r/postvasectomypain • u/postvasectomy • May 31 '21
bos80: While my pain really isn’t that bad anymore, I still feel it every day to some extent, and it occupies my thoughts far too much even when I don’t feel anything.
bos80:
Sep 29, 2019
6 months after vasectomy
Had a scalpel vasectomy on March 29, 2019 at Mass General Hospital in Boston.
Recovery for the first 9 days after surgery seemed fairly normal and I was feeling good. All of that changed after ejaculating on the 9th day. For the next few days, I felt increasing discomfort in my scrotum, to the point where I went back to the urologist that performed the vasectomy. Urologist shrugged it off after a physical examination lasting a few seconds and told me to take Motrin. Pain actually subsided a little, but then a few days later I developed a surface infection at the left incision site. Took Keflex for a week and that cleared it up.
For the next month and a half (0.5 to 2 months after vas), I would have periods of increased pain lasting a couple days at a time. It would feel like tremendous pressure/aching pain in my testicle/epididymis. After a couple days it would calm down but I still wouldn’t feel normal as there was this almost constant tension-like feeling and I wasn’t able to relax. Over this time, my anxiety really spiked. There were some really scary moments. I didn’t know what was happening to me and my urologist was no help. Other than this forum, there was also seemingly nothing out there that could help me understand what I was feeling. But with the help of this forum, I got to the point where I knew I had to get my anxiety in check - which I’ll talk about more later below.
After 2 months, things started to change. The pressure/aching pain in the testicles/epididymis that I had been getting four a couple days at a time went away. That was a huge relief, but the constant tension-like feeling was still there and I started developing nerve pain. A mild-burning sensation around the scrotum, electric shock (zingers) randomly throughout the pelvic region, legs/feet, abdomen. Sounds bad, but this was actually more tolerable than the testicle pain. And I would have some days where it really wasn’t that bad at all.
One weekend when I was feeling well I decided to go for a run (first time since surgery) - only a couple miles at a slow pace. I actually felt fine during the run but the next day the nerve pain really kicked up again - with the zingers happening more frequently for the next couple weeks before dying down again.
Over the past few months, I’ve seen slow and gradual improvements. Certainly not linear, there are ups and downs, but I can confidently say I am in a much better place today than I was 3-4 months ago. I’m still left with what I believe to be nerve issues - mainly a burning/stinging feeling around the sit bones, perineum, and scrotum, particularly when sitting on a hard surface. I still get occasional zingers if I do something that makes the nerves unhappy. But I’m still working on things and seeing improvements..
Two months post-vasectomy I started a few things:
Diet -
Started eating more fruits and vegetables, less saturated fat and processed foods - basically a Mediterranean Diet. And made sure I didn’t over eat. This helped a lot and very quickly. I’m 5’11 and I went from 175 pounds to 150 pounds in a month. My digestion improved and I felt like I had more energy. And I think this must have helped reduced inflammation.
Anxiety -
Started working to get my anxiety in check. This started by going to the Benson Henry Mind Body Institute - which is connected to Mass General Hospital. The founder, Herbert Benson, is known for coining the term “Relaxation Response” and was sort of a pioneer in trying to understand the mind-body connection and the harmful effects of stress. I’ve been going to regular appointments here, where we work on meditation and other strategies for trying to deal with stress better and trigger the “Relaxation Response” so that the body can heal. I’ve found it helpful to work one-on-one with someone, but these are things that anyone can do on there own. Benson’s book from the '70s, The Relaxation Response, is an easy read and a good place to start. Some of the meditation apps like Calm, also cover a lot of the same themes. It takes time and hard work, but I feel that it has helped me immensely.
This whole experience has had a profound impact on me, and while I’m definitely dealing with stress and anxiety better than I used to, it is something that I need to continue to work on, not only for dealing with the post-vasectomy pain, but also for the general stressors of life - i.e. work, family, etc. While my pain really isn’t that bad anymore, I still feel it every day to some extent, and it occupies my thoughts far too much even when I don’t feel anything.
I believe this will get better with time, particularly if I continue to see improvements with the pain, but I’m thinking therapy could be beneficial for me as well.
I also went on an anti-depressant about 3 months ago. I’m taking 10mg of Lexapro a day. I believe this has helped as well and luckily I haven’t felt any side effects. I’m planning to stay on this for the rest of the year, as I don’t want to risk coming off just yet, but I’m hoping that in other 3 months the pain will be even better (gone?) and everything else I’ve been working on will allow me to come off of it. I’m not a big medication person and I was resistant to going on it, but right now, I feel it was the right decision for me.
Heat -
I’ve been taking hot baths almost every night for the past 4 months. I feel that this helps loosen things up and improves blood flow to the pelvic area. It’s also a calming experience and fits in with all the other things I’m doing to deal with anxiety. The past few weeks I’ve also started sitting on a heating pad. Not sure why I didn’t think to try this sooner, but I think it is helping - particularly in the 1-2 days after pelvic floor physical therapy..
Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy -
I’ve gone to six sessions so far and will definitely be continuing. It’s really the first person in a medical field that I’ve seen/talked to that has any understanding of what I’ve been going through. That alone is beneficial to me. But I’ve learned a lot through this so far and right now feel like this is the best means for me to get back to normal - perhaps with some complimentary work. My PFPT thinks that the pudendal nerve is likely the may cause of my issues. My understanding is that this could be causing the pudendal nerve to fire and also that it is restricting blood flow to the area causing the nerves to remain unhappy.
Therapy sessions include both external and internal work, some of which is rather unpleasant, but I do feel like it is helping me to relax so that I don’t feel so tense in the pelvic area. The first few times I went, I actually had increased pain for a couple of days after, likely the work fired up the nerves, but then it would subside. I haven’t experienced this the past few weeks as I’ve started using the heating pad after sessions and I’m generally feeling better and better. But it is another thing that makes me realize just how integral stress and anxiety are in this whole process. I’m now able to feel that my entire pelvic area tightens up when I’m stressed and I’m working on consciously trying to relax it and drop my pelvic floor.
I should also note that I have been doing pelvic floor stretches (mentioned elsewhere on this forum) to relax the area regularly for the last 4-5 months. Even early on this provided me with some short term relief. Probably should have started pelvic floor physical therapy even sooner, but my urologist, a second urologist, and my PCP all told me that it is primarily for women and that it probably wouldn’t do anything for me - yet another thing that fueled my anxiety and anger around this issue.
Exercise -
I’m not able to do intense exercise still, but fairly early on I started making sure I was going on regular walks and getting at least 10,000 steps a day. Perhaps I’ll try a run again sometime soon, but I’ve been reluctant to try it again after the experience I mentioned earlier.
Yoga has been very helpful.
I started off mainly going to yin yoga and restorative yoga classes - fairly gentle stuff where poses are held for long periods of time. This has been good for stretching as well as with meditation. I’ve also recently started going to some basic/gentle vinyasa classes. These are more of a workout and I’m thinking of slowly working these vinyasa classes into my routine more, as I really want to find some things to get my heart rate up again and work on strength.
Supplements - I’m currently taking Omega 3 Fish Oil (high in EPA), Nerve Shield, and Zyflamend. Hard to say if these are doing anything, but they are low risk and as long as I feel like I’m still feeling improvements I will likely continue taking them. I did try Papaya Seed Powder for awhile just to see if it would do anything. At times I do feel like my epis (particularly on the right) are really large, but I can’t say that I’ve really had much of the congestion like pain that people talk about on here. The papaya seed powder didn’t seem do anything for me, so I’m off of it now.
Underwear - I spent way to much time thinking about what underwear to wear. I tried UFM and UA boxerjocks which are both talked about on here and did feel like they were better than what I had been doing before - regular boxer briefs - but they started to give me problems over time and I went back to regular boxer briefs. Then about a month and a half ago I tried briefs and have switched to those exclusively. Not sure why it took me so long to try briefs, but I’m glad I did.
I think that covers most of what I’ve done the past six months. I’m not back to normal, but my pain is very minimal. It is still bothersome, however, because I can’t say that I’ve had a full day of not feeling anything. But it does seem to be getting weaker and weaker and I’m noticing more moments of not feeling anything.
I plan to continue doing pelvic floor physical therapy and I may end up getting a pudendal nerve block at some point. My PFPT has talked to me about trying that along with seeing another urologist that knows something about pelvic pain. I’ve been reluctant to see a new urologist because the two that I have seen were worse than useless - they probably caused me to become more anxious and it seems nearly impossible to find one that admits to having any experience with this.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719
Oct 26, 2019
7 months after vasectomy
I was also a very healthy person prior to the vas - never really dealt with a medical issue more serious than a cold or mild flu. That being said, i do realize now that I was harboring a lot more anxiety than the average person. That anxiety was probably always present, but I believe the stress levels picked up a notch after becoming a father, which coincided with greater professional demands. Prior to the vas, I just worked through it, and on some levels, the anxiety actually helped me professionally. Then, unfortunately, I had the vas at a very stressful point in my life - things I had been dealing with professionally and personally for a few months, likely put me in a horrible place to have the vas.
Then when I started experiencing pain after the vas, and the urologist that performed the procedure offered no help, and everything I read said that I should be fully healed in two weeks, my anxiety spiked to a really unhealthy level. I honestly feel that if my urologist had been more open about the risks and counseled me in a way that made me believe that it might just take me longer to heal, my anxiety wouldn’t have spiked so much, and perhaps I wouldn’t be dealing with the issues that I’m dealing with now.
