I know I’m late in publishing October’s journal, but this week is the first time I can comfortably sit at the computer, even for just an hour at a time. And I’ve updated my pain logs since surgery (finally!), as well as my data spreadsheets! I’m so excited!

I’ll update you on my surgery (what they did, what they found, what they removed) in a separate post, but the pre- and post-op pain is a night and day difference! And the pain I’m now experiencing is me healing from the intense surgery…and I mean intense.

Okay, on with the show! (I cannot wait to update you on surgery!! Stay tuned for that post!)

My entire October pain and diet tracking journal can be viewed one slide at a time here. It even includes the medications and struggles/victories while I was in the hospital for four days:

And here’s the breakdown of my pain during October on statistical scale:

What are you looking at? It’s my pain levels every day during October. The green row shows my date of surgery. And the red rows are when I was on my period. I attribute all post-op pain due to the intense surgery that was done as well as my period. I wholeheartedly believe non-period pain will fade as I continue to heal from surgery.

• We only had sex once in October (sex has become just too damn painful) and that hurt. So, sex hurt 100% of attempts during October.
• My bowel movements hurt 89% of the time before surgery, and ZERO percent after surgery. YAY!
• The lower left abdomen hurt 95% of the time before surgery and 27% after surgery.
• The lower right abdomen hurt 15% of the time before and 9% after.
• The lower mid abdomen/uterus area hurt 5% before and 45% after surgery.
• My lower back hurt 42% of the time before surgery and 36% after, most of which was while I was laying in the hospital bed or on my period.
• It hurt 10% of the time to pee before surgery and 0% after
• And, of course, I had 0% incision pain before surgery and 100% after. This too shall fade!

I had to take a moment to sit back and cry yesterday when I finished updating my October tracker. Look at that difference before and after surgery!!! I can’t even!! Zero bowel movement pain. Very little lower left quadrant pain. Very little lower right quadrant pain. Zero pain when I piss. And, again, I know the rest will fade as I continue to heal! And, hell, I’m all emotional again. I can’t wait to update November’s pain tracker!

Okay, now my favorite part…the poopy pain charts!!!

If you can’t read the tiny numbers on the above-chart, it shows I had painful bowel movements (whether it was a solid poo or diarrhea) almost the entire month of October, some reaching as high as a 9 out of 10 on the pain-scale. It took me a few days to be able to poop after surgery, but every poop in October after surgery has been 100% pain-free!

Again, I cannot express how pleased I am that Dr. Mel Kurtulus and Dr. Matthew Schultzel spotted and removed the Endometriosis from my guts. And then some…I cannot WAIT to write about my surgery! Take that, diarrhea!!!!

And want to see something that JUST NOW made me cry as I created it? October’s solid poop pain…the pain when ya pass something NOT diarrhea:

I cannot express, CANNOT EXPRESS, how important it is to track your symptoms and diet. Sharing my pain journals with my Endometriosis excision surgeon and my colo-rectal surgeon led them straight to my Endometriosis during surgery. Straight. To. It.

I know that oftentimes Endo pain can radiate and be tricky and the lesions can be elsewhere, too, which is why it’s important to have a surgeon skilled in spotting and excising it from everywhere…BUT…I’m a firm believer that Step One is tracking. We have to do our diligent part to not only learn and know our own bodies, but do it in a way that we can share with our healthcare team.

I look forward to sharing about my surgery! And am really excited to transcribe and analyze November’s pain journal!

I hope you’re all doing well. And if you’re not doing well, I’m right here for you. Always.