Draining Seton -- lots of pain normal?

[Garf]

Hi all!

I've been dealing with perianal crohn's the last two years, specifically anal fissures. In the last 6 months though I developed an abscess which led to a fistula. I was put on Imuran & Humira which actually seemed to heal all of my fissures and I was feeling great other than aggravation from the fistula which remained.

As of last week, I had a seton placed to keep the fistula draining but since then I have had a lot of pain again, maybe worse then ever before, with several fissures. I feel like the seton has some type of wire/cord poking out in multiple places that is scraping my sphincter, is this normal? Currently I can barely walk from the pain and yet I read some people having setons and being back to playing sports in just a week.

Really confused, I thought this would be a non-invasive surgery with a quick recovery. I have an appointment in a week with my CRS, but worried I'll get worse. At this point I'm even considering a (possibly temp) colostomy (was offered it once before) in the hopes I could just heal the fistula completely as the surgeon told me I may need to keep this horrid seton in forever. Also, if I did have a colostomy, could they remove the seton in the same surgery?

Thanks so much for any advice!

 

[Garf]

For anyone curious or is having a similar experience I thought I'd post an update below,

Went to see my doctor and they said they could just remove the seton right there in the office, which I had no idea it would be that easy to remove. My pain levels got better after it was removed, but didn't go away completely.

It turns out I had a thrombosed hemorrhoid right below it and the seton was squeezing and poking it. How lucky am I? The funny thing is I haven't strained in a long time. Oh well, I might try a seton again after a few months when I feel like the area has completely calmed down, if it doesn't and I keep having my other issues (repeated fissures) then I may look at a colostomy.

Anyway, for anyone with an abnormally painful seton, just know you can have it removed instantly at the doc's office.

 

[exit4]

I am having a no knot seton put in in a few weeks - it has no knot - just smooth tube with male to female connection. Leaving with a seton knot is so uncomfortable!

 

[lysagrey]

I personally think that pain is kind of subjective. Some pain is normal. A lot of pain is never good. I personally have had many different situations where I would have pain flare-ups and honestly it has been really tough to fight off the symptoms sometimes. I personally have tried many different pain-management protocols and some of them do work and some of them don't. The standard ones are okay but they usually make me feel really tired and groggy. I talked with my general practitioner and he suggested I try kratom. I thought that it was kind of an interesting idea and since I have tried practically everything else on the market I decided to give it a go. I did some research and settled on white kratom. I have been really happy with the results. It does help me fight the pain as well as the anxiety that feel when I go in public. I think that in some cases it is useful. I think that if you want to try something new and nothing else really helps you should give it a go. If you have too much pain you should talk to your doctors. I feel like it might be the best advice in this situation