As I did not have the mesh and was scared away from it I will say that the non mesh way did have a lot amount of swelling. I am a white but my equipment was completely black the next day. Also one of my testicles was swollen up the size of a softball and everything turned black. It was about 3 weeks before everything went back to normal. But for three weeks I was very well endowed. I joked with my surgeon that the surgery only took 10 minutes and the other hour and twenty minutes he just stood there and punched me in the nuts. Everything is good except for some lack of feeling in the incision area. So far there are no issues. Ive ridden about 4000 miles since the surgery and am now in the gym 5 days a week as well as commuting on my fat bike.
Either way you choose to do surgery I wish you the best of luck!!!
Timing! I had surgery yesterday at lunch time for a right inguinal hernia.
I had it under local, sliced open and a mesh put in. I was not made aware of any potential issues with the mesh and have to admit that I did not research the mesh at all - seemed to be a fairly straight-forward surgery. I do have a line of staples holding the outer layer of skin together… chicks dig scars right?
Straight after the op was pretty good while the local was still in effect. Now I’m on 2x horse tranquilizers every 4h. About lunch time today (24h post-op), I had been feeling ok and started stretching the painkiller timing out to 6h apart. BUT when I next tried to stand up to get another one, it felt like my guts were going to fall out and it hurt a LOT (sharp burning pain).
However, in general, my mobility is already improving and I slept fine last night. Getting dressed/undressed takes about 10x longer than usual though and I certainly recommend stool softeners as well as eating smaller, more regular meals (instead of just a few large ones).
So, right now i’m back on the good painkillers at 4h intervals, but have dropped down to one tablet only. There is more discomfort, but I don’t like taking drugs and would prefer a bit of discomfort instead.
My doctor said that I can expect to be able to do short walks tomorrow, progressively longer walks through the next week and can get on my trainer for easy spins as soon as Monday - dependent on the pain level.
The mesh is basically impossible to remove. Your tissue grows around it and becomes inseparable. I have heard of it being removed, but it ends up being several hours in surgery. Only those with chronic debilitating pain are going to undergo that, and it’s hard to find someone to do it. Assume it will be with you forever.
My general practice doc that evaluated me said he could “kind of feel” a small hernia on my left side as well as the prominent one on my right. I’m hoping that if it does exist the surgeon will take care of it.
Being awake was no problem. Despite only having a local, they still put you to sleep for most of the operation - so I was really only awake to walk into the theatre and again when they were finishing closing up.
Didn’t feel a thing and just had a chat with them. The most painful part was them putting the drip into my hand…
I walked into theatre at 9am and was lying in recovery at 9:30am. It doesn’t take long!
The surgeon I was referred to is a hernia specialist and does a dozen or more Of these operations each week. He prefers to do them open, rather than laparoscopically and uses the mesh most of the time, as these methods apparently gave him the best results with the least chance of complications.
I want whoever is cutting me open to 1) have done it a lot of times before and 2) to do it the best way they know how. I just went with his recommendations. I’m no expert on hernias, he is!
Will it dissolve? I’m sure they could make one that does, but my understanding is the ones in regular use are essentially some kind of plastic, probably with a hormone coating intended to encourage the surrounding tissue to integrate into the holes in the mesh.
How old were these meshes though? We are talking medicine here - any implant technology more than a couple of years old is probably old hat and has likely since been drastically improved.
I believe many medicine papers aren’t even worth reading if more than a year or two old…!
I guess the point is they’re not supposed to dissolve. Silicone breast implants weren’t supposed to leak, and replacement joints aren’t supposed to corrode or splinter, and yet they do and it’s all bad bad bad. I’m not saying don’t get it, but it might be worth a round of 50 questions with the surgeon. Eg, if I get long-term chronic pain, do you pay for that? A refund at least? They treat these thing very nonchalantly, but it’s a medical device, the safety for which hasn’t been established the way you probably think it has.
Well it’s too late for me to change my outcome, but I will ask some extra questions at my post-op checkup on Thursday.
Doing some reading, it seems that <1% is the complication rate, with a large portion of complications being chronic pain. However, they also state that the stuture method is significantly more likely to fail and can also result in the same complications…
It’s been another fairly painful day for me. Definitely need to keep up with the strong pain killers on day 2 of recovery, however I’m now only taking one tablet every 5h, instead of two every 4h.
18 years with an open cut mesh implant here. Not a single complaint.
Mine was an emergency operation.
Admittedly, I did have some waiting time as I’d been at my best mates engagement party doing shots of tequila when everything went tits up.
