Does anyone still read this thing?

I heard that people have been checking the blog for updates that have never seemed to materialize. Partially this has been brought to my attention by the influx of email regarding said topic. Well the simple answer to all the inquiries is that I am doing well, but nothing exciting has happened. I have also been insanely busy. Time to write about seemingly nothing has been difficult to come by. I haven't been to the doctor since my last follow up, which is nice. I am all healed up (i.e. no more entrances/exits into/out of my body that weren't there when I was born). School has been demanding much of my attentions of late. I am finishing up teaching 7th graders at a local middle school. I also got a job teaching Math and Grammar to some 5th graders (very part-time). Grant research has been occupying a disproportionate amount of my energy lately as I am planning on researching in Delhi next summer (finally!). I have been working furiously in whatever spare time I have to create a group of essays regarding the ordeals of the summer. I have a naive pipe dream of publishing them some day. Since everyone seemed to enjoy the blog, I figured why not? Once I get a decent chunk done (right now I have about 35 pages), I will put a link on here to them so that everyone can devote more of their time to my favorite subject, me.

So here I am. Everything is good and done. I feel like I should offer some perspective on everything that happened and how life has changed. If you are hoping for that, sorry to disappoint. I have no perspective to offer. I am still working on that. Perhaps by page 200 of the collection of needlessly descriptive and self-centered essays I will get there. It seems counter-productive sometimes to dwell in the past, but there is always something that we can gain from major, life-altering events. I am just not 100% on what that is yet. Just stay tuned for more revelations as we get closer to the conclusion of all of this business which will hopefully arrive someday. Maybe I will hit on some universal, earth-shattering truth. That could be fun.

Has anyone seen that Gas-X commercial?

I know, I know. I said that I would update everyday, and now it has been a few days. Well, sometimes stuff comes up. So lets go over everything that you missed out on. Friday ended on a high note. I felt great and was very optimistic. I did forget though another one of the laws of recuperation, one good day, one bad day. Saturday was not too enjoyable to put it lightly. The gas pains from the previous night returned, and this time they decided to stay. As if the constant pain of air jockeying for position with my organs was not enough, the residents decided to pay me a visit in order to examine and hopefully remedy my hematoma. While I was fortunate that one of them at least had some bedside manner, it would be of little comfort. The best course of action was determined to be to remove two of the six staples holding my incision together, and then to encourage my hematoma to drain on its own. This doesn't sound so bad, and even the staples (the sight of which make me shudder while thinking of a horrible office equipment malfunction) weren't too bad to take out. The "encouraging" of the hematoma to drain however consisted of one of the residents essentially putting all of her weight on my incision in an effort to push some of the clotted blood out and jump start the draining process. Did I also mention that the area around my incision is also basically a 4x6 bruise? Needless to say, this was the only time that I can recollect yelling in pain during a medical procedure. Fortunately for me, the "procedure" was a "success," and the residents packed my wound and went on there way. Wait! Did I explain the whole "packing" process yet? No? Well you are in for a treat. After my incision was so carefully opened, I was left with an opening in my abdomen that roughly shares its width and depth with the Grand Canyon. But we can't just suture this thing up. In order for it to properly drain, it has to heal from the inside out. So how does that happen? Well three times a day, it has to be repacked. The repacking consists of taking the old dressing out, and then shoving as much gauze as will fit into the opening in my body into my body. Very soothing. I have yet to complete my first one of these procedures unassisted, but the night is young.

Aside from learning the ins and outs of this new-found hobby, I also spent much of Saturday fighting off nausea (a battle which I lost at least once and resulted in what I believe Montezuma's Revenge feels like), going to the bathroom about every hour and a half (I can look forward to going 15-20 times a day for the first couple of weeks), and gritting my teeth through gas pains. All of the nurses commented on how I was some superstar for not taking any pain meds. The only problem with that is that I would have been happy to take them, had any been available that would combat the pain that I was having. Oh well, I'll take what I can get. After all of this excitement, I was happy to spend the remainder of the day watching episodes of Lost and trying to rest.

Sunday I awoke in much better condition and spirits. The gas pains were still there, but a bit lessened. I just tried to avert my eyes during the repackings. And I was finally back on some full liquids. Not much happened this day. I continued my regular trips to the bathroom. I watched more of Lost. My nausea built throughout the day until I could not eat. And I was presented with the theory (their word, not mine) of how my hematoma came to be. Apparently, it can also be caused by a blood vessel that has not been tied off or cauterized during surgery. That's right, they tie them off. Pretty horrific. This was the agreed upon theory by my surgical team. It was also explained to me that at least one member of the team wanted to bring me back into the OR to fix this blood vessel. Nothing beats two surgeries in as many days. Luckily, this hapless fellow was over-ruled.

So now it is Monday night. Things are going much better, and I hope to be released tomorrow. I have finally eaten some solid foods without wanting to throw-up. I am still spending a lot of time in the bathroom, but what else is new? I just have to get a little more comfortable with the repacking, and I will be good to go. The I will have to come back in a week or so for a follow-up and for staple removal. Seriously, they are pretty gross. I promise to update everyone on my progress, but it probably won't be everyday.

There and back again...

So I'm here, sans ostomy, and feeling great. But how did I get to this point? Well, lets go over the last 24 hours or so. We (my mother and I) arrived in Madison yesterday at about 6:30 yesterday evening. After checking into the hotel (the process of which involved my saying "what a production" to my mother several times in exasperation), I decided to take in some of the local cinema. As I had not eaten since lunch, and would not eat anytime in the foreseeable future, I decided that it would be a good idea to distract myself. Once I returned from the 2 1/2 hour epic of The Dark Knight, I began the next stage of my preparations for today (the first of which was self-imposed starvation). Earlier that day I purchased from Walgreens what looked like something that you would find in the supply closet of a doctor's office in California recently after the Louisiana Purchase. It was a sizeable bottle of grape-flavored, carbonated laxative called Magnesium Citrate. When I returned to the hotel, I consumed the entire bottle with a water chaser, and waited. The idea of using a laxative is slightly disturbing for me normally, but now I was using one to hurry things along in a rather non-traditional way. Within a half-hour, my ostomy bag began filling at a break-neck pace. Much more than the equivalent of the bottle's contents passed through me, which would come into play the next day. As I was looking forward to being free of the bondage of the ostomy, I let my guard down and the little bugger got the best of me one last time. I don't know if any of you have tried to empty a bag filled with liquid and attached to your body at 2:00 AM, but trust me when I say to maintain your diligence in such cases. I took for granted the fact that I was a veteran with such tasks, and failed to notice the rather large gap in between the toilet seat, and toilet bowl at the hotel. I figured that once I cleared the seat, I was home-free. Unfortunately, this was not the case. As I opened my ostomy bag for what would be one of the last times, a torrential flood of my remaining fecal matter came pouring through the aforementioned gap. My old nