Excuse me while I wallow in self pity. I went to my colorectal specialist today. The pain from my abscess is pretty much non-existent. It's only tender to touch directly. I dropped my pants and my doctor poked around with her finger finding the abscess. The abscess was tender to her touch, but I didn't feel the pain I felt on Thursday when my gastro touched it. The colorectal moved her finger to another spot that I didn't realize was tender as well. She pointed out that it was a fistula. She asked a few questions about possible side effects, which I hadn't experienced. That's when she said something like: For your bottom being such a disaster, you sure don't show a lot of symptoms. Even my doctor thinks my ass is a disaster. lol
According to the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons, "An anal fistula (also commonly called fistula-in-ano) is frequently the result of a previous or current anal abscess. This occurs in up to 50% of patients with abscesses."
Apparently, even though the antibiotics are healing the abscess, the fistula makes it extremely likely for the abscess to return after my round of antibiotics are complete. My colorectal doctor was very concerned and recommended that I schedule surgery for next week. Next week, I will have my first Crohn's related surgery. She will be opening up the fistula and possibly the abscess to put a drainage seton in place to open it up so that it can drain and heal. She will also be flexing my stricture in hopes to being able to perform a sigmoidoscopy and she will be surgically removing a skin tag by my anus. She said recovery is one to two weeks. I'm so thankful that my supervisor at work has been understanding throughout all of this and told me today that "my health comes first" when I apologized for having to take off four days next week.
I feel like this song 'We Don't Have to Dance' by Andy, the lead singer of the Black Veil Brides band was written about my relationship with Crohn's.
