrible experience but at least I am not alone in this....which is sooooo comforting! Just joined and already I find I can see and read that other ladies can relate to this/ these things.

I sincerely hope you and others who responded in like are on the road to health and recovery!

JennJenn0808!

You can see from my signature line I had a LAVH with repairs in December, 2011. The recovery is tough but it is nice to feel so much better!

Oh sorry! Ill be looking at dates from now on! Or do you mean that you went through this in 2011? Still figuring out the site and on this baby forum site sometimes heavies would respond to very old threads...hope I didn't do that here. Thanks for the encouragement ....I need it!

No, it is not an old thread. You would get the best support by starting your own thread and addressing your issues in it.