Barbie Butt surgery Qs

To those of you with a permanent ileostomy... I wanted to talk about Barbie Butt (Ken doll butt) and being "sewn up."

Ive read a blogged experience about it (thanks VeganOstomy) and talked with a girl indepth on Facebook about her time in the hospital after.
Two very different experiences.

So I was looking for some more!
Im also curious about the options; staying as is (not really an option since the colon/rectum that is left is still diseased, causing issues and more likely to developcancer some day) but also I believe there is an anal stump option? But that doesn't seem to make sense. From what I understand my option would be to be sewn up.

So I was just wondering for those of you sewn shut:
1.) # days in hospital
2.) # days off work after
3.) Gluteal drainage tube?!
4.) Pain from surgery
5.) Pain from dressing changes

And general recovery timeline. With more time to prepare. And assuming we will be doing this in January, I may also have a different job or the option of not working for a little while. I want to be prepared as this sounds like one hell of a surgery to recover from and I havent hears much about it like the pouch surgeries.

THANK YOU for sharing <3 <3

I don't know much about the surgery that involves being sewn shut....but I do know from most of what I read on here that the recovery sounds long, tough and sometimes awful!

I knew from the start I wanted a permanent ileostomy, but my surgeon was concerned that I was too sick,weak,malnourished, etc...to handle recovery from surgery AND healing the wound from being sewn up...so she did not.

Having the rectum and even some of the anus removed, and NOT being sewn up is definitely an option, and there are a few of us here who are living with just that scenario. When I emailed my surgeon to ask the specifics of what was done to me, this was her response, "You have an anal stump. All the rectum was taken out. The anus is stapled off at the top so there is no access to your abdominal cavity. However, no one should do a digital rectal exam or use a scope to look inside this.".

As far as I know, I can stay like this indefinitely. Of the people I know of with the same anatomy, I seem to be the only one that has any sort of issue with a lot of mucus discharge, and I am still hoping that decreases as time goes on. My GI says it is normal, so I'll wait it out for a while. I would be quite happy to just stay as I am now and not get another surgery!

(Embers, this is word for word what I sent to you in email, but thought I'd post for others to enjoy- ha!)

I do have the Barbie butt- it's practically healed, almost 5 months post-op! It was awful, really. The colectomy was way easier to deal with, surgically speaking, than the rectal wound. Everything was done all at once for me- colon out, ileo made, rectum removed, fistula repaired, & butt sewn up. My surgeon stapled me shut- I had about 10 staples running from the bottom of my vagina all the way back to the top of my butt- frightening looking! And painful, much more so than the colectomy wounds. The staples stayed in for 2 weeks post-op. I took lots of sitz baths during that time... basically flopped around on the couch, walked as much as possible, etc. I needed pain meds pretty much the whole 2 weeks, & a week or so after. Not heavy-duty meds, I think I went thru Dilaudid the first 2 weeks, then went over to just Oxy's. (Taking the pain meds was also due to the whole colectomy though, not just rectum removal.) It had to heal from the inside out, so even when the staples were removed, there was a pretty deep hole. I went to the Wound Ctr. at the hospital a couple times, to have them check the status of it. The WOCN I use thought it looked great, was healing right on schedule. Now, there is a tiny pinhole- maybe 2 mm's deep??? It still itches, but no pain. I didn't have to use a wound vac or anything weird like that. No packing, etc.

I had my anus and rectum removed and my butt sewn up during my original ostomy surgery because I knew I didn't want a j-pouch. I was fortunate in that I had absolutely no problems with my butt incision healing (my abdominal one was another matter!)

To answer your questions:

1.) I was in the hospital five days for the initial surgery. I was in for some additional days later due to abdominal incision healing woes (I had a reaction to sutures used in that incision and it kept reopening.)

2.) I was off of work for eight weeks though the abdominal incision healing complication made me miss some additions days here and there after that

3.) I did not have one due to the Barbie butt... but did have one inserted around week four due to a suspected abdominal abscess that ended up not really being one (was just a random pocket of harmless fluid but looked like an abscess on a CT scan.)

4.) I felt like I barely noticed my butt incision after surgery because I had pretty bad pain from the rest of the operation and that was what my mind was more focused on. My surgeon used staples in the upper layer of the butt incision (and sutures in the deeper layers). My main issue was that the butt incision itched like crazy in the initial week or so of healing. Once the staples were removed around day ten, things felt better. The incision healed perfectly and I had no issues with it opening. There was some pain in the deep layers of my rectal area and tailbone which slowly dissipated in the first year after surgery. It wasn't severe pain at all-- just a dull ache that happened the most when I stood for long periods of time or when I clenched my butt muscles. It didn't stop me from doing anything.

5.) I didn't have any dressing changes for my anal incision because it healed very well. I folded a small piece of gauze in my butt crack for the first week to absorb drainage, but I didn't really end up having any there.

Hope this helps!

I had most of my rectum removed when I had my first operation, a hemicolectomy. I was told at that time, that I would have to have a second operation later on to remove the rectal stump and anus due the cancer risk from the inflamed tissue there resulting from Crohns. I thought maybe I might get away with putting it off for a long time because I was definitely not ready for more major surgery. It didn't take long for me to start feeling those phantom feelings and the urge to go, which I no longer could do with a colostomy. Then I started to see bloody dischard from my anus and it began to ache more and more as the weeks went by. My surgeon encouraged me to get the stump and anus removed and I hoped this would relieve my discomfort. So 5 months after the first surgery in October 2013, I went in again and had the rest removed. As it turned out, my rectal stump had adhered to my vaginal wall, making the condition and repairs worse than anticipated. The healing took a few weeks and it was pretty painful at first, but I now have zero pain or discomfort in that area. My butt looks almost normal and not like a Barbie butt at all. It's just not as deep as it used to be (the crack ... sorry if that is TMI) but I think we all want to know as much as we can if we are facing these problems and surgeries. I hope this has helped. I know that I am very happy to have it over with and am starting to feel so much better after all the years of pain. The colostomy is a challenge and definitely not a pleasant thing to deal with now, but I remind myself regularly that it has literally saved my life.