I lived with bladder prolapse for over 10 years and finally it got to a point where I was having bleeding and also it was causing me to not be able to urinate because it was dropped so low that the urine could not flow up-hill so to speak as it needed to to reach the urethra. Anyway, I got two opinions from two different urogynecologists and both recommended a procedure called sacrocolpopexy. It does involve mesh and I hesitated for a while because of that. But both told me that because my prolapse was stage 3 (it was stage 4 by the time I did the surgery), there was a very high probability that if the ligaments were just repaired, the prolapse would return. So after much deliberation, I ended up doing the surgery with the mesh. It was done with the daVinci robot and I had 4 little holes in my tummy none of which involved any stitches that had to be removed. I have no scar tissue that is visible and you can't see the spots unless you look very carefully. In order to do this surgery, it is most often that a hysterectomy is done along with it because basically the uterus is in the way. Again, I was hesitant but went ahead as I am postmenopausal and am 63 years old. I use Estrace Cream now a couple of times a week just for tissue health as recommended by my doctor but I did not have any ill effects from the hysterectomy at all. Bottom line is I wish that I had done this about 5 years prior to doing it. It would have saved meyself so much pain and agony. The bleeding from the pessary that I tried to wear and the nights when I could not urinate and laid awake in such discomfort could have all been avoided. As far as incontinence, I did not have this at all prior to surgery but my doctor did something called a urodynamics study in order to see if I would likely have incontinence once the prolapse was fixed. Apparently they can project based upon this study whether they need to make any adjustments during the surgery for you if you are likely to be incontinent after the repair. When you have a prolapse it can mask incontinence because the urine cannot flow. Therefore, after the repair your incontinence may become evident. So my doctor found with the study that I likely did have some incontinence. He corrected for it during the prolapse surgery and I have not had any problems. My friends say I have the bladder of a 19 year old now. I stayed in the hospital for two nights following my surgery. It is usually one night but I requested my doctor let me stay two since I live alone. I came home with a catheter in and it stayed for 7 days after surgery. On the morning it was to be removed, as you might guess I showed up early for my appointment. I don't know if this addressed the scar tissue issue very well but this is my experience. Please ask me any questions you like and I am glad to share what I can. If you are willing to travel out of town and want my doctor's contact information, I can certainly share that as well. I am nearly a year post surgery and have no issues whatsoever. I wish you well and am so sorry you are having such pain and difficulty. I am a chronic pain sufferer from some back issues and so I know how pain can really get you down. Best of luck to you.

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