It went away, now back

i am right there with you. it is soooo frustrating. i found out at 6 weeks pp, and now am 16 weeks. also doing physio (yet had a few weeks off due scheduling problems). i was taking the peak pretty obsesively for awhile, but have slowed down because i know if my cystocele is peaking , it can ruin my day. the hanging feeling is a bit better...i think partly due to the vagina being a bit fuller after stopping breast feeding...as well as the fact that i empty my bladder often. but as the day progresses, the hanging gets worse. my physio says i have another good 6 months of healing. but i too am having a hard time with this. it is so hard with a baby to have time to be horizontal, or not carry the baby 24/7...so i feel there isn't much time to just let the darn thing get stronger. i will hang in there with you...at least people are saying we still have time. but much like you i am skeptical.

Hi Jsync

Just picking up what you said. All the incontinence stuff I have read indicates that we should be not emptying frequently, as the bladder is designed to expand quite happily when it is full. This also exercises the sphincter that keeps it closed, and also trains the brain to hold it closed, and to be able to ignore the 'empty me' signals. This may not be important now, but in 40 years or so you may run into problems because you cannot retain urine for more than a short time. It is not easy to learn to retain urine when you are very old.

I suspect you are doing this because an empty bladder places less strain on your pelvic floor and makes you feel better when it is empty. The other side of the coin is that a full bladder is too big to fall out. It is a natural pessary in itself. I don't know that I am correct in my assumptions about why you are doing this, but it might be worth keeping in mind for when you get older.

Cheers

Louise

I am 16 weeks PP. Discovered my cystocele at 3 wks and it was horrendous. Grade 3 at the time I discovered it and went to a urogyn.
I thought i was the most obsessed woman out there! I do daily checks for the "station" of my prolapse.
And yes, I too have noted that it seems to flare on days for no apparent reason. It seems just when I start feeling a bit better and tell some one that I am improving, i regret it the next day when things spontaneously seem to drop again.
Mysterious for sure. My husband suggested keeping a log of my daily activities and how i'm feeling that day to see if i can find what aggravates it, eg not enough sleep the night before, how many blocks i walked, what kind of lifting, bending or cleaning i have done etc..

It seems to be random though. maybe it's hormonal too. are you nursing?
I am.

Can i ask you two who are about 16 wks pp like me, how does a physiotherapist differ from a physical therapist, or are they the same?

to the other mom, who seems to be in nyc by her user name, can you recommend your physiotherapist?
thanks !
keep going - we will continue to get better over time. this is slow going. i have been very frustrated and often depressed, but at the end of the day i am so much better than i was at the 3 wk PP point when i discovered the huge bulge.
now there are days when i have to reach up there to find it.
little by little getting better

hey louise. yes, i do empty my bladder alot, but primarily when i am out of the house and i am not able to sit or find bathroom. at this point the heavy feeling is a constant reminder to me, and when it is empty i can feel more normal. at home however i drink tons of fluid and try to allow myself to retain the urine longer. i agree with you 1000%. the emptying just helps me cope a bit better when i am needing to do something outside of my home.

sounds like you, sheppie and i are truly in the same place right now. i have had some improvement...can hold my urine longer without incontinence. actually the past few days i think i barely have any dribble at all. yay. but the damn bulge is usually there by the end of the day, sometimes earlier. i go to mount sinai for the physical therapy of my pelvic floor. i do kegals while watching a computer moniter to check my progress. and then a probe does some kind of stimulation to work out the muscles for you. the physicians assistants name is xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx she is wonderful and easy to talk to. you might need to see a urogynecologist before you can see her. mine was xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx. nice man with good sense of humor. my experience there has been quite good so far. the phone is xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx. lets all keep each other posted on this.
i actually stopped breastfeeding, so have seen some changes in my vaginal tissues since then. just curious, i posted elsewhere regarding becoming sexually active again. since you two gals are at the same stage as me post partum...have you had sex yet? and how did it go???? j

Edit by Louise. Really sorry J, but we need to ask you not to give specific names, phone numbers etc in your posts. Pity, sounds like a good operator. Perhaps you could share this arrangement by private email. I noticed you were not receiving emails. You can do this by clicking on your username, then using the Edit tab change your email preferences. I think you have to scroll right to the bottom of the tab to find this, not sure. Cheers, L

i think i have fixed it so that i can get emails...thanks louise....

JSNYC, I don't even need to see the name!
I thought you might be going to the same place when i saw she was a PA from one of your prior posts. I have done the same work with her, although i got discouraged and stopped going about 5 wks ago when I had a bad flare.

Now I am resuming this week with her. I made 4 wks of appts! I am getting back on track.
I actually have had a few good days this week and am feeling more encouraged.
I think i will keep nursing for the next month and see you i feel.. i 'm not ready to wean.

