NCOT

So happy Miranda that you're feeling up to posting!! My heart goes out to you, pre operative
pain is no joke!!

I hope you continue on the path of good health.... Bless your heart!

Hugs!!

Holy crap, I'd forgotten The Stolen Colon D:

*googles* Okay, it's come up, literally the first link on Google. I also can finally read it on my smartphone!

@dunny - Thank you muchly. Can't believe how much I underestimated post-op pain - going from 0 to 10 pain in the space of a few hours brought it home right enough. My logical mind tried to persuade me; it said that having muscles and nerves cut cannot be anything other than excruciatingly painful, but my stupid mind won the day with 'hey, it's just like having a large paper cut on your belly, innit?'

@Jade - Cheers :p

Hi NCOT,
So glad it went well and you are taking your new plumbing in your stride. 2 h seemed like a fast operation, but now as you mentioned that half of your colon is still in, makes sense. I'm with you that I don't really understand the surgeons choice, but maybe if you had crohn's for such a long time and it never had effected that part of the colon, it never will? The swelling of the stoma will go down quickly and the stench will go once you are on solids. Have you had a proper meal yet?

(((hugs)))
Glad to hear you are on the mend. We have been thinking/worrying about you
Dave

Glad the surgery went well. I can't imagine how much pain that kind of surgery must cause. I am a wimp when it comes to pain so I would need a morphine drip to take home. ;)

One day at a time and each day will hopefully get easier and less painful.

So good to hear from you, NCOT!

OMGosh, if they had offered me paracetamol for that type of post-op pain I would have flipped my lid!! Glad they finally got it back under control. The same thing happened to me (epidural became dislodged less than 12 hours after surgery) and I was then put on the morphine pain pump - thought I would go out of my mind in the interim . Thank goodness for the pain meds that do actually work!

You sound great, keep up the good work .

Hey NCOT,

How you feeling. From what I've read, people that just had surgery feel good already, like they have this sensation that the disease went away. Are you experiencing any of these feelings?

Miranda,

I like everyone else here, am also very glad that everything went well and esp. that you're back here.

Hope you'll be totally recovered soon. Can I ask a couple of stupid questions?

Will you be able to discontinue all Crohn's meds at this point? Did they leave some of your colon for a likely/possible reconnect in the future?

Once again, so good to have you back posting here. All the best for a quick recovery.

Tom.

Hey! So glad to see your post. The fact that you squeezed a week of hospital saga into a long-ish single post is astounding! So glad to hear you made a new friend, too. Here's to continued good healing!

Cheers once again, folks! :p

I swear my hospital takes meanness to pathological levels. I made an appointment with the nurse at the GP's surgery this morning, because I only had enough liquid oxycodone to last me about two days. She prescribed me some more, but I found out from her that the stuff normally comes in 250ml bottles. So in order to give me less, somebody at the hospital must have purposely poured it into a smaller 100ml bottle. That's not just budget-cutting; that's pathological meanness <_<.

My GP phoned up, bless him. I thought he was still away on his mountain-climbing trip, but obviously not. He said he would prescribe any meds I needed on repeat prescription and that we couldn't have me in pain - like I said, bless him <_<. So at least I'm no longer stressing about being in horrible pain for the next few weeks. I do feel significantly better today, although a tad out of it at the moment - probably due to the painkillers, to be fair :p

@nenagirl - Exactly. I'm just so grateful to be living in an age of effective painkillers. My dad mentioned how there was no anaesthetic until the 18th century, but they did operations anyway. The mind boggles. Actually it does more than boggle: it shuts right down and retreats into a scaredy-cat shell.

@Somedude - That's actually really hard to answer, harder than it should be. On the whole the answer is more yes than no. I do feel better within myself, but not miraculously so. It's not like 'hallelujah, I'm cured!': the feeling better is a subtle, rather than dramatic, feeling. However, don't forget I'm also zonked out on painkillers and have done a very fast taper on Pred (from 40mg to 20mg in a week; that's fast, however the rate will be much slower from now on). I think the feeling better is something that will become much more obvious over the next few weeks and months.
Also, of course, I was on a high dose of Pred before the op. While that didn't put me in remission, it was enough to keep me from feeling desperately ill. I wasn't somebody in the position of needing emergency surgery. The feeling instantly better probably would have been more obvious if I had been.
And, finally, there are other noticeable differences. Namely, my rectum is 100% better >_>. I get the occasional phantom feeling there of wanting to go, but that literally is it. No pain, discharge, etc.

So... dunno if that helps or not!

@Tom - No questions are stupid (that's what I tell myself when I ask a dumb question :p) Anyway, those ones certainly aren't dumb at all. I'm off Crohn's meds for the moment, as I'm not really counting Pred or the pain meds as Crohn's meds. Folks with UC can discontinue meds for good after a colectomy, but the situation is a bit more complicated with Crohn's for an obvious reason: the disease can come back. Some with Crohn's appear to stay on meds, while others come off them. And in trying to answer this, I have just realised I don't really have much of a clue. I'm gonna do some internet research on this, see if I can pluck out a few statistics. Personally speaking, I want to go back on the Crohn's meds like I want to have a hole drilled into my skull. I still would do so if I thought any of them stood a greater chance than a placebo at keeping the Crohn's at bay, but I am not convinced they do.
Maintenance meds post-surgery was something I talked about with my IBD nurse briefly (before the surgery, that is). 6MP was suggested as the likeliest possibility, because that was the med I seemed to tolerate the best in the past. I'll talk about it again - hopefully with my consultant - in a few weeks' time.

The surgeon left my rectum and some of my sigmoid colon behind; so, yes, enough for a future reconnection should I want one.

Hope that helps. Apologies for waffling, that's what being zonked out does to me <_<.

Oops, almost forgot to mention (kazbern's post reminded me). My new friend phoned today and proceeded to talk both hind legs off a donkey for 10 minutes D:

Your waffling sounds so upbeat honey, and that's so good to hear, albeit pain meds or
not! I can see a smile in your words, and that makes me feel like this surgery has already
had good effects on you!! As I said before you're very brave... I certainly wasn't as chirpy
as you, and I only had resections! Your surgery is altogether a different kettle of fish!!

Well done, I'm very proud of you!!