I'm 35, male. I get a lot of exercise, and I'm fit. 6 feet tall, 155 pounds. I had been dealing with hemorrhoids for 15 years. It had gotten to the point where I had to physically take my finger and push them back into my butt every time I took a poo. Also, I couldn't walk very far without one or more hemorrhoids starting to come out. Over the years I developed a system, while out in public, of getting them to go back in temporarily. I would squat down and center my butthole right on my heel, then put all my weight on that spot and it would push the hemorrhoid back into my butt. But this would only give me 10 minutes or so of relief. I would have to seek out a place to sit. Finally, after years of dealing with it, and after it'd gotten to the point where I was bleeding a lot, everyday, AND after I finally got health insurance, I saw a doctor about it. I had a colonoscopy and he told me I had some of the largest hemorrhoids he'd ever seen. He sent me to a colorectal surgeon. Now, I'd gotten very good at managing the issue and to the colorectal surgeon it didn't look all that bad. So he did a banding procedure, but that didn't help at all. I went back to him to ask about the surgery, and he advised against it. I insisted, however, as a quality of life issue, that he perform the surgery on me. He told me that because I had internal and external hemorrhoids it wasn't an option for me to get the laser treatment. I had to go under the knife. I decided to go for it. The doctor told me I would be able to go back to work in one week. He performed the surgery and I woke up in recovery feeling no pain. I was on Percocet. I was able to pee and seemed fine. He sent me home with a prescription for 100 Vicodin. I began taking them right away, but as soon as the Percocet wore off I found I was in terrible pain. I ended up in the E.R. at 2am, screaming and crying and begging for pain relief. (I'd previously had a kidney stone, and found this to be much, much worse - and that's something I thought I'd never say.) The E.R. doctor gave me a shot of Morphine, which helped enough that I was able to stop crying and moaning for a few hours. They sent me home with a prescription for Percocet. Thankfully, this worked for the pain, some, but not as much as I would have liked. I found I couldn't stand to have my girlfriend sleep in the bed with me because when she so much as rolled over I screamed in pain. The worst was when I had to have my first bowel movement. The doctor had prescribed fiber pills and colace stool softener. I took this regularly, but I followed the directions on the fiber supplment bottle, to take 2 tablets 3 times a day, and I later found out this has the effect of bulking up the stool. This is not something you want. So, though I was eating very, very little I still having very large stool for the first several days until I figured this out. This problem was compounded by the fact that my butthole was sewn up very tight, it seemed to me. It was very difficult to get the stool out. I tried not to strain, but for the first 4 days I was in the bathroom for up to 4 hours a day, crying and yelling and screaming - and I just wanted to die, it was so bad. On a couple of occasions I just had to push the stool out, because I could feel it pushing on the inside of my butthole, where the incisions were and the pain of that was immense. Plus the anxiety over having to go was not at all minor factor. It was extremely mentally taxing. Once on the third day I couldn't get the stool to come out at all and ended up taking a hot shower, hoping for some relief. (I didn't have a bathtub at my apartment at the time, but I wish to God I had.) I ended up pushing the stool out while standing up in the shower, crying and yelling. I then had to clean up a big poo off the shower floor. It was one of the lowest points in my life, and very surreal. I couldn't believe I was feeling that much pain. I hated so much for my girlfriend to see me like that. She was great through it all, but it was unbelievably humiliating still. The whole time I was wondering if I had made the right choice by having the surgery. The doctor told me that my hemorrhoids were so bad that I wouldn't have gotten any relief if he hadn't surgically removed them - but I still questioned whether it was the right thing to do. I was that miserable. After 4 days of pain I called and begged the doctor for stronger pills, and he prescribed me dilaudid. That took a while to build up in my system, but once it did I felt much better. On one of these forums, I saw someone say that taking motrin and smoking marijuana worked very well for someone. So I tried that. I don't smoke marijuana in my regular life, but I made some calls and found some. Not legal medical marijuana. Just some kindbud that a friend was able to buy for me from a shady pot dealer. I found it worked amazingly. I was still in pain, but the marijuana had the effect of taking my mind off the pain. I could watch tv or a movie or read, finally. Previously, all I could focus on was the pain. Anyway, I was still miserable up through the 8th day, but somewhere during the course of that time I came up with the disgusting solution of reducing the amount of pain I was experiencing while going poo by filling the sitz bath with very hot water and epsom salts and actually going poo in that water. (This would have been much better if I could have gone in the bathtub, but, sadly, that was not an option for me.) Still, I found that for 2 hours after having a bowel movement I had to lie on the bed face down in the dark without moving one iota. I would just lay there and moan for a couple hours til the pain became somewhat bearable. After about the 8th day I was able to walk down the driveway to the mailbox and back. That felt like a major achievement at the time. It turned out that going back to work after one week would was unthinkable for me. At this stage I began to notice that a foul-smelling liquid was seeping out of my butthole, pretty much all the time. This lasted about 4 or 5 days, and it came out slowly but pretty much constantly. Then it began to taper off after a few more days. The smell was terrible, but luckily it stopped after a while. At about 2 weeks after the surgery I stood up one morning to go to the bathroom and a lot of blood starting dripping out of my butthole. I went to the E.R. again and it turned out a stitch up inside me had come out. This turned out not to be a problem and the bleeding subsided after a couple days. Somewhere along about the 10th or 12th day I began to ween myself off the Dilaudid, as both it and the Percocet I learned had constipating effects. I figured I didn't need that. So I continued to treat the pain with 3 motrin every 4 hours, along with lots of marijuana smoking. The third week after the surgery was much better. I was still in bed 20 hours a day, at least - but I could tell I was getting better. After about 3.5 weeks I was able to poo in the toilet like a regular human being. That felt like a major hurdle to get past. I went back to work after 4 weeks, but I was still walking very slowly, and I found I couldn't make it all day long, sitting at a computer. So I worked half days for that first week. Now, 5 weeks after having the surgery, I'm able to walk fine. I'm definitely still healing, but I'm much improved. I take a sitz bath after every bowel movement, and whenever it hurts at all, and when I'm at work and can't take a sitz I use tucks wipes to get my butthole clean after going poo, and then take a sitz bath first thing when I get home from work.

This was, without doubt, one of the hardest things I've ever gone through in my life. Probably the hardest. There were moments when I just wanted to be dead, the pain was so intense. It was a huge hassle for my girlfriend, to take care of me the whole time. I'm still taking 2 fiber pills every day and colace, and drinking tons of water all day long. I also have found that a chinese tea, Healthy King brand's "Easy-Going & Colon Clean" has been great for me. It makes the poo come out easily, and together with the stool softener, makes the experience much more pleasant.

In some of my lowest moments I took great comfort in reading other people's accounts of their surgery experiences, so I wanted to make sure to post mine here. I can honestly say that now that I'm rid of hemorrhoids I feel the surgery was worth it. The doctor says I'm healing beautifully, so I'm very grateful for that. I would just say to anyone who is considering having this surgery: know in advance how painful it will be, and don't expect to be able to go back to work after one week. Of course, everyone is different. But for me it was not even a consideration to go back to work one day sooner than 3 weeks. I was finally able to have sex with my girlfriend again a few days ago, and while it felt very weird up inside of me, it was ok. That was reassuring, to return to the world of the normal, living human beings. So, to anyone who finds him- or herself facing this surgery, please know what you're getting in to. One good thing to remember is that people don't die from this. ;) The main thing you have to deal with is the pain. Good luck.