Just thought I'd update everyone on my surgery from 1/29. My surgery was a proctocolectomy with a permanent ileostomy, unfortunately it could not be done laparscopically due to all the scarring from previous resections. So after almost 6 hours of being under, Mayo in Scottsdale got it all taken care of. Haven't posted sooner just because it's still hard to sit upright for a long period of time. Good news is the bag hasn't bothered me a bit and when I woke up from the surgery, I truly felt different (clean) - I could feel that the crohns was gone which is a good thing. The surgeon confirmed that it was never in my small bowel which is pretty much what we knew all along, so he thinks I could live disease free for many years if not the rest of my life - although there are no guarantees it (the crohns) won't come back, but we're thinking positive.
Now I just have to figure out what appliances I like best. They gave me velcro bags in the hopsital and I liked those. I ran out and am now using the two piece with a clip. I'll search the forums to see if anyone posted any feedback on what they preferred. I'll work with the companies to see about getting some samples and determine what I like best, but would be curious to hear from others that have used the clip and the velcro bags and why you went with one versus the other. There may be things I'm not thinking of since I'm new to this.