What this experience covers
This experience covers a confusing and demoralising situation: your fissure has healed — your surgeon has confirmed it — but you are still in pain. This composite is drawn from many anonymised accounts of people who discovered that their pelvic floor was the source of their ongoing symptoms.
The pattern
The confusion
People describe a specific kind of bewilderment. The fissure was the problem. The fissure has healed. So why does it still hurt?
The pain is often different from the original fissure pain — less sharp, more diffuse, more of an ache or pressure — but it is persistent and real.
The discovery
Through specialist assessment — often with a pelvic floor physiotherapist — people learn that their pelvic floor muscles have been in a state of chronic tension. Months of clenching against fissure pain trained the muscles into a pattern they do not know how to release.
The treatment
Pelvic floor physiotherapy becomes the new treatment path. People describe:
- Learning to identify and release pelvic floor tension
- Breathing exercises that target the deep muscles
- Gradual reduction in symptoms over weeks to months
- A very different kind of treatment from anything they experienced for the fissure itself
The resolution
Most people describe significant improvement with pelvic floor work, though it takes time and consistent practice.
What people wish they had known
- That the pelvic floor can maintain pain independently of the original fissure
- That this is a recognised condition, not something imaginary
- That pelvic floor physiotherapy exists and is effective for this
- That the pain after healing deserves its own investigation and treatment
When to contact your doctor
Seek medical attention if you experience:
- Ongoing pain after a confirmed healed fissure
- Pain that is worsening or changing character
- New symptoms — bleeding, bowel changes
- Impact on quality of life that warrants investigation