SRS Scares

[Rejennyrated]

OK I'm going to cut to the chase and ask the question we all wanted to but were too afraid to ask....

How long after SRS will I be able to get back on a motorbike? 

Sadly YMMV... it depends on too many things from your healing rate to you pain threshold to all sorts to predict.

That is a hard one but I would say a month or two. It is how shall we say it, very painful down there and they gave me a cushion with a hole in it which helped some. You are going to be on 4 wheels for a while.

This is certainly the norm and sounds about right as a guess - however just to show you what I mean, the (sadly now deceased) wonderfull lady who eventually became my partner for 25 years was still having issues after a year - whereas I was riding a pushbike within a fortnight ... So ...

We would need someone like S pock to calculate that...
or make an educated guess as someone said...

hugs

Actually this is spot on!

[Squircle]

Sadly YMMV...

Quite literally!

I won't push it. Hopefully my surgery will be over winter when the good bike is in storage.

After my FFS I was so lacking in energy for a good week afterwards from the aneasthetic. For the first few days any overexertion made me feel sick. I am expecting that to be considerably more with SRS considering how major an operation it is.

One other thing that I experienced was post operative depression. I didn't recognise it at the time but in hindsight thats what it was. It took me by surprise but at least I'll know to be prepared for it after SRS.

[Dena]

Quite literally!
After my FFS I was so lacking in energy for a good week afterwards from the aneasthetic. For the first few days any overexertion made me feel sick. I am expecting that to be considerably more with SRS considering how major an operation it is.

One other thing that I experienced was post operative depression. I didn't recognise it at the time but in hindsight thats what it was. It took me by surprise but at least I'll know to be prepared for it after SRS.

No problem, you spend the first 6 days flat on your back and you can't even get out of bed. The next couple of day regaining enough strength so you can travel and the next 6 to 8 weeks not doing much of anything.
That is unless you are stupid like me and return to work the week after you get out of the hospital. I spend 10-11 hours a day sleeping, 8 hours a day working, a couple of hours a day commuting and the rest feeding, cleaning myself and trying to get all the dilations done. As I said, I was stupid.

[Jenna Marie]

Squircle : Well, you can take my time to get back on a bicycle and extrapolate, I guess. I don't ride motorbikes, so I don't know whether that's be better or worse... but you might. Though I said a year, and I realize it was actually more like 9 months before I could get on an exercise bike (but another couple months waiting for the weather to be decent to be able to take the road bike out.

I also had my GRS with an epidural plus twilight sedation, which meant I bounced back from the operation a lot faster than was likely if I'd had general anesthesia; no ongoing weakness or nausea or depression from GA (though I did get pukey from the morphine for a few hours afterward).

Dena : Wow, 6 days flat on your back? They had us all up and walking by a maximum of 18 hours post-op! I liked that a lot better; I heard some horror stories of boredom and discomfort from lying still for too long, whereas I was a little cranky to be walking so soon but it was fine physically.

[Rejennyrated]

One other thing that I experienced was post operative depression. I didn't recognise it at the time but in hindsight thats what it was. It took me by surprise but at least I'll know to be prepared for it after SRS.

This is remarkably insightfull and will stand you in very good stead.

You may get luckier the second time, some do, but at least you are well prepared.

As a matter of fact I have a suspicion that a lot of so called "postop regret" that is held up by our skeptics and detractors is actually really unreccognised and misdiagnosed post Anaesthesia depression. I was very lucky that I escaped it but I have seen it in others.

I used to do some regular voluntary counselling and support work with newly postop patients for a certain UK psychiatrist, and on a couple of occasions I ended up having to put back together women who had unfortunately first seen other "therapists" who had wasted no time in telling them that it was obvious that their depression was a "clear sign" that they had made a "horrible mistake" and that then never should have had this "terrible and inappropriate operation". This of course had left them even more depressed and confused...

I'm happy to say that in both cases I was able to help them refind themselves and both went on to become successful and happy women - however its is clear that if someone with insight had not been available these two might easily have been pressured into damaging detransition and a life time of sadness and confusion.

So forewarned is forearmed - and please join me in spreading the message to others, that postop depression is NORMAL and ABSOLUTELY does NOT mean you made a mistake!

[Dena]

Dena : Wow, 6 days flat on your back? They had us all up and walking by a maximum of 18 hours post-op! I liked that a lot better; I heard some horror stories of boredom and discomfort from lying still for too long, whereas I was a little cranky to be walking so soon but it was fine physically.

