Sarah

It was like, you know, oh well, you’ve got three children, so that’s okay. You know, there’s lots of ways people… because it’s because uncomfortable. It’s a really uncomfortable thing for other people. Because you don’t… like you go to a Mum and toddler group, and, you know, you’re the one that’s had a hysterectomy. So no one wants to say anything. Other people feel uncomfortable with the fact that if they’re pregnant, it’s a really, it’s not a very nice place to be for a while, and you feel bad, because you’re just, you do feel quite resentful at the same… They have reason to be kind of wary, because you do feel, it’s an awful feeling. It’s that, it’s a real empty sort of feeling. 

Yes. A long, long time yes, yes. I mean the actually [sighs] I mean because afterwards as well, like, you get, like odd kind of when your kind of like nerves are all sort of knitting back together again, you get lots of like sort of like little like pricking sort of pains, like little like elastic bandy kind of, that’s the only way you can kind of sort of describe it. It’s like little elastic bands sort of like pinging, sort of sensation. And that, that can occur for quite a while afterwards a year to eighteen months afterwards where everything’s sort of knitting back together.  You give yourself time to heal that’s a really, really massive like. Although like obviously I had the three kids and stuff, is when you’re tired go for a sleep. Remember that you’ve had like major, major surgery. I know like lots of women have hysterectomies nowadays, but it is major, and if you’ve lost it in a traumatic way, you know, it, give yourself a bit, you’ve got to give yourself a bit extra, and if it hurts don’t, don’t do it. If you’re still getting pain when you’re picking things up or you know, it’s not to push yourself too hard as well, or to be too hard on yourself. And just say well, “It’s just tough, I can’t, I can’t do… (I don’t know) I can’t do the hoovering today, I’m just too tired.” Or, “Its causing me too much, oh, I think it might overdo it.” You know, because otherwise you set your back, yourself back, so much, because I’ve done, you know, so many times like, I think I’ll do that, then I’ll do that, and I’ll do that, and many, you make it worse for yourself. Because rather than having a rest and then over the next couple of days being able to do everything, you push yourself and then have to take a week off, because you know, you’ve really pulled something, you know, something’s not quite right.

The complications that I’ve had personally is I’ve had lots of bladder problems where my bladder was handled and things like that, so irritable bladder so frequent urination, easily to get like urinary tract infections. The sort of, like during intercourse, it can be, at times quite uncomfortable. You, for me, the worst for me is like the bowel problems that I have, I’ve got a prolapse. My bowels were handled, because I was left open, they, they tried for a long, long time to get the wound to shrink to stop the bleeding and they did try that for a long time. So my bowels were out in the open, I supposed to air for quite a long time. And the more they’re open to the air, they become sticky and the more they’re handled, they become sticky. So you get liked adhesions, where they kind of stick together. So I have a lot of adhesions. And as I say, I’ve got, not the same, before when you can decide, you know, I want to go to the loo, you know, you think oh I’ll go to the loo before I leave the house, you know, you can, but when you’ve got like bowels problems like I’ve got, you know, it’s not the same sort of push as you had before it’s, you have to kind of learn, go back and learn how to go to the loo again which can take sort of a lot of time and a lot of patience and a lot of chopping and changing, but it’s going back, it’s not to be embarrassed. I spent years being embarrassed about it and getting nothing done at all. I’ve had, like nothing done. I’ve kind of suffered in silence and you think oh you know, I don’t want to go in and talk about my bowels or have anyone sort of think about that particular area and stuff. So instead, especially being a young woman, the last thing you want to do is go in and talk about bowel and bladder problems, but I’ve recently gone and, and seen someone and then they’ve referred me back to the gynaes now. So I will go back and sort of have something done. I’m not quite sure what, but they’ll do something to make life bett… its not to suffer I think as well. It’s not to try and soldier on, you know, if it doesn’t feel normal, then it’s not normal. If you’re, you know, your body is going to be completely different afterwards that’s what I always believe, but there’s a difference between it not feeling the same as before, and it feeling wrong. There’s something wrong with you, and that’s really important is getting that sorted, is being persistent and going back and asking, just asking is this normal? You know, is it normal now, that you know, because you can feel your bowels closer to the front now, where if you didn’t before, so you can, it sometimes feels like there’s something moving inside you, which is really, really bizarre. Which is a lot of women who have had hysterectomies like this, have this experience. And you know, it’s not being worried to keep going back to the doctors and saying, “Is… am I normal, is this normal?” Because you know that if you’ve never experienced it then you don’t know and they can tell you yes or no. And if it’s not then there’s something that can be done to put it right again, you know.

And it’s a really, it’s just such a taboo sort of subject. And you know… because people… I mean even now, like with all my girls all close together. I mean when they were little because of the age that they were, we had a triple buggy. So they were all in, they all had a little seat, and you know, complete strangers would like, you know, like make comments like, “Oh, you know, you’re going to keep going until you have a boy.” And you know, and it’s really sort of, it’s quite harmless sort of things and I wouldn’t say, “Oh no, I’ve had a hysterectomy.” I’d say, “Oh no, threes enough for me.” And even now, people say, “Oh you know, are you going to have any more?” And I don’t ever say, “No. Because I’ve had a hysterectomy.” I will say, “Oh no, I’ve had enough.” Or, “I’ve done my bit for mankind. Three girls is enough to sort of keep the race going.” And you know, because it’s awful, that, saying that to somebody is just, because it makes, it almost ruins their day, you know, and makes them feel bad. It’s like, to me it’s almost as bad as like the old you know, mistaking someone for being pregnant. “Oh when’s it due?” And it’s like, “Oh I’m not pregnant.” People remember that kind of thing for ever. They will recount the tales to all their friends. “Oh do you remember when I said, you know, it was just horrendous.” And I think that’s similar, it invokes a similar sort of feeling, is to say, “Well no, actually, I can’t have any more children I’ve had a hysterectomy. And I had a hysterectomy in a really traumatic way, when I gave birth to my last daughter, you know. 

I also at times pushed him away as well, because I didn’t feel like I was a woman anymore, because I didn’t have a, I didn’t have a womb, you know, and that was, that was really, really tough for me, because nothing, nothing felt the same. Nothing was the same. So like the real intimate parts of your relationship as well, you know, that all felt different, after a hysterectomy. In fact it was not the same. And I found it was pointless. It had become, even when you’re not trying for a baby, I think in the back of your mind there’s still that kind of possibility, even if the most careful, even if you’re being the most careful, there’s still that thing in the back of your mind that that’s what that’s for. But I felt that I’d become like, I wasn’t a woman anymore, because I’d lost that, that skill, that kind of, the thing that I was good at, you know. I was good at having babies. I fell pregnant very, very easily, very, very quickly. I had no problems whatsoever in that respect, and I felt like I’d lost, and I was a Mum, that was my job. You know, that had always been my job, and I felt that I’d lost that part, even though I was still being a Mum to my other children, I felt that, and I hadn’t realised it was going to be my last pregnancy, and that changed, that changes your whole mindset. If you don’t know, if you think, oh this is definitely going to be my last one, I think you can possibly savour, you savour each moment a little bit more. But because you didn’t, its, you know, not only did you, is it a shock that that was your last pregnancy, you also then sort of, I’m sorry, you sort of miss out of masses, the things that you’d have really wanted to remember are the things you can’t remember.