'I'm in pain the whole time': Vaginal mesh survivor Margaret

Margaret Byrne at Leinster House for an Oireachtas health committee hearing on vaginal meshes. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photos

Twenty-two years and eight surgeries after she had a vaginal mesh inserted, Margaret Byrne is in pain every day.

The mesh had been seen as a better solution to pelvic organ prolapse  and urinary incontinence than the traditional approaches. Instead, it has led to thousands of women suffering decades of pain, incontinence, and tears in their bladder or bowel.

"I screamed at him I wanted this out of my body," is how Margaret remembers one fraught conversation with her doctor.

In 2017, Margaret was among the first Irish women to go public with concerns, after she saw protests in the UK and realised she was not alone.

"I'm in pain the whole time," Margaret says. "I got the mesh put in in the year 2000, so its 22 years. I was a young woman then, 48,” the mother of three says.

The mesh was inserted to treat stress urinary incontinence, which can develop after giving birth.

Her pain continues, however, and she says bluntly: "I'm doubly incontinent now my bowel is gone as well." On Wednesday, she joined other women supporting Mesh Survivors Ireland and Mesh Ireland, from Northern Ireland, at the Oireachtas health committee.

Five years on from that first interview, the group's existence is a huge help.

"Things have changed in that, definitely, the Government is aware of it, the surgeons know about it," Margaret says. "I do feel there is a lot more needs to be done. I do feel there should be a redress scheme for women who have been injured." At the time, she was told the traditional method of creating an internal sling from her own tissues would need a six-week recovery.

In contrast, she was told mesh could be installed through key-hole surgery, would leave no scars, and she could be back at work after six days.

As a busy software engineer, this seemed like the better option, one she and other women bitterly regret.

However, within a week she noticed a brown discharge, indicating infection.

"I realised there was more to it than that, when I felt, myself, that inside that the mesh, which has a sharp edge to it, had eroded into my vagina," Margaret says.

"So the edge was exposed, a good inch of it was exposed. It went right through; it is like a really jagged edge, it is like a piece of tape about an inch wide with a zig-zag edge. You could see it and feel it." 

For three years a surgeon tried to fix this by trimming the edge, then covering it with skin or burying it, but nothing worked.

The intertwining of the mesh and human skin has been described as similar to chewing gum stuck in hair.

She and her husband were unable to have sex for years.

"We couldn’t have sex, because he was getting cut with it as well," she says. "I know a lot of women are ashamed to talk about this. If you are in a small community, or whatever, you don't want people to know you can't have sex with your husband; it’s a stigma thing. Some men have left their wives because of this; it is not an easy thing.” 

She is hopeful this committee hearing will lead to more awareness, and even this week the group has been contacted by another new family seeking help.

The use of transvaginal mesh implants was suspended in Ireland in 2018.