The story of my arse is unfortunately a longer one that I had originally hoped it would be! I've had a cyst on my lower back since I was at university. I knew it was there because if I was ill or paddled on some particularly unpleasant water it would get upset and swell up a little. It never really caused me any bother and most of the time I wouldn't even know it was there.
I was quite confidant that I had successfully diagnosed it as a 'pilonidal cyst' using the power of the Internet. At some point this developed into a 'pilonidal sinus' or got one, or something like that. This means it has a little tunnel out to the outside world. This lets it discharge any yucky puss that it has developed. Unfortunately it also means it is much more susceptible to infections. So not overly surprising that is what happened next!
At the end of November 2009 I got 'man flu', or at least that is what Sarah told me I had. Turns out it wasn't 'man flu' at all it was the cyst. It has at some point gotten infected and unlike any previous time wasn't going away without a fight. Thinking that Sarah was probably right I ignored being ill for a few days but was getting no better so booked in with the doctor. By the time I got to the doctors I was starting to think it might be 'swine flu' rather than 'man flu' and was feeling rather unwell and had a temperature of nearly 40.
The doctor took my temperature (twice, I don't think she believed it first time!) and sent me straight to the hospital. Turns out the cyst had gone rather bad and was essentially giving me blood poisoning which is what was causing me to feel so ill. Blood poisoning and rushing to hospital, it seems, are not usual symptoms of 'man flu' and as such I got treated to some sympathy from Sarah as she drove me to hospital
At the hospital I was quite quickly shuffled through all the queues at A&E, skipped the long waiting list for a bed on the wards and was booked into surgery as soon as they thought any food or drink was out of my system. Surgery want well except for the usual complications with anesthetic not working as quickly as they expect it too (count from 1- 10 for me …. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 …. um okay now do it backwards …. 10, 9, oooow it hurts, 8, 7, really hurting now, 6, 5, ooooh going fuzzy, 4, …. gone). I don't remember anesthetic burning my arm as much as it did this time, but maybe they use different stuff when you are younger!
I woke up not long later (not that I had any concept of how long I had been out) in the recovery room being warmed up by a funky hot blanket thingy. Turns out I do get cold, but only when I'm out of it on knock out drugs! Once they were happy that I was re-heated to a suitable temperature I was back on the ward where I felt hungry for the first time in ages … even hospital food seemed like a feast!
I managed to wangle getting discharged the same day and was home by teatime! This maybe wasn't the brightest idea as I was in quite a lot of pain and the ibuprofen certainly wasn't going to be as good as the Morphine I could of had if I'd stayed in hospital. Thing is I really don't like hospitals, not at all, not one little bit … so I'll take a bit of pain at home over Morphine in hospital any day!
I was kind of told at this point that it would be a long ish road to full fitness again but probably 6 – 8 weeks. This would consist of a few weeks of daily dressing changes and then we'd see how things went from there. An appointment was booked with the consultant at the end of January just to check up on things once it was done healing! We are now in April and I still haven't done healing. All this time I have not been allowed to go out and do stuff, especially the things I like to do as they tend to land up with getting dirty and wet which is not what an open wound needs!
The last few months have gone a little like this:
- December -> Mid January – Quite Painful, Daily dressings by nurse, Lots of Bleeding and Ooozing!
- Mid January -> February – Less Pain, Less Mess, still daily dressings by nurse, no more pain killers
- February – Only painful if knocked, still dull pain. mostly daily dressing by nurse but skipping a day at the weekend
- March – Mostly pain free although aches if knocked or sat on for too long, dressings mostly done at home by myself
- April - Mostly pain free although aches if knocked or sat on for too long, no more dressing just need to keep it clean
A few trips have come and gone that were supposed to be my getting back out there trip and I've been the shuttle bunny instead, but there is no point spending all this time getting fixed to mess it all up by paddling a dirty river or caking myself in mud biking. I am also still at the point where if a fell over and landing funny it would really hurt so skating and such like is off the calendar for the time being too.
Nothing has really gone wrong during the healing, it is just taking it's time. The would has been clean and has not got infected at all and doesn't cause me any real discomfort any more unless I spend too long sitting down. Hopefully this is the end of the story and by the time I see the consultant again at the end of May I will be fully healed and allowed to go do stuff again. If not there may be some more surgery to come but I am hoping to avoid that if at all possible!
I get the impression from talking to the nurses and the consultant that, given the size the hole was at the beginning, I haven't done too badly to be where I am today. The good old 6 – 8 weeks is for your standard average size hole and mine was far from that. I just wish I'd known that up front then it wouldn't have been quite as disappointing when I wasn't healed that quickly.
Everyone has been brilliant throughout the whole process. I would like to thank the nurses at Tadcaster Medical Centre (Bev & Jane) who had to suffer the sight of my butt for nearly 4 months, the nurses at Selby War Memorial Hospital who dealt with dressing at the weekend and the consultants at York District Hospital.
So why tell the world … well apparently this kind of thing happens to 26 people in every 100,000 so it is not uncommon. It affects men more than women (because we tend to be hairier) but is unusual in children and the over 40's. Maybe someone else will read this and realise it really is going to be a long recovery but that it isn't as bad as it sounds when you first get told that you are going to have an open wound for 6 – 8 weeks. It does hurt at first, a lot, but that quickly subsides and you can get back to having a relatively normal life. Keep it clean, look after it and do what the nurses tell you and you'll get there in the end.