It was a long wait for sobriety while keeping the golf ball pressed in with my thumb.
I was very much awake for the operation. The reflections in the light gave me glimpses of what was happening to my belly.
My experience has been all good. Not a single problem.
I hope yours is a similar experience.
I had that happen both times. Unless you lay down for a few days after the surgery, the blood will travel downward from the mesh site into… your left or right testicle. It has to do with the anatomical geography down there, the opening where an inguinal hernia forms has all kind of your undercarriage wiring passing through it as well so until the swelling and bruising gets cleaned up It can be more pressure than usual on those structures. Some hernias can even prolapse into a testicle if things are shaped an unlucky way. The whole area gets tender and sore from the extra baggage but resolves after a short time as your body cleans up the mess. It’s important to be as active as you can tolerate as far as walking etc to allow the healing adhesions to form correctly and circulation to do its job promptly in returning the area to a healing state.
I do remember the first surgery hurting worse for a day or two, the 2nd I was able to walk the dogs for a mile the very next morning with minimal issues, just walk as slow as you need and don’t drop things because bending over sucks.
Hey Cerb, just following up on this as I’m doing research about laparoscopic vs open surgery. I take this to mean you went with the “open” style of surgery based on the fact that you had local anesthesia, as my understanding is that general is the only type of anesthesia for laparoscopic surgery.
How are you feeling?
If I was undergoing surgery today I would be choosing open, based on my research.
I had open mesh repair around 15 years ago. No chronic issues. I’d say it took about 6 months to really fully settle. There was no day to day pain after a few weeks but every time I did something new that I’d not done since the surgery e.g. a longer ride, I’d get some discomfort after, just a bit of an ache. Nothing to worry about. No issues after that initial period. Given took up long distance riding 5 years later, and rowing 4 years ago, I am confident it’s good.
My surgeon was a top guy locally. I saw him on TV a few years later being interviewed about a new kidney transplant technique he was involved in.
Both were lapro, I think it was a case of the 2nd surgeon being more experienced and maybe my own contribution of 2 years of training between the surgeries so my overall health and fitness was likely significantly better and made for a better recovery. There a lot of variables otherwise too, from the size of the hernia, how your guts are oriented behind, the brand of mesh used, maybe even the weather out to contribute to more or less energy when feeling down?
Nuance aside I’d not consider either of them to have been difficult to get through. I didn’t lose more than 4 weeks of training either time (no work missed) and probably could have gotten back to the trainer sooner but didn’t out of caution. Once you’ve had a lapro repair on a hernia they will be reluctant to go lapro again for the other side or if you have it fail at some point in the future, due to scar tissue it’ll be a traditional trip through the front with a scalpel, so err on the side of caution because subsequent trips into your lower abdomen tissues become exponentially worse for recovery and surgical options. For #2 I actually had consults with two surgeons in the same office, the first was planning to go an open repair since I had a history of the lapro repair on the other side. Thankfully his colleague decided he could do it and took over because I wanted to have as little downtime as possible.
Edit - you might see if you have any hernia specialty centers within comfortable distance of you, there was one near me but the scheduling was further out and they were out of insurance network.
Also, the DaVinci robotic surgery machine is also becoming more common and even 2 years ago was showing a lot of promise for easier hernia recovery since the dissection is more precise.
Feeling not too bad. No painkillers at all taken overnight on recovery day 2, as i could sleep fine without them. But i’m about to take some now so I can get things done (like make my own breakfast without too much pain).
I don’t think i’d be quite up for a long walk yet and the thought of holding onto a dog lead while they’re pulling sounds like a really bad idea!
It has been extremely painful at times - mostly when bending or reaching, and usually when the drugs are wearing thin. To start with, I’d get a feeling like my guts were going to fall out, accompanied with a sharp searing pain at the op site. The guts falling out feeling stopped after recovery day 1. At recovery day 3 - i’m still getting the searing pain from time to time when moving around, but painkiller level is greatly reduced and the pain isn’t as intense.
I’ve taken the weekend plus one day off work for recovery (3 days recovery total) and feel like I should be ok to be back to work on day 4. Will likely be quite tender/gingerly still - but i don’t think i’ll be in as much actual pain.
Good luck with the recovery. I had bilateral repairs done earlier this year using mesh, apparently they were large (whatever that means) and that was what was recommended.
About 8 weeks off the bike, currently 4 months post surgery and back riding without issues. In fact I had carried them for 12 months and it is a pleasure to not be in pain when out of the saddle up the hills.
Recovery was painful for the first few days and difficult not to be able to pick up the kids… but i did exactly what i was told and all has gone well.