What this experience covers
This is a composite drawn from many anonymised accounts. It is not one person’s story. It brings together people who lived with an anal fissure for most of a decade, and who eventually healed.
Some had a single fissure that never quite closed. Some had several over the years. A few also had an abscess or a fistula along the way, or a sentinel skin tag that grew while the fissure came and went. What they share is a long middle, a turning point, and a different relationship with their body at the end.
If you are early in your own fissure, this is not a forecast. Most fissures heal far sooner. These accounts are here for the people who have been at it for years and need to hear from others who got out.
The pattern
The silent years
A striking number of people describe years of managing alone before they told anyone. The reasons are familiar: embarrassment, hoping it would sort itself out, flares spaced just far enough apart to put off the appointment. Some say the first few years were spent “coping” rather than treating it.
Looking back, this is the part people most often wish they had done differently. Not because seeing someone would have fixed it overnight, but because the clock on treatment options only started once they did.
Healed, re-torn, healed again
Once treatment starts, a common rhythm sets in. A prescribed ointment is used, things settle, and for a few weeks or months it feels over. Then one hard or rushed bowel movement and it is back. People describe this loop running for years, sometimes with a skin tag forming as evidence of how many times it has happened.
Triggers people name include a constipated week, a bout of diarrhoea, long days sitting, travel, pregnancy and the weeks after birth, a hospital stay with painkillers that slowed everything down, and for some, the days around a period.
When something else is going on
In a smaller group, the fissure was not the whole story. Some found the reason it would not stay healed was an underlying condition, such as Crohn’s disease, that needed its own treatment. Others had a fistula or abscess alongside, which brought swelling and discharge rather than the classic sharp pain. A few were told after years that their main problem was a tight pelvic floor, or skin thinned by long-term steroid cream use, rather than an open tear.
People in this group often say the real turning point was being properly examined and, sometimes, tested, rather than trying another cream.
What finally changed
Almost nobody describes a single fix. The accounts that end in healing usually describe a combination, often in this order:
- A procedure that reduced sphincter tension or treated the fissure directly (Botox, lateral internal sphincterotomy, fissurectomy, or a flap), sometimes more than one
- Steady stool management afterwards, without big swings between hard and loose
- Work on the muscles: pelvic floor physiotherapy, relaxation, and for some, dilation discussed with their clinician
- Treating whatever else was going on, whether that was bowel disease, a fistula, or stress
Several people say the surgery did not feel like the end at the time. It got them to a point where the slower, daily measures could finally work.
Stopping being “a fissure person”
After a decade, the fissure becomes part of identity. People describe organising work, travel, food and intimacy around it, and then struggling to stop once it heals. Trusting a normal bowel movement can take months. Some keep their old routine for a long time as a kind of insurance, and gradually relax it.
What comes next
People in these accounts say they would tell their earlier self three things. Get examined properly, early. Ask what else could be going on if it keeps coming back. And do not wait for a perfect moment to discuss the next option.
If you have been dealing with a fissure for a long time, it can help to write down what has happened so far: what you tried, for how long, what made it flare. That history is what a colorectal clinician will want.
When to seek care. Call 999 or go to A&E if bleeding is heavy, will not stop, or makes you feel faint. Get urgent help (NHS 111 or your local urgent care line) for fever or feeling unwell with pain near the bottom, a painful swelling or a lump that discharges pus, or severe pain with being unable to pass stool or wind. See a clinician promptly for new difficulty controlling stool or gas, a lasting change in bowel habits, weight loss, or dark blood mixed into the stool. If a fissure has been present for more than six to eight weeks, or keeps coming back, it is reasonable to ask for a referral to a colorectal specialist.