Estrace cream thoughts?

Body: 

Hi ladies! Well , I went tony old ob for what I thought was a rectocele. She said the wall was thin but my intestines weakened . She did find a cistocele ( spelt wrong). She never graded just said was slight. She also told me had ton of scar tissue from multiple traumatic births.
Her game plan estrace once a day, kegels and to return in a month. What has been your experience with estrace ?

Hi Momma5

I am surprised that your doctor has prescribed Estrace (cream). It is normally only prescribed for women in perimenopause through to post menopause. This site, http://www.drugs.com/estradiol.html says that there are cautions about prescribing oestrodiol to women who are nursing (it can reduce milk production and may pass through to breast milk) , or pregnant, or who might fall pregnant. Estrace is not supposed to act anywhere but in the vagina where it is put. However, my experience says otherwise.

I have used it post-menopause in preparation for a PAP smear, on my doctor's request. I found that while I was taking it I got increased vaginal discharge, which was OK for the 10 days I took it, but it made my pubes stick to my knickers. Ouch! I started getting hot flushes during the day while I was on it, and they stopped the day I stopped using it. Obviously it did get into my system. I would not use it again.

At 2 months postpartum you are at the stage where it may start to worsen, which it seems has happened. There is nothing to worry about, although I can understand your getting very stressed and puzzled about it. By the time you are 6 months postpartum your body will enter a kind of new stage of reversion post-pregnancy, and the real improvement in pelvic organ support starts then. Until then, for some reason we are not sure of, anecdotal evidence is that it often worsens, or stays the same. Then it starts to improve later, and the improvement will go on until about 2 years postpartum.

By the way, there is no clinical evidence that weaning will improve prolapse and there is no clinical evidence that Kegels will improve prolapse.

Though they might strengthen the muscles, walking in Whole Woman posture may be just as effective. This is because the act of walking stretches and contracts your pelvic floor muscles one side at a time, as you move alternate legs forwards. This puts these muscles through their full range of movement, which is a very efficient way of making any muscle stronger.

At two months pp your body is producing low oestrogen levels, for good reason. Oestrogen is not good for babies. It is also stopping you from ovulating. It is also making your vaginal more like a menopausal vagina, which sucks when you are not post-menopause because it will be drier, less resilient and less slippery, so the walls kind of stick together, and cannot freely move over each other. Oestrogen might make you feel juicier, but that is not necessarily in the interests of your body, or your baby's body. I will have to leave that to you to decide for yourself whether or not to use it.

It sounds to me like you have a very accurate perception of what is going on inside your vagina. You live with it all the time. The doc has only examined you once.

The DVD, First Aid for Prolapse will help you further to understand prolapse, and what you can do to help maintain the pelvic organ support that you have. Once you know that you need to be patient, and that there are ways that you can get around difficulties, I think you will feel more confident about the future, and living with prolapse.

Louise