Fiona
Fiona suffers with recurrent urinary tract infections and a pelvic organ prolapse. She has had previous mesh surgery which helped her symptoms for about four years. Fiona is currently waiting to see an urogynaecologist.
Fiona is a full-time admissions officer working in an educational setting. She has three grown up children and lives with her fiancé. She describes herself as White British.
Conditions: recurrent UTI, pelvic organ prolapse
More about me...
Fiona suffered with urinary tract infections for more than a year despite several courses of antibiotics. The infections caused vomiting, headache, pain, stinging, burning and blood in her urine: she felt like she had been “hit by a brick wall”. At times, Fiona found it difficult to continue her full-time work, housework, and things that she enjoyed. Fiona does not feel that she was listened to, or investigated early enough, and it came to a point where she was rushed to hospital with a kidney infection. After this, Fiona insisted that the doctor did further investigations to find out what was going on and these revealed a vitamin D deficiency. Fiona feels cross and embarrassed when other people have suggested that infection is caused by poor personal hygiene.
Fiona has also had pelvic organ prolapse and incontinence for some years but has felt embarrassed to talk to her doctor. She always has to make sure that there is a toilet nearby and worries that she’s “not going to get there in time”. There have been times that she has been “caught short” and had to “go behind a bush” in the countryside. She had mesh surgery to ‘hold up’ her bladder some years ago, which she says helped her symptoms for about four years. Fiona feels that there is a stigma related to prolapse and incontinence because it is a sign of the body “falling apart” with age. She also lost her brother to cancer and did not want to go to the doctor for fear that it might be something serious. However, as Fiona was getting increasingly sore, she decided she needed to “bite the bullet” and gave herself “a bit of a talking to” about going to seek help. She plans to get married in the near future and would like to be able to enjoy an intimate relationship with her partner.
Fiona also lives with persistent pain from Fibromyalgia and feels that this diagnosis is sometimes used to explain any other symptom. She understands that doctors are very busy and feels that this has resulted in a loss of ‘community’ knowledge, which means that you are “forever having to repeat …what you’ve gone through”. Fiona describes herself as a strong person who has “learnt to be a fighter”. Indeed, she would not change who she is today despite the challenges that she has faced. However, there are times that she does not feel as strong as people think that she is: “you’re quite a vulnerable …[and being ill] knocks you back a little”. At times, she feels low and emotional. Fiona feels it is helpful to confide in people so that you do not feel alone, and she is able to confide in her partner who “looks after” her when she needs him to. Fiona feels that people are more open and accepting about incontinence than they used to be when she was younger. She thinks it would be a good idea for girls to learn about these issues at school.
Fiona feels that life has become so busy that it is taking its toll on our bodies. She favours natural remedies and mindfulness and drinks plenty of water to “clean yourself, insides out”. However, she strongly feels that if you have an infection you need to seek medical treatment or it can get very serious. She would like more doctors to be fully trained in pelvic floor dysfunctions and urinary tract infection.
Fiona was left “quite bedridden at times” by her urinary infections, and needed her children’s help to get routine housework done.
Fiona was left “quite bedridden at times” by her urinary infections, and needed her children’s help to get routine housework done.
Basically, you lose a lot, for me, I lost a lot of weight because I just couldn’t eat. I couldn’t, because it affects, because I’m in pain anyway it was just another additional pain on top of that so I was quite bedridden at times couldn’t go to work. Luckily, my children are all grown up or older so they would do the housework. I couldn’t do housework, I couldn’t do, you know, even change my bed, you know, needed help sort of to the bathroom all those types of things, it completely affected my life. It took all my strength basically I was sort of, you would think I would have a real chronic illness and was recovering from it but all it was a water infection. I don’t think people realise how serious they can become if you don’t get the right treatment.
After having urinary tract infections every week or so for nearly nine months, Fiona asked her GP for some investigations.
After having urinary tract infections every week or so for nearly nine months, Fiona asked her GP for some investigations.
I think the best example I would was obviously suffering with them the whole year and continuously going up into the doctors every two weeks, every week for months and months and then I just thought, “No.” You know, I was, my life was very busy, my work life is very busy and it got to the point where I thought, ‘No, there’s definitely something wrong’ and I went up again and he just looked at me and just went, “Oh I’ll give you these antibiotics,” and I went, “No,” I said, “this has been going on, look at my records and you can see I’ve been suffering for nearly eight, nine months and you have not even asked to investigate this any further. I need you to do something and that’s when they did all the blood tests and they come back and they said, “Oh yeah, you’re not producing Vitamin D,” and since then I obviously I take my Vitamin D and I’ve been quite lucky touch wood, so yeah.