Recovering from Ovarian Cancer Surgery
- No two ovarian cancer surgery experiences are the same, but most women can expect their full recovery to take 6-8 weeks
- Women are encouraged to move and walk around during their recovery period
- Avoiding heavy lifting and strenuous exercise that engages your core can help facilitate the healing process
- Even though the full recovery can take 8 weeks, most women can expect to feel like their normal selves again after about 4 weeks
It sounds like a long time, but Dr. Rachel Brightwell, a gynecologic oncologist with Austin Cancer Centers, emphasizes that “six to eight weeks of recovery” does not at all mean that you’re going to be laying in bed for two whole months.
Read More Moving around during recovery, on the contrary, is really important. According to Dr. Brightwell, getting up and walking around insomuch as you are able to can help prevent life-threatening blood clots called “DVTs.” Six-to-eight weeks can give women enough time to regain strength in what’s called their “fascia,” which is the sheet of connective tissue beneath your skin that holds your organs in place (including, importantly, your bowels). To facilitate this healing process and give the fascia a full chance to recover, Dr. Brightwell says, it’s best not to do any heavy lifting or exercises that require you to really engage your core. Engaging your abdomen muscles too much during recovery, she says, can put a heavy strain on the sutures (stitches) that the surgeons put in the fascia. “We just don’t want anything putting a lot of pressure on that,” says Dr. Brightwell. “That’s what takes the six-to-eight weeks.”
Usually, women will find that that the worst of their pain subsides in about two weeks post-surgery, which Dr. Brightwell calls getting “over the hump.” By about four weeks, she says, most women will feel back to their full selves.
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