I had my surgery in Colorado and the rule was 6 day on your back or sides By day 3 or 4 you felt like you were developing bed sores and I wanted to lay on my stomach because that was the only place that didn't hurt but that was forbidden. The laxative crew came in and clean you out because without moving you didn't feel like moving. When they finally let you out of bed, it was all you could do to sit on the side of the bed without passing out.
I don't know what they used on me but my head was fogged for two days after the surgery and I didn't feel like getting out of bed. I refused all pain medication in an attempt to get my head cleared out but that didn't help. With out physical movement you only felt like sleeping a couple of hours a night so I would lay there away listing to them clean the bed pans. The idea for keeping you in bed that long was so everything would remain in place and start healing.
When you do get out of bed you can't walk very far without needing a nap. Sometimes I would return after a walk, sit on the edge of the bed and lay back because I didn't have the energy to properly get in bed. That would happen after my nap. In a way I was luck because the swelling prevented me from peeing so they held me several additional days till we got that working and I was better able to handle the trip home. The only thing on TV was the local farming channel and I didn't much feel like doing the brain stuff I brought along. Mostly I was in a room by my self because the person I was to stay with was a smoker. I am allergic and after that airway was remove I couldn't quit coughing.
I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

Walking 18 hours post op. WOW. Looks like I need to brush up on the modern procedures because they have changed a great deal. I must have had my surgery in the stone age and we thought it was advanced because it could be done in one surgery with an optional touchup.

[Jenna Marie]

Dena : It really is fascinating how surgeons' preferences and the times change, isn't it? I know some of the big Thai surgeons still require sustained bedrest, mind you; they do a more intricate surgery and don't want to risk prolapse or tears. But I had penile inversion (one-stage, modified with a scrotal skin graft for additional depth as a lot of PI surgeons do now), and we not only had to try to walk every 2 hours on the second day, the residence was deliberately designed with stairs so we'd have to climb them to get to the rooms by day 3. I admit I cursed Brassard a few times on those stairs. I celebrated the first time I managed the 2-mile round trip walking to our local library branch, and I think that was about 2 weeks post-op, so I have to admit the policy of getting us up and exercising gently seemed to have worked.

Still, I'm amazed when I hear the stories of 30 years ago and how well the results turned out, given the state of plastic surgery (in general, for cis people) back then.

[Rejennyrated]

Yes, as I'm now being trained to do general surgery myself, I can tell you the reason for the change too. Back in the day it was thought that making someone rest would increase the healing, reduce the risk of sutures failing, and also, because you could then fast for a longer period, would reduce the need for bowels to open etc thereby reducing infection risk.

I recent years most of this however was found to be decisively false. In fact gentle exercise gets the heart working and thus improves circulation and perfusion of the wound which in turn speeds healing. Improved suturing techniques using vycril and monocryl disolvable sutures, and in some places staples, has also vastly reduced the risk of suture failure and thus it is also safe. Clearly you dont want someone doing a marathon, but there have been very convincing clinical trials, which showed consistently better results from earlier mobilisation and good nutrition, and in fact so much so that the much much faster healing actually reduced the infection risk by far more than avoiding the need for bowel movements.

All of this also vastly reduces the risk of serious complications like DVT... so its actually a no brainer. While you dont want someone straining, the faster you can get them mobile and back to normal the better for them.

The result of this is that these days they get you in, prep you, operate the same day, and get up and out within three or four, and you get better healing a nd afr fewer complications than us oldtimers who had the seven days (or six).

[Katie]

Being a woman is not easy. You cant have your cake and eat it too.


Mod Edit- remarks that make a group more or less legitimate for doing or not doing something are against TOS 10.

[Jenna Marie]

Jenny : Yes, that's more or less exactly what the nurses explained. As a matter of fact, they also strongly *encouraged* a bowel movement by day 3; anyone who didn't report having one was going to be pursued with prunes and stool softeners. Since morphine and other painkillers can cause constipation, the worry wasn't the bowels working per se, it was the straining -  better to have an early, soft movement than to hold it for days. Along the same lines, I was offered a full meal (roast beef and mashed potatoes, as I recall) 3 hours after I got out of the recovery room. Brassard's policy is to feed patients well.

[devon14]

Thank you all for your information! This has been really helpful and has calmed me down a bit.