I elected not to have a fissurectomy 2 years ago. The Colo-rectal guy said he would cut the fissure location then cut the ring the same length. Well, the tear finally healed and just can't think of cutting it open again. Like everybody says a cut to heal a cut. Anyway, my ring gets tight for no reason and I use lotion before going. I can't keep doing this. I'm getting the feeling everybody likes the ring cut only(is that LIS?). Let me know if this is correct. Also, what does botox help? I've had a hip replaced, broken fingers but I'm scared about the ole bumm.. The pain I had when the fissure was open was terrible. I wouldn't take a pain meds, in fear of constipation..
Please advise on what my best option would be.. I have some itching now rare pain (I can deal with) but the tight ring is cramping my life..
I trust you guys more than the Dr's..Help

For the last few years I have had a constant battle with hemorrhoids and anal fissures. I didn't know it was fissures and thought I just had hemorrhoids. The sphincter muscle around my anus had tightened up and wasn’t relaxing when I had a bowel movement. I had never heard of anything like this and thought I was just having constipation, all the time. For a couple of years my life was consumed with laxatives, stool softeners and other types of drugs. I lived in fear of having a BM. I missed a lot of work because of it and wasted my vacation time on two day recoveries. It was horrible. Regular doctors were useless. They would say to eat more fiber. What a joke. Fiber just made a bigger BM and caused more pain. I have to say that there were periods of relief where I would go a month or two without symptoms. I would begin to believe that the agony was over. It would always come back. It had gotten worse to the point where I had the problem much more than not and I thought I was going crazy. Life was becoming unbearable. I finally went to a rectal surgeon. He said I had a huge fissure and scheduled me to have a fissurectomy and sphincterotomy. I had to be there at 6:45am last Thursday, August 27th. The surgeon partially cut my anal sphincter muscle to relax it and cauterized the fissure. He sent me home with some anti biotics, some anti nausea medicine and some pain pills. I had instructions to eat lots of fiber and take mineral oil three times a day. I didn’t have a BM until Saturday and it was pretty bad, but the Darvocet helped. I noticed that even though it hurt like crazy because I was so sore down there, the BM was much easier than it had been in years. Every day since it has hurt less and I’m going back to work today, Wednesday, September 2nd. I’ll add more later.

Here it is 10 days after the surgery and I can have a BM without having to take a pain pill afterward. I'm still taking the mineral oil a couple of times a day so I can't tell exactly how much I've improved but I feel like I'm making a lot of progress.

Thanks a lot for the reply and please keep me posted. The colo-doc I went to said he cuts around the fissure to heal itself, nothing about cauterizing. I was in sooo much pain when it was open..Do you how he cauterized it? I know what you mean being fustrated.. I'll go a month then have problems from nowhere. I can't keep going like this, thanks a let me know the progress..

Hi my fellow members i just joined this group to try to find out what to do for my husband. He is so much pain from a anal fissure he has seen a Dr and they recommend to either cauteriz it or have surgery.A friend recommend sylum husk from the vitamin shoppe it worked good for a couple weeks taking it in the morning with apple juice or ice tea fissure went away for the most part got small and didn't bother him. Well guess what its back and with vengeance the poor man. Has anyone had this done before and i was wondering the out come. Any advice would help I also want to post my own post but couldnt figure out how.

Now it's been 16 days since my surgery. I feel great. It's awesome to be living without pain. I go back to see the surgeon for a follow up in about 2 weeks. If you or a loved one is tired of living with pain then I would recomend this procedure. I'm still on the mineral oil, though. I guess I wont know for sure until I'm completely off of that.

I had fissures for about a month. I had the lateral sphincterotomy. It worked for 2 weeks until I had a hard stool. That caused another fissure which lasted for 2 more months. During that time I was in EXCRUCTIATING pain after bowel movements for periods ranging from 3-8 hours. After ending up in the ER and requiring 2 morphine shots for pain one night, I went to see the best colo-rectal surgeon I could find. He gave me Diltiazem and suggested I try Citrucel in addtion to the stool softeners I was taking. If that didn't work then next step was a colonoscopy to see exactly what was going on. Well that has been 3 weeks ago. Once I started the Citrucel and the Diltiazem, the pain went away within 3 days. My stools were much softer than they had been on just good diet alone. I am still using the Diltiazem although i'm not sure I need it anymore. The only side effect it seems to have is that it dries out the skin around the anus sometimes. That can be treated with Eucerin cream. I eat fiber cereal and light sandwiches but I am slowly starting to introduce other foods back into my diet in small amounts to see what happens. So far so good. I know the fissure area is still weak but at least the pain has stopped both during and after bowel movements. I HIGHLY recommend the Citrucel and the Diltiazem combination. You must get your stools to just one notch higher than liquid to get this problem healed.

It doesn't sound like your doctor gave you a good post surgery to do list. Part of my after surgery instructions was to take two teaspoons of Metamucil per day and 3 or 4 tablespoons of mineral oil three times a day. I only took that nasy stuff (mixed with orange juice) twice a day but it made all the difference. The mineral oil has kept my fissure from reopening and has allowed me to heal. It's been 28 days now and I'm doing great.

Thanks for the update improved. Did you have a skin tag? Did the doctor use stiches to close the fissure or did you get the LIS only? I'm soaking loosing the muscle but I think the skin tag is tearing sometimes.. Does the muscle feel alot looser? Sometimes I use lube just in case, I don't want to keep doing that.. Thanks for posting!