The only problem I've had with the blond PA is that she is not a physical therapist and I wanted to get guidance from one, so I actually am starting to see a PT in addition to our PA. She is guiding me on how to protect pelvic floor and giving me suggestions re: proper body mechanics and delevoping other muscles to avoid using the pelvic floor in situations. I think this makes sense. I'll keep you posted.
kisses to our 4 month old babies!

Wonderful!

Louise

thats too funny. i would like to email you to find out who your PT person is. i think that might be helpful. i actually took a break from our PA because she had been away. also, i don't have a sitter yet, so i can't always make her tuesday or thursday appts. i was having problems with a burning sensation and i am worried that it is due to the lube she uses. so i am waiting for her to get back to me about that....so i can know how to proceed with her. i saw from the other post you are breast feeding. i actually stopped. although my cystocele is almost the same, the surrounding tissue seems plumper and better able to maintain the cystocele so it lessens that "falling out" feeling. so i am hoping everything internally is plumping up and that my grade 2 will become a grade 1. i feel good to be "hanging" in there with a fellow recent postpartum gal. please email if you have a chance regarding the PT person. i am looking into an acupuncture person if you are interested. j

I lose track of how many weeks pp I am, but my little guy was born april 26 so if anyone has a calendar handy you can count. I guess its around 18 weeks or so??
anyway, I've had this prolapse about 2.5 years. its been two steps forward one step back all along. and then one day its awful. and then goes back up. sometimes I know why, lots of lifting, wearing high heels for too long or just that time of the month. speaking of which, I read recently that there's a hormonal shift at around 4 mo pp. maybe that's why? I also noticed that things got much worse a few weeks ago and now its back to my baseline.
just a guess though. the important thing to remember is that if it was higher a few days ago, it will in all likelihood go back soon. I use the 'bad days' as reminders to take care of me and pare down my schedule as much as possible. don't know if that's really what does it, but it makes me feel better and as though the prolapse serves a purpose.

curious though....about PT, aside from pelvic floor ex's and stim, what do they do?

they are the same

Hi Sheppie and Others

It is interesting that your PT said you would not "heal". By healing she must mean go back to where you were before this happened. Nothing can do that. My old Oxford dictionary gives several definitions for 'heal'. Restore (person or wound) to health (literally and figuratively), cure (person of a disease), (of wound) become sound or whole. It is a pretty malleable term. There is definitely a physical component in all of these definitions but IMHO, healing is also the non-physical; about feeling as if you have got over it to the point where the quest for wholeness ceases to be the main aim of living, you have the resources necessary to deal with the wound and it just becomes another equivalent factor to all the other struggles we live through. It is kind of like that last stage in the grief process, resignation, where you can move on and the grief-causing event ceases to colour every activity in your life. Many women do experience an improvement in prolapses, either the degree or how often they experience symptoms, or what they can do without causing a bulge, just by moving differently.

It is also about losing the fear, especially when you have a bad few days, and really know that it is only for a few days and that it will return to baseline as long as you respect its needs.

Let's be realistic. In a perfect world we would change many things if we could. How often have you heard somebody say, "I am over it." in relation to something that really upset them, and that they couldn't change? They have suffered, carry some scars, got used to it, improved their situation as much as they were able, and literally move on. Healed? Probably.

What do others think about healing?

Cheers

Louise

Louise,

Absolutely profound. Thank you. I especially liked this:

"It is kind of like that last stage in the grief process, resignation, where you can move on and the grief-causing event ceases to colour every activity in your life."

That is so, so true.

But as a fighter, I had to go through the "This is going to heal because I'm going to make it heal; I'm strong enough to do this; just give me time."

After several months of good days and bad, I realize it's a chronic condition I'm going to live with for better or worse, and compared to some things, it's not so bad. My daughter works with a young mother who has bowel cancer and three young children. My cup runneth over.

I've learned so much about this from this site, can't thank you ladies enough. It gave me the courage to face the doctor. I have a lot of excellent information now, and it all comes in handy every day on my journey.

Much of the healing is mental. The physical is incidental - sort of comes with the packaging. I think you learn this as you get older.

Can't say the yoga doesn't help a lot. It helps make me feel really strong and capable of enduring what I have to endure.

Again, thank you all so much.

Judy

Change what you can change; be happy with what you cannot.

i was just thinking about this today. i am not happy with how things are, but i must admit they are so much better than they were. i met up with some friends who have a baby 3 weeks older than mine. i hear the stories of how the mom has gone back to the gym and started running again. a part of me is so jealous. but the other part said, "wow, i was able to get through the day without thinking too much about this problem".. i met these friends in the park about 7 weeks ago, at which time i was so desperate and depressed. due to the distance of the bathroom, i walked in desperation to hold in my "heavy bulge", and prayed not to urinate on myself. this time, i didn't feel the desperation. i did have to do a few preventative urinations, to avoid a bad situation. but overall it was much better. not perfect, not my old self, but the new me who has this beautiful 4 month old baby boy. if i am this much better in 7 weeks, i know i have healing to come. but i also know that i may have a prolapse to deal with for a lifetime, and i don't want it to control me...but i want to find ways to control how i feel about it. well, i guess today is a good day....you all will hear from me on one of those bad days!!!

