Monday – April 27th, 2014

It’s been 4 weeks since surgery. The days following surgery seemed to drag. I remember thinking a few times that I just wanted to fast forward a few weeks so I wouldn’t have to deal with all of this. Now here I am. I’m a little less tired than I was last week.. granted it’s nine and I am in bed. I am definitely moving around much better. Bending up and down and lifting my legs are still tough… not because of soreness or pain, but because I am just weak. Also, it feels a bit uncomfortable to bend down, especially when I have a belt on and it’s right up against the bottom of the bag. I am still waiting on the stealth belt. No real problems to report bag wise. Everything seems to be going okay. I weighed 111 pounds at my 2 week check up… I weight 120 pounds now, at least that’s what the scale at my house reads. (not 100% reliable) The point is, I am getting some weight back. It’ll just have to take time unfortunately. I have been waking up at night at least once to release the air from my bag. I am now realizing that there’s no reason to get a bag without a filter. With a filter you can avoid having to open the bag to release the air. With a filter it takes care of it for you and is odor free. A huge plus. Why they even have bags without the filter is beyond me, but is certainly something I wish I knew before I ordered 20 bags without one. My nurse (mom) is going to call for me tomorrow and see if we can get a sample of a bag or two with the filter. That would save me a lot of middle of the night wake-ups and trips to the bathroom to let the air out myself. We’ll see how it goes. I am ready to be back to normal. I also have not tried to drink yet. After work tomorrow will be my first experiment. One Captain and Coke. Wednesday I’ll do two, thursday three, and so on until my bag explodes, or until I do… I’ve got to test my limits. Also, if I can’t swing a golf club soon I’ll certainly lose my mind. The weather is getting real nice here… I need to play. My next bag change isn’t until Thursday morning.. the day of my trip to Boston. I’ll check back in then! Oh, one more thing.. tonight I dumped out a bottle of LIALDA and 6MP. That sure did feel good. Also, I’ve been off Prednisone for a week, and I’m feeling real good!

Monday, March 30th, 2015

Surgery was scheduled for the afternoon. The surgeon stopped by to introduce himself. I think his visit was to help put my parent’s minds more at ease than mine. Don’t get me wrong, it was important that I liked and felt comfortable with the person about to open me up. And I did. He was nice. This is his job. He does this all day every day. I was confident I was in good hands.
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Saturday March 14th, 2015 – Monday March 23rd, 2015

I wake up at about 9. I’m not sure how I even willed myself to sleep with the amount of pain I was in from the headache. I call my mom and tell her I need her to come and take me to the hospital. Here’s the catch: My GI doctor is in Wilmington. Wilmington is two hours from Myrtle Beach. My parents are smack in the middle of Wilmington and Myrtle. My mom wanted to take me to Wilmington because my doctor is there but I was hesitant because it was so far. We argued via text, as I waited for her to arrive, about whether or not I could even make it the whole 2 hour drive to the hospital. In the end, we went to Wilmington.

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