Bag free and home!

I got home from my takedown surgery last night! 3 days, very short hospital stay. I would have been released in early afternoon, but my surgeon was in an emergency surgery till 6pm and couldn't see any patients till afterwards. I got the go ahead to leave since I had eaten two meals and tolerated everything. I'm doing well, going about 10-12 times a day so far and still subconsciously reaching for my bag from time to time.

I know some peeps around here are getting there take downs soon and wanted to know what my experience was like so for those of you interested I will detail it below!

Firstly, I was up and out of bed the same days as my surgery. Not very sore and my incision where the ostomy was doesn't hurt at all. I have some soreness along my ribs, like when you worked out too hard and too long and my hip is a bit achy. My hips are kinda bad though since my first surgery 9 months ago. I was allowed clear liquids on the day after my surgery and post colon diet on the day I went home. Mostly I was bored at the hospital. It took about 30 hours for my bowels to wake up and really the only bad pain is gas pain, kinda sharp but doesn't last long and I know it will go away over time. Pretty darn easy hospital stay if I do say so!

I bought myself a COCO bidet 9500x last week cause they were on special and even though I only had one day at the hospital with just wipes, the bidet is super awesome. It takes a lot of wiping to make sure you get everything off since its all liquidy at first and that was already causing me some irritation. So if you can afford it you may want to get a bidet. Biffy bidets I know are much cheaper than COCO, only $100 for the plastic one. But you may want to wait and see if irritation is a problem for you because not all people get it. I have a few anal skin tags so I went preventative route since those things have given me problems pre-colon removal. I also recommend getting a quilted bed pad like the ones in the hospital because its really easy to wake up, kinda be out of it and not realize you need to go to the bathroom and leak a bit. I did it last night. I got my bed pad thingy at an old fashion pharmacy that sells ostomy supplies, and supplies that older people tend to need like wheelchairs and walkers and they even have Ilex paste, which was designed with ileosomy and jpouchers in mind. (I have some of that too!) But its best to be prepared and not worry about these things later, so if nothing else, get yourself some wet wipes and some kind of paste.
All in all much faster recovery than the ileostomy and the prep was super easy. My doctor even lets you have a breakfast since ileos have such a short transit time. Wish I did this years ago! Good luck to all the others out there waiting for their take downs and thanks for all the good advice and well wishes!

Glad you're doing well, and interesting to read your experience, even though mine's permanent. Hope your recovery continues to go smoothly

I have a biffy, which is a lot less useful to me than it used to be, but I found it awesome when I was having lots of diarrhea with my IBD.

Congrats on your takedown and pooping again! Calmoseptine ointment is also wonderful if you get some butt burn which we all seem to get at times. I don't need it now as much as I did in the beginning but it's very soothing. You may find yourself dealing with some gas pains the next several days but they do get a lot better after about a week or so. Hope the rest of your recovery is very uneventful!

Glad to hear ur doing good!, pls keep us updated!! I should have my surgery in a few months! I will keep u n my prayers. N wat is this coco thing?? Very interested now

Rita, Google Coco bidet and you can see exactly what we are talking about. It's basically just a seat that replaces your existing toilet seat. It's hooked up to regular toilet water lines. Mine is plugged in becase I wanted heated water but there are models that don't have to be plugged in but they don't heat up the water. After you do your business, you push a button and it cleans you up with a spray of warm water for up to a minute. They are awesome for j-pouchers because we go #2 much more frequently and with the bidet seat you really only have to wipe once just to dry yourself off, thus cutting down or eliminating irration from lots of wiping. Mine has a heated seat too, which is pretty nice. 

So happy to hear it went well! Good luck on your continued recovery - I'm sure it feels fabulous to be done with the surgeries! Can't wait to be there with my daughter! Keep us posted.

Thank you for the update! So glad to hear things are going well for you. I can't wait to be making this same post myself!