So, I’m nine weeks post-op as of today. As expected month 2 really kicked my ass. Getting better week by week, but definitely up and down.

The good news is that pain has been gradually improving. In fact, I’ve often been late taking my pain meds for the last week because my body hasn’t been making it clear that it was time to take them. So starting to experiment with ramping down the amount.

Unfortunately those plans have been foiled the last couple days by a probable urethral opening tear. (Thanks constipation…) Which is really painful, and all the more so because I’ve having to wear menstrual pads for the discharge, which makes it pretty much impossible for the tender area not to be rubbed and bleeding constantly. At night, even a single bed sheet put an uncomfortable amount of pressure there. Doesn’t help that dilating puts pressure on the urethra can cause irritation, plus the dilator stretching the skin around the urethra wasn’t pleasant at all. But gotta dilate lest my neo-vagina close up. So just tried to do my best to grit my teeth and think of England.

There’s also been two bouts with vaginal order, which occurs when I don’t get the lube (used for dilations) completely rinsed out and it ferments. Which can occur rapidly and smells really nasty. Thankfully, I’d reached the point where I could switching from the irrigation syringe to an actual vaginal douche bottle, which resolved things. (With either it’s just rinsing with clear water.)

Still fairly wiped out, since at a minimum I’ve had to wake up every three hours to take pain meds, and there have been plenty of nights where I’ve also woken frequently due to pain. Hard to nap during the day because they’re doing construction next door.

I knew it was going to be hard recovery, but I definitely underestimated how hard it would be. But I’ll get through it. Until then, I’m just embracing the suck.