Help! one month post op (Nissen Fundoplication)- need some advice?!

Can anyone give me some advice? This tighness and gurgling is getting worse, to the point that I cant sleep at night, and have to go and lie down several times during the day! Hope this is normal as i'm starting to worry! Is there anything I can do to relieve these symptoms?! Help! :(

Mel

BTW, you can relieve the nausea with meds give your doctor a ring and get a prescription. And, it is perfectly normal to get nauseas the first couple months. Some get more nauseas when they begin to be too adventures with the amount of food, so maybe cut down on size and eat a little more often.

Mel,

Where is the gurgling? Is it in your stomach? I remember having that when my problems started a year ago.

I don't get that now but I do have a burning sensation in my mouth...gosh that's my worst symptom.

It use to be my stomach uncomforatble feelings but now it's the burning in my mouth.

I thought the Nissen would've worked. Maybe it needs more time....maybe I'm healing....it's hard to say.

I'm about 4 weeks post op....

Hi Kyheart,

I remember reading all of your post during your recovery. It was so inspiring and I hoped it would've turn out like that for me.

But here I am at 4 weeks post op and still feel a burning sensation in my throat/mouth.....

It's very discouraging but all I can do is wait and be patient which is hard....

Hey Mel -- I'm at 3+ months post op. Most of the time feeling pretty good. However, lately - about the last couple of weeks, in the afternoon I'm getting that terrible left shoulder pain again. It usually abates after gas x and walking around but for a while it is terrible. I'm going to go back to less heavy solids -especially meaty things- tomorrow to see if it will get better. Anyone else have the shoulder pain symptom this far out? Maybe I"ve been a little too aggressive with the eating????

How are you doing maximus?

Jam,

I feel you, I try to be optimistic but it's hard. I was so hopeful for NF that it would cure this problem. It seems to have helped but not enough as I would hoped. Still I want to believe we still have more healing to do. I'm real careful with my diet. I try and stay as active as possible by jogging and doing some light exercising. Exercising was my passion before getting hit with LPR/GERD. It was devastating the first time I felt this tightness in my throat whenever I would exercise. Now for some reason, it's not that noticeable when I exercise. It could be that the throat is use to the damage already. I doubt it's healed because my mouth is still sore.

One thing that use to bother me a lot was this uncomfortable feeling in my stomach. It was almost like a burning/tickling feeling which was bad. After NF, it went way down which I'm happy about. Still I want the burning in the mouth to go away. Still 4 weeks is early like most people said. I wish there was a scientific explanation to how the longer we wait the better we will feel you know what I mean? Is the wrap going to sit better over the LES, is it going to get tighter? I just hear of so many early success stories. I knew it was going to be a gamble going into this because of my atypical symptoms. Maybe twice I heard volume reflux / regurgitation. This is when I was on PPIs and I was running. But now it's more of a burning in the mouth that's a challenge. Who knows, maybe in several months...we might just be all healed and that would be a miracle. I'm glad I found someone who understands what I'm going through. That's what this forum is for.

But in the mean time, we just have to keep moving forward. Somehow, one day, I will accept this if it doesn't get better and maybe I will forget about the pain. We will see...

Hi Jesper A,

I'm glad to hear the hunger thing is normal, as it didn't really worry me until my dietitian seemed concerned. The only positive thing about not being able to eat is that I'm not at all hungry anyway!

It seems that the gurgling in most cases is just an annoyance, but it's keeping me awake at night as it's quite painful and uncomfortable. Did your surgeon say what caused it?

Unfortunately because I'm on an anti-spasmodic medication, I can't take any sickness meds as they would react with it, so I'm a bit stuck in that sense!

I do usually try the 'small meals often' approach (though when I say meals I mean half a cup of food! Think I'm going to try cutting the portion sizes down a bit to see if that helps. I'm not able to swallow solid foods yet, so sticking to liquids and puréed food.

Thanks,

Mel

Hi Max,

The gurgling seems to be in my stomach and intestines and takes a long time to go away. I've never experienced anything like it before. At first it was just weird and kinda funny, but it's now becoming uncomfortable!

Sorry to hear you're having problems with the burning sensation. I've been quite lucky on that front and only experienced heartburn/ reflux a few times, but I'm pretty confident that's normal at this stage. Not comforting I know, but I'm trying not to think about the success of the operation until the 6 month mark!

Have you got any acid medication you can take for the burning? My surgeon told me I wouldn't need to take the medication I was on for acid before the operation, but I have needed it a couple of times and it did help. maybe it's worth giving it a go?!

Mel

Hi leniijane,

If you don't mind me asking, why are you on your second surgery? Did the first come undone? That's something I'm quite concerned about happening!

Mel

Max,

Yes it just seems to become problematic after I eat. I still have the nausea as before but the acid has almost completely gone (apart from a few occassions).

I'm glad the problems from before the op are sorted, but I just hope they will not be replaced with these new ones! :S

Mel

Hi Mel,
I'm about 18 months post op and let me say the first few months were tough!! Everything you're experiencing is completely normal. I kept losing weight for 6 months after the surgery but lost most of it within the first 2-3 months. It only took a few bites of food and I was full and I was like that for a long time. I lost about 30 pounds very quickly and was concerned at one point if it would ever stop! I now weigh 115 lbs so thankfully things just leveled out and the weight loss tapered off. I lived off of supplement drinks but unfortunately was able to only drink about half a bottle of Ensure in one sitting as I'm sure you're well aware lol. I had to be sure to put something in my stomach every 2-3 hours even if I wasn't hungry.

As for the stomach gurgling, I still get that even today but it's rare! Luckily it's only annoying and not painful or anything for me. Only occasionally after surgery did I have any nausea but it was usually associated with the pain meds. I had been on numerous meds prior to surgery and found that I needed to reevaluate my meds and try either stopping them or lowering the dosage (with my Dr of course). As of today I'm off ALL of them! At one point I did have horribly debilitating pains in my stomach which occurred about a week or two after surgery but that was from the liquid diet believe it or not! I was up late at night unable to sleep because of the discomfort. Milk products (including liquids!) can cause stomach/intestinal upset and it did with me so I had to limit my intake. Try playing around with different liquids (broths, milk, whey or soy protein, etc.) and see if some more than others bother you. Once you get past the first few months your stomach should start feeling better. I myself was on liquids for 2 months because my stomach couldn't handle the soft foods!! The other thing that really helped was a heating pad on my back/sides! It helped to loosen the muscles up a little around the discomfort making it more tolerable.

I can say that at 18 months out, I have had zero heartburn! Occasionally I will get a stomach ache (probably from excess coffee, tomato sauce,etc. - I'm making up for lost time! lol) but a Zantac always takes care of that. I can safely safe that having the surgery was the best decision I ever made and it gave me my life back. Yes, I still have gas/bloating issues (GasX and Phazyme are my best friends) and only rarely am I able to burp but I will gladly take that any day over how I felt before! Staying away from gum, ANYTHING CARBONATED (such as soda, beer, champagne, sparkling water, etc.), not drinking out of straws, eating slowly and eating smaller meals WILL help reduce any bloating/ gas discomfort. I can only hope I will never need to have my surgery revised but until then I'm feeling the best I've felt in 10 years. Sorry this is a crazy LONG post but I hope my experiences will help you a little bit! Just give it some time. Each week look back at how you felt the week before and you'll see the progress even though it's slow. :)

Carolyn