Baby steps, Jsnyc, baby steps. That's the way. Tag every bit of progress, be prepared to backslide and accept it when you do.

Writing a brief prolapse diary might help you to record and recall these little bits of progress to encourage yourself along. It might seem a bit obsessive but we feed off our successes in all walks of life. It is sometimes good to look back and say, "Was it ever that bad? I have made some real progress in the last few weeks", or look back over the last month and say "What a terrible month. I am getting nowhere." Then looking over the previous month and discovering that you have made some progress compared to the previous month. It might be helpful?

You have some lovely parks in NYC. We saw lots of Moms and nannies with babies and kids in Central Park when we were there in May. It must be lovely at this time of year with all the shade, and such a contrast with day to day living in an apartment.

Cheers

Louise

thanks for understanding and cheering me on. yes, i love nyc. lived here about 20 years and not too far from the park. the leaves should start changing pretty soon..so it will be glorious. due to my leg injury i had been homebound for over 3 months and missed much of spring and summer. so i am thrilled about autumn.

you are on your way!!!!!
louise is right, it helps to note progress, every now and then I track my own posts here. I can't believe how far I've come.
and you will too!

and I am jealous of you being so close to the park. I live in suburbia and have to drive to the nearest park. I have a nice size yard, with swings and all, but it lacks other people. nobody around my neighborhood during the day aside from construction crews.

i am back to work and very conflicted about it. i don't like leaving my boys, but once i get there i like the space away from the kids, the shift of focus to help others and distract myself from my own problems.

But today I just felt like I constantly needed to take bathroom breaks. I had this sensation I often of urge to urinate frequently. I drives me nuts. Then I had to break 2x to pump. All of this back and forth between my patients made me feel like maybe I should not be working. But seeing patients is less physically taxing then caring for a 3 yr old and a 4 month old, plus I get the healthcare insurance for the whole family, so i think i have to stick it out for now.
Again, I just want to be better, I just want to be the old me.

But for perspective, my patients all have HIV/ AIDs and Hep C, many have cirrhosis of the liver. Most of them have to take over 10 meds a day and a large porportion of them have very poor chances of long term survival. So after a day in the clinic I am reminded of how much of my health I do have and how fortunate I am to have the life that I have and this great family.

Agree to the beauty of the parks. I mourn that I can't walk to work through central park like I used to. I'm just not there yet. But I will be at this time next year!

Jsnyc I will try to figure out the email function.
Ciao

I forgot to say that I totally identify with the feelings you have when you are with other moms of newborns and see them doing things you can't. I have 2 great friends who have newborns 2 wks older than mine. I was at one of their homes 2 weeks ago and I specifically recall my friend M running up and down the stairs of her brownstone to check on the baby. It struck me then that she is able to have that spring in her step that I will not have for a long time. It does all seem so unfair.
And I saw my sister n law at 5 wks postpartum picking up her heavy toddler, running around with him in the grass, wearing her newbie in the bjorn etc. I couldn't help but feel envy. I think this is natural. We are coming to terms with our changed bodies and their limitations.
But we will get better. We will!

Hi Sheppie,

My uterine prolapse went up and stayed! It prolapsed to the vaginal opening a week post partum and was right at the vaginal opening. I pushed it back and it stayed after that. From what I have read, a prolapsed uterus is the most likely to heal. I have read of several other women having the same experience as myself. It must be to do with the ligaments all being loose and then tightening up again I think. I still have a small rectocele and cystocele which are really only softer front and back vaginal walls for me and I have never had any symptoms from these. Everything improved greatly during the weeks and months post partum in terms of general tone and tightening. Hope this helps a bit! x

we are sure in the same place right now. i am also having that issue with urinary frequency, as well as this burning sensation in the vaginal area. plus ofcourse the feeling like i have a billiard ball in my vagina that i need to hold in. funny, all symptoms come and go. i wake up wondering "is today going to be an okay day?" i find that i feel better if i drink a ton of fluids, because at least the urinary frequency is because i really do have to pee. but that doesn't work if i am on my way out for the day...

funny side note. i use to work with PWA's. i was a social worker at one of the NYC hospitals. i now have a private practice. so i use to pee inbetween patients before i got this cystocele, so at least that part is no big deal. also, i sit during my job...so the only dread is the walk to and from my office. i think days off are worse...like making plans in the park, or going to an appointment. if i take the bus, i am so upset if i can't get a seat. i feel like i am just as disabled sometimes as the other people...just no one can see it. i keep trying to be positive...some days are better than others. i walked from the west side to the east side through central park on sunday...something i was very pleased about! i am hanging in there with you!!!!