To ask about your C-Section scar?

[HelloBunny]

Aibu to think that mine might have healed nicely by now? Or do some scars never really fade away to the fabled feint line?

I had EMCS almost a year ago. The recovery was brutal... The scar was very raw / lumpy, and took ages to settle down. I used a medicated lotion on it for the first three months.

Now, it’s still quite delicate. I never really touch it. It’s livid, purple, and sticks out as if it was a long earth worm across my front. Behind it the muscle (or whatever) is hard.

It still feels tight at times & gets “tired” after long walks / housework, etc... I haven’t done any heavy exercise (or lost much baby weight). I’m not a young woman, so maybe that’s a factor!

Funny thing is, I have no stretch marks & my pink freckly skin behaved quite well during / after the pregnancy (I did lotion or coconut oil every day). I’m not left with hang-y skin, either (well, perhaps when I lose more weight...)

The scar is quite low down, but catches on knickers that are not granny pants (I would to give them up!). I’ve had my bikini days, so I’m not much worried about that...

Yanbu - it will eventually improve.
Yabu - you’re stuck with it for life.

Mine was a lot like that but the lumpiness and hardness did eventually go away. It’s very low, thin and quite faint now. I had a lot of numbness in the area that the GP said might be permanent, but all the feeling did come back, probably took months to a year.
I have the overhang, had no idea it was a thing until it happened to me!

I get weird pains from the scar up to my belly button still. Sometimes the skin hurts sometimes it doesn’t
It’s weird

Op what skin colour are you? I'm Asian, my scars have faded to a dark brown and I'm 11yrs post section

Mine soddingwell traumatised me. I think about it regularly. I have birth on a hospital an hour away from where I live. On my own. Drove myself there and back. I did far too much when I got home and ended up with a massive (MASSIVE) build up of fluid. It kept gushing out. I have never heard it happening to anyone else. Pints and pints. Over and over. The scar is dimpled. Still numb. I was a mess. Put me off having more kids. Got a perfect one out of it though. I think about it regularly though. I remember my sister sitting on the edge of the bed holding the baby and water was shooting out of me.

Mine is rather stylishly hidden by a massive overhang. It’s quite pale in places but visible in others.

Mine is virtually invisible. My stomach is fucked though - loose skin and terrible stretch marks. So I need a tummy tuck and I’ll definitely have an enormous fucking scar from that. I would happily swap you OP.

As a pp suggested it sounds like a keloid scar. I had the same as you with my first but the second was better and didn’t turn into a keloid scar (& the original scarring was removed). People who haven’t had them & have the faint line have not had this kind of scar so it’s not relevant to your experience.

There are a lot of resources & apparently some ways of reducing or improving it:

www.nhs.uk/live-well/healthy-body/keloid-scars/

As you say though OP, you had a positive outcome & that’s the silver lining. My second scar is far from pretty but I don’t have the tenderness or itchiness that came with that first one so I have experienced both the keloid and a ‘normal’ scar. I had a six year gap before my second DC and remember the first scar being really annoying, catching on clothes & causing discomfort, if I hadn’t ended up having a second I may have tried to resolve it another way as it’s just a bit uncomfortable. As for the numbness - my understanding is that it’s to do with nerve endings, either not connecting any more or worse still ending up in a slightly different position! There’s an area about an inch above my scar to one side that if I touch it feels like I’m touching below the scar, that’s just a weirdness I guess I have to live with (again back to the positive outcome - I’ll always feel lucky that both DS1 & I survived a fairly horrific birth experience & if an ugly scar and some displaced nerve endings are the worst thing I have to suffer then it’s ok!).

(oh and first c-section was nearly 18 years ago for context!!)

wizzywig, fair freckly skin. Prone to sunburn, heat rash, keratosis pilaris, stretch marks (got them as a teen, on my thighs). So, I expected stretch marks more that anything, but all of my lotion action paid off, it seems!

Going to try a good oil, as suggested, daily. Now I feel a bit better about touching it... When it was first healing there was a lump on one side that I tried to massage. But that made me worry about it more, so I ignored it & it more or less went away by itself (it might still be there, but I don’t check anymore!)

Mine is tiny (maybe 2 or 3 inches) and silver, its also under the hair (tmi). I had a consultant do my c section, my son was very premature, 28 wks, 1lb 10lb so I think I had the best surgeons they had do it due to the huge risk to his life. Luckily no over hang just goes a bit shelf like if I get to fat. It can still sometimes feel a bit odd but it never bothers me anymore. That was 12 years ago.

20 months on mine is pretty much flat and invisible. However I have a significant patch of skin above the scar where I've lost most or all sensation.

I have 2. Both tiny and invisible. From 15+ years ago, so ages ago. But still occasionally itchy. Wierd. And big overhang, which I've given up caring about.

The kangaroo pouch sucks after c section. Feel as though the only way to get rid is a tummy tuck! No amount of exercise gets rid of it.

DD is now 4 and my scar is still very visible. No pain or numbness though. I have the delightful shelf. Spanx helps

@AnneLovesGilbert

Yes I get itching, also deeper than skin and I also get a burning sensation 8 years on.

Could be a hypertrophic scar? My first was like that, the only positive of having a second Cs was they cut that one off and my new one healed perfectly!

I can’t really see mine now as it’s just a silvery line but its so far down in my pubes because my son was very premature that it killed all the hair follicles and I’ve got a big bald line 🤣😬

Mine’s the same. Not keloid but hypertrophic. It will flatten on its own over time, but a twice daily massage with Vaseline is the only thing proven to improve the look of scars. It’s the act of massage not the product, which helps. (From a dermatology consultant).

@Garman

Could be a hypertrophic scar? My first was like that, the only positive of having a second Cs was they cut that one off and my new one healed perfectly!

This is something I’m hoping for if I do decide to have a second! 😂 you’ve given me hope.

Get yourself some Kelo cote it helps flatten out keloid scars or raised scars, reduces redness and speeds up healing

I had mine 3 years ago and it was very purple and lumpy until about 6 months ago when all of a sudden it flattened out and faded. It's still very visible and hurts when I've done anything strenuous. I'm so glad you posted this OP as I thought I was just being over sensitive and imagining it all but it seems normal for some women to have very long recovery times. I wonder if it makes a difference whether it was elective or emergency?

I’d say so, nailsathome. Doctors were urging me to have a C-Section as soon as I went in for my induction, so they could book it in & be organized. Midwives advised me to keep going with labour.
In the end the doctors were called in when things weren’t happening fast enough. It was all very fast & late at night. The doctors were running between multiple births, so I was in & out in less than an hour, I think...
Having said that, I’m very happy with how my birth went. I know women who had elective C-Section, and the scar is the least of their worries... Birth is so precarious, whatever way it happens. I’ll always be grateful to the midwife who looked after us.

Definitely sounds like a keloid scarring as other folk have said. Try the gel patches and creams but if they don't help it's worth visiting your gp at some point. I've had similar scarring from a different operation (on my ribs and stomach) and ended up having to get a series of injections from a dermatologist into the scarring to calm it down which has worked well.

Like a PP I had mine ‘tidied up’ at my second (non elective) C section. Had internal adhesions/scarring helped then too.

Didn’t have the scar sensitivity / ‘angriness’ you mention.

Some years later still have a large numb area and a ‘shelf’. But much neater and no more internal pulling!