Oct 23, 2011

I am back in my own bed...I was released yesterday afternoon. I feel so much better than I did a few days ago. I haven't had a real bowel movement yet. I'm taking Vicadin for pain and that will constipate people. It's nice to be home. My critters were so happy to see me, especially Jinx...he must have meowed for 10 straight minutes. I can eat most foods now, but I have to stay away from gas causing ones for a while though. I plan to make lots of smoothies and juicing. I have to change the way I take meds and vitamins now. Did you know alot of these pills are digested in the intestines? I thought they were in the stomach. The vitamins and herbs I take now are in capsules so I will break them open and add them to my smoothies. If I need antibiotics I will need them in liquid form. This change will be forever. I will also need to eat smaller more frequent meals and drink more water.
I had a small scare this morning at 6am. I woke up and went to the bathroom to pee and my pullup had diarrhea mixed with blood in it. I thought at first that my stoma bag leaked, but that was secure. It definitely came out of my rectum and small fresh drops of blood continued to come out. I also had cramping and pain all over my abdomen, not just my incisions, so I called the emergency room nurse to see if I should come in, she told me they were slammed with trauma patients....its Saturday night and lots of shootings (my personal comment) but that I could come in to get checked out. I decided to wait for the "rush" to get over and go back to sleep.  I got up 3 hours later, nothing in my pullup now and my abdomen feels better. I will wait and see. If there is something wrong it should leak out of my rectum again. If it does I will go to emergency and get it looked at.
It will take practise to get this changing my stoma bag down. There are lots of steps. I can only change it 2-3 times a week...I will only get enough supplies for that amount.  The supplies will run total about $300 a month! Emptying the bag will be ok. I will rinse it out with my squirt bottle to keep any odors to a minimum. I have to admit my stoma looks weird...it is actually my intestine sticking out of my skin, luckily it does not have nerves. It looks like a fat tongue and sticks out about 1/4 of an inch. Look it up on google image under colostomy and stoma if you are curious. I was going to post a photo of it on my blog but I figured it might gross some people out. It sure will be nice to have the freedom to leave my house earlier and not poop my pants anymore.

Eat your fruits & veggies!   xo  Inge

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