Extension to sick note after hysterectomy

[Saywhatyoumeanandmeanwhatyousa]

I recently had a total abdominal hysterectomy. I have a vertical incision from my sternum to my pubic bone. The surgery wasn’t straightforward as I had a large number of adhesions from previous surgeries.

The wound became infected, although this has now cleared up after two courses of antibiotics.

The hospital signed me off work for six weeks, and I am due back at work on Monday. I honestly don’t feel ready to go back, but I don’t know if it would be reasonable to ask for an extension to my sicknote.

Is 6 weeks a normal amount of time to take off? I would be very grateful for any experiences or advice. Thank you.

Of course it would speak to your GP. I had a hysterectomy that was not straight forward at my third birth and it took me four months to be able to manage the school run.

I’m sorry to hear you’ve had to go through that and that it wasn’t straightforward. I haven’t had an hysterectomy but I would encourage you to extend your sick leave if you are not ready to return to work, whether that’s physically or mentally not ready.

I’ve had issues in the past with pregnancy and the way I’ve looked at it is no one is going to give me an award. If you go back, They will expect you are 100% ok to be back at work, you know you are not ready so please don’t push yourself

I had a vertical scar although not as long as yours. I took extra time off. I was an Early Years Teacher and had to bend down to work with children and heave equipment about. I went back two weeks before the summer holidays and that wore me out so I was glad of the further 6 weeks to recuperate. If your job involves sitting at a desk it would probably be possible to go back sooner. There's no point going back to work if you can't do your job properly and have to rely on other people to do things for you and only you know how you actually feel.

My TAH was straightforward - horizontal incision and no infection - but I found I needed another week after the six weeks elapsed because it was still painful to sit upright for too long.

The six weeks is a minimum and everyone's recovery is different. With the complexity of your procedure and the infection afterwards, it sounds totally expected that you would need longer. Someone I worked with who had the same procedure was off for about three months, for example.

You should contact your GP and arrange an extension - discuss with them how long you may need.

If you haven't already, I would also ask your employer for a phased return. I started on half days (but worked in the middle of the day, i.e. 10-2) and built up my hours by an hour a week, adding half an hour at each end so I had three weeks before I was back to full time - this worked well for me.