Surgery or Medicine????

From: Caroline (anonymous@medispecialty.com)
Sat Mar 30 01:23:01 2002


Hi,

I'm new - and enter as a frayed knot at the end of the rope. 13 years ago I had my gallbladder removed, the archaic way (6 inch scar). A couple years later, a lap/laser for dx and tx for endometriosis. Five years ago a hysterectomy for the same (left the ovaries in). Two years of glorious pain free living and then BAM. Constipation/diarrhea back, pelvic pain back w/a vengeance. Pinching in my bladder, burning and stabbing pain in lower left and right side of pelvis. Recurrent cysts, and the pain gets worse the more active I try to be. Sitting is bad. Walking hurts after 20 minutes. It feels like a combination of a pinched nerve and perpetual pulling/twisting to varying degrees. Sometimes I'm merely annoyed. Other times I am incapacitated. Worse at night than in the morning.

CT of abdomen revealed nothing but a cyst. Colonoscopy revealed polyps, benign and removed. CA-125 negative, MRI of abdomen, nothing but the cyst. The pain is unresponsive to motrin and celebrex and the worst anxiety provoking symptom is one I can hardly bring myself to confess to the doc b/c I now think I am nuts on top of it: Every time I eat more than a very small amount of food, I am short of breath. Can't take a deep enough breath in, and don't feel like I can let enough air out. My breath sounds are unremarkable, however. My gyn is trying her best to help w/out surgery, but she has NOT helped relieve pain.

My question is this: Medicine (pain management/lupron) or surgery or a combo? I've never been diagnosed w/adhesions, but it certainly has been talked about as a possibility in conjunction w/the ab surgery and previous endo treatment. I don't want to get in a cycle of neverending operations but I cannot live in this much pain all the time - especially if there's a possibility that it isn't necessary. What do you think? Thanks

--
Caroline

Enter keywords:
Returns per screen: Require all keywords: