Hello Everyone!
First I'd like to thank you all for being so helpful. This site has been invaluable to me through this whole process. It's a whole community of people who understand!

Alright, so I have a new issue. I had my takedown surgery on March 13th (2008) and recently things are starting to work very well. I take 8 immodium a day and finally no antibiotics and the diarhea is gone!! But for the past month or so I've had a lot of dryness in my female parts. Understandably this causes irritation and redness when I wipe or wash myself. I haven't used any new soaps, and it's deffinetly not menopause (I'm 16). Is this common for people with J-pouches? And does anyone have any suggestions as to what I could do about it or any medicines or treatments I should ask my doctor about?
Thanks again for everything!
Joleen

You are 16 years old and had this surgery you poor bugger. I personally havent had dryness in my female parts after surgery but have you been on alot of antibiotics recently as it could have made you more prone to vaginal thrush?? which can cause redness irritation in that region.
You are very brave to have had this surgery at such a young age good luck.

Yeah...sounds like a yeast infection from the antibiotics. This is VERY common. And easily fixed. Call your doc before it gets too bad. It's a one pill fix. Your regular doctor should be able to take care of it. You might have to go in and give a urine sample to confirm it. Yeast infections can get real painful, and hard to get rid of if you wait too long. So have it checked out. Good Luck.

I don't know. I haven't been on antibiotics for about three weeks and I've had yeast infections and bacterial mess-ups from antibiotics before and it doesn't seem like one. The only time it feels irritated is when I wipe or wash myself and I think that is because there's no discharge whatsoever to protect it.

I have had the same problem, though I didn't realise that it could be connected to having my surgery. I had my 1st surgery when I was 18, and takedown when I was 19 and ever since I've been a bit dry "down there." I find it very uncomfortable to insert a tampon for example, and before my surgery, this was not a problem. There was another discussion, not too long ago about dryness and such. But yeah, i suppose we are in the same boat.

Hi Joleen,

You have to remember that this is a huge operation that you've had and your body has been through an awful lot. Every time I've had abdominal surgery it has thrown my hormones totally off the scale and I've needed hormone therapy to help put things back on track again.

You may only be 16 but that doesn't mean that you are immune to suffering from premature menapause caused by the trauma of your illness and surgery. Now that isn't to say that this is perminent, far from it. It just means that it's going to take a little while for you body to regain it's strength and while it's busy doing that other non-essential issues like hormone production will be taking a back seat.

Things will get back on track but it wouldn't hurt to have a word with your ob/gyn to put your mind at rest.

Good luck and take care.

Shell

Hi Joleen,

NY-Pouch recently posted the following link to an article from Cleveland Clinic. It states that after j-pouch surgery, women may experience vaginal dryness.
http://www.clevelandclinic.org/health/health-info/docs/...?index=7067&src=news

Hopefully it will improve over time, as Shell says. In the interim, you might ask your OB-GYn, (or your mother's ?) if there is something he/she can recommend to help ease the discomfort.

Anjuli

I was 18 when I had my surgery. You are very brave to be going through this so young. Take care of yourself and only keep POSITIVE people around you. You'll heal in no time. I had dryness also. Being a teen, hormones are not so stable, so give it time to settle down and talk to your doctor for any treatments (whether it be a yeast infection or whatever). I got an ointment (sorry can't remember what it was) and that helped a lot. I also didn't get my period back for almost a year. Just be open with your doctors, if they are not worried, then you don't have to worry. The more they know, the better care you get. I say all this, because it took me a long while to not be embarrassed to talk frankly with my doctor about all the gross and painful stuff. Good luck and I hope you have a speedy recovery.

Astroglyde (sp) is super. It helps a lot.

Thanks for your input everyone. I'll deffinetly talk to my ob-gyn and stop worrying. This too will pass, and atleast it's not UC.
Joleen

Another recommendation for Astroglide.

I had the same issue. I didn't know it could be related to the surgery, as I've already had my pouch for 15 yrs. I also got ointment (don't remember the name) from the female doc and used astroglide. Thank god it's not an intestinal issue

Amber