Since this section addresses "Nutrition, Health and Fitness", I decided to tuck it in here. Mods, if you want it elsewhere, feel free to move it. My adventure started about 16 months ago. Finally getting off my butt to take care of what I had been (very foolishly, I now know) dreading, I had my very first colonoscopy....at the age of 61. Yep, don't be brain dead, like me. Listen to your doctor, and maybe you won't have a similar "adventure" in your life! At least, I hope not.... So I come out of the light anesthesia they give you for the procedure, and about 5 minutes later the gastro doc stops by to tell me the results. One polyp that they took a sample of; everything else looked fine.....except the 5 cm (~2") long mass in my rectum. He took a bunch of biopsies from it, but said it didn't look cancerous. Lab results reported the same. I go to the VA (who had paid for the colonoscopy via "Community Care"), and my Primary Care Physician sends the results to GastroIntestinal and Surgical clinics. GI doesn't believe they have anything they can do, so surgery looks at it. Had a "sigmoidoscopy" (where they don't go nearly as deep), and the doctor took a bunch more biopsies. Still coming back as negative for cancer, so let's look at getting it out. This was about a year ago....and then my move to Mississippi came up, and I knew there was NO WAY that I could do the surgery AND get ready to do the move, so I postponed the surgery. Got down to Mississippi, got established with the VA hospital here. Only about half of the info that the VA in Buffalo had for me made it through their data transfer (typical government). New surgeon, he says let's do another sigmoidoscopy. He sees what the surgeons in NY had seen, and refers me to a surgeon he's worked with, at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC), next door to the VA hospital. She looks at all the data, and agrees to do the surgery.....but being a highly skilled professional, wants to have her own look at it. Sigmoidoscopy #3.....and the 4th time in about 13 months that I've had a scope up my back side! Why was I worried about the colonoscopy, again?? Finally, December 20th, just over 4 weeks ago, I get the surgery done. FINALLY!! But because of the location of the removal and repair, the surgeon doesn't want to create undue stress on it.....so I have had to learn to live with an ileostomy. Basically, they cut off the flow of waste into the large intestine (and points downstream), and I have an opening on the right side of my abdomen, with an "appliance" that surrounds it, and directs the waste to a bag hanging off my body. Did I mention my adventure?? I'll have this for not quite 5 more weeks. At the end of the month, I'm going in for a Barium enema (yep, another aspect of the adventure), to make sure everything is patched up nice and tight, and we have no leakage. If everything looks good, a week after Valentine's Day, I'll have my 2nd surgery with the surgeon, and we'll re-establish normal flow, and stuff everything back into my abdomen where it belongs. It's been a challenge, I won't kid anyone about it. Foods that I once ate without any issues I have found can either plug the "stoma" opening (grape skins, whole kernel corn, etc), or give me really thick waste to push out. Hydration is my friend! I just wish I could convince my bladder of that! But I'm thankful that what was taken out continued to show as non-cancerous. Dodged a bullet, for sure! Why am I sharing all this? Because, as a group of many guys, we all know that we are the WORST at taking care of ourselves! We are kings of the "I feel fine, why do I need to go see a doctor??" movement, aren't we? And then we get hit by something out of left field, and typically, because we DIDN'T take care of it earlier, it's 10x worse than it could have been. I'm guilty of it. You know you probably are, too. So this is ME, encouraging YOU, to take better care of yourselves. Even with a negative cancer diagnosis, I'll be going back a year after surgery, to get a colonoscopy. And I'll gladly do so. Hell, after all this, it'll be EASY!! In the meantime, I hope you'll all look at your family history, find a doctor you can trust if you don't have one already, and confer with him or her. Get the damn testing done! Most insurances will cover a Cologard "poop in the box and send it in" test, with no money out of your pocket. DON'T be like ME, and wait. DON'T be like a very good friend of mine, from high school, who didn't see 50 years old, because of colon cancer. Okay, I'll step down off my soap box now.
Yep,86 and have had pre cancer polyps removed for about 15 years. I don't even want to think about what would have happened if the first one was not removed about 15 years ago as it was "large" then.. Good luck and I will say a prayer for you. Wore a bag for urine for a few weeks an it SUCKS BIG TIME.
Spent 9 months in the hospital recovering from wounds and injuries sustained in combat, as well as the excruciating physical therapy that followed. I was told I would most likely loose my left leg below the knee, and would likely have serious issues with my right, both due to schraple and parts of airframe along with serious bone and muscle/tissue damage sustained in the crash that followed. I could have signed the papers and did the deed and been discharged end of the month, instead I screamed at the doctors, made them promise not to cut, to take their time and make extreme efforts, and by all the gods both old and new, the doctors did miracles beyond all I could have hoped for! I not only kept my left leg, but recovered, and not only that, I forced my self to focus on my therapy so hard that the doctors were forced to allow me to not only return to full duty, but allowed me to take the full flight physical so I could return to my team and return to combat, Cause DAMN, I still had work to do, and I made my self a commitment that is I was going to go through with my service, I was damn well going ALL THE WAY and do my full 20! I have fought to keep my leg since those days, since 2006, having blood flow issues and enduring more surgeries then I can count, but thanks to the miracles of modern science and advances in trauma care and recovery, I am finally 100% fixed, my blood flow is back to pre trauma levels, I.E. normal, and I don't have to live in constant fear of loosing my leg! I still suffer from the other injuries, but to be alive and mostly whole is blessings beyond measure, those issues I can and will live with, a constant reminder of a glorious life well lived! I am forever thankful to those amazing doctors and all who refused to quit, to quit on me, and to a man or woman, they all said the same thing to me, As long as I was willing and determined to fight, so would they, and Damn if they didn't!
Update, as of this past Friday (Jan 31). Got the leak test done. Probably the most unpleasant part of this whole journey! But the word is, no leakage, under pressure. That's what I was looking for, in the radiology report. So unless the surgeon sees something else in all that radiologist gobbledegook, in 19 days, I'm going back on the table to return to "normal". At least, what passes for normal in my life!!
Update to my "adventure". This coming Friday, after 9 weeks with my ileostomy, I'll be going back on the table to have it reversed. I'll be in the hospital for 2-5 days, and out of work for 2-3 weeks, short-term disability, to recover. Seriously can't wait to get my "normal" life back!
Back home again. A day earlier than I was expecting, but I'll take a night in my own bed as compensation. The only weird part is going to be wound care. Visiting nurse services will be able to come out 2-3 times a week to help, but I'll be doing the bulk of it, since I have no one here. The hope they made for the ileostomy has to heal from the inside, out. And since there might be faint traces of poop in there, they don't want to just close it up, then have an infection form inside. So 2x/day, it gets packed with moistened gauze, and covered up. Pulling the old gauze out is supposed to ensure that anything not supposed to be in there is pulled out. Going to be FUN, since it's on the bottom side of my belly slope, where the stoma was.....so I'll be working in a mirror, to do the work. Hopefully by the end of next week, they'll tell me to knock it off and let it close up!
