My Journey With Crohn's Disease - Part 2
2 Weeks Since My Operation
It’s been 2 weeks since i had my stoma operation and I’ve been home for 10 days now. For the first 2 or 3 days of being at home, I really didn’t feel myself. I was in a fair bit of pain, especially when I needed to cough, and I felt like my personality had gone. We were watching TV programs that I’d usually find funny, but i wasn’t enjoying them. I wasn’t really laughing or even smiling and i had periods of being quite low. I loved being home with my family but I just wasn’t myself. Looking back it was probably just a case of the pain i was in. Almost everything i did hurt.
My appointment with the nurse to have my staples out was on Monday 29th. I was quite anxious about this purely because I hadn’t had it done before so had no idea what to expect. Char said i shouldn’t feel any pain as she had taken them out of patients during her nurse training, so I guess I’d have to take her word for it and see how it went at the time. As it turns out she was mostly correct. I felt a slight sting with a few of them but the majority were fine, just a little pulling feeling.
I then had an appointment the following day, Tuesday 30th, to see my stoma nurse, to check how everything was healing, make sure i was doing ok and for me to ask any questions i had. I’d made sure I had my questions written down because I can never think of questions at the time and then remember loads once I’m home. The appointment lasted over an hour and the nurse was more than happy to answer the many questions I had. It’s so important when going through something like this to ask questions. Today was also one of our son’s 21st birthday so it was now time to go home and celebrate that. I must admit, that evening we had an Indian takeaway and birthday cake, and i slightly over indulged, which resulted in a very uncomfortable night, with a lot of stomach pain, so i didn’t sleep very well. My body obviously wasn’t ready for that! The pain gradually subsided over the late morning and afternoon.
This week I also began to do some online work with clients as i was desperate to get back to working with them and beginning to get back to some form of normality. As I write this, I’ve just finished my last client of the week and i feel great for getting back to it. The past 2 days i have also been doing some VERY basic exercise. Some walking (mostly around the house, shopping and going to appointments), some seated leg extensions with no weight, standing calf raises and some light dumbbell curl and press. I certainly won’t be overdoing it too quickly and i will listen to my body, but i wanted to just begin the process of building my strength back up. Exercise will very much be an individual thing and will be different for each person. Listen to your body, write down and plan what you are going to do and understand that, especially during the first few weeks, every day you will feel different. Some days will be easier than others. I would also suggest getting professional advice on what to do if you are at all unsure.
Going back to how i was feeling emotionally for the first couple of days being at home, I now feel much better. I’m laughing again (although this does still hurt at times), I’m feeling more energised and more positive about the progress I am making. There are still bad moments but it’s still very early days. The scales show I’ve lost another lb or so but this will be due to the fact I’m moving more now than when I was in hospital. I’ll keep eating and hopefully my weight will begin to go up. I’m currently on a low fibre diet as much as possible and drinking around 2 litres of fluid a day. My stoma is shrinking slightly as it heals and my surgical cut is now free of dressings. Fingers crossed all is going well so far with the healing process.
3/7/20