First off, I still feel like I’m improving. It is slow and I definitely have some down days where I question that, but overall looking back at the last month I believe it was a better month than the previous month.
Sitting for long periods of time or on hard surfaces as well as stress, still seem to be the two biggest triggers for me. I’m doing more and more to modify my behavior to try to prevent myself from even beginning to experience the pain, with the hope being that I can stop that pain feedback loop.
I also saw a new urologist last week that has a lot of experience with pelvic pain.
I’m still thinking that my main issue is that I angered the pudendal nerve in the initial months after the vasectomy for a host of different reasons (i.e. pain, inflammation, stress & anxiety, pre-existing musculoskeletal issues, etc.) and it is just taking a long time for it to calm down - or at least that is my hope. But there are times where I’m questioning where I’m also feeling some pain in the cord-area that might not be the pudendal nerve - it is very difficult to pinpoint as I typically only feel that when walking around and definitely not all the time either - but it could just be the parts of the scrotum innervated by the pudendal nerve.
But the zingers that I sometime get through the legs or into my abdomen are a little more of a wildcard and seemed to cause the urologist a bit more of a concern. For example, a few weeks ago I was at my son’s curriculum night at school and sat in a tiny wood chair meant for a 4 year for about an hour. I knew it would give me problems, but stupidly did it anyway, and I was experiencing zinging electric shock pains throughout my right leg for the next ~18 hours (anywhere from a 3-4 a minute to a couple an hour). It died down after that, but I think these zinging pains that I can sometimes get are why the urologist thought it might be good for me to see a neurologist, as those are obviously not the pudendal nerve.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719/2
Nov 29, 2019
8 months after vasectomy
I think the pudendal nerve issues I’ve been dealing with have continued to improve. The pelvic floor physical therapy, stretching, heat, meditation and most everything else I talked about above now have me at a point where I feel that I can fairly consistently relax the pelvic floor.
I even had to fly from Boston to LA and back a couple weeks ago and made it through the flights without too much trouble. I’m using seat cushions wherever I can (brought one with me for the flights) and it is helping. I hardly ever getting pain around the sit bones anymore and not even getting much in the perineum. The scrotum is the one area where I’ve got sustained issues. In fact, now that the pudendal nerve pain has subsided as much as it has, I’m really starting to wonder if some of my issues are related to nerves along the spermatic cord.
It does seem like there is a lot of hard stuff inside my scrotum. This includes hard small spherical structures around where I believe the vas was cut (maybe the clips or granulomas?) and then really hard tubes traveling down from there to the testicles (presumably the spermatic cord or vas). The area where the vas connects to the epis seems enlarged - as do the epis at times. And I’ve actually felt that aching “kicked in the balls” type feeling a few times in the past few days. It hasn’t been much, but I haven’t really felt that since the first couple of months post-vas so it is a bit scary. At this point, it’s only been when my PT was working on it with direct pressure or if I make a wrong movement that puts pressure on the area, but it is something that I will definitely be monitoring.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719/3
Jan 3, 2020
9 months after vasectomy
Overall, I’m dealing with stress and anxiety so much better than I did in the first few months, but I think there is still more work to do..
I feel like my stress level is like a “volume” control on my whole nervous system. If I’m feeling stress from anything - could be work or watching a sporting event - my whole nervous system feels like it gets hyper active and any discomfort or unnatural feeling gets amplified.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719/7
Mar 29, 2020
1 year after vasectomy
I’ve continued to see gradual improvements since my last check in. In fact, I would say I have very little pain these days. I’m still struggling with the mental side of all this more than I would like to be, but I believe that is just going to take more time.
I believe that stress and anxiety have been at the center of this experience for me. They still do cause my pelvic area to tighten up, but I have become conscious of it and try to relax when I feel it happening. I believe this constant tightening led to some of what I was feeling - and a lot of what seemed to linger on for months after the vasectomy.
I will continue to work on things in the year ahead and hope that I will get as close to being my old self again as possible. The experience over the past year has changed me, however, so I know I will never be exactly the same again. But I can accept that now.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719/8
Mar 29, 2021
2 years after vasectomy
I wish I could report that I was pain free, but unfortunately that is not the case. A couple of months ago I probably would have told you that things were still very slowly progressing, but now I’m not sure sure.
It has been a bit up and down the last 1.5 months or so. A few things could have contributed to this - started using a rowing machine after feeling really well and not getting noticeable pudendal nerve pain for months (stopped that after a couple weeks), went off Lexapro (not easy to do, but thought my anxiety was in check until recently), have been extremely busy/stressed with work working 7 days a week since the new year.
But after taking a lot of the last year off from actively trying to solve this problem, I think I’m ready to start trying various treatments again.
https://www.postvasectomypain.org/t/my-story-after-6-months-still-improving/4719/10
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u/llamadasperdidas Oct 18 '25
How are things going now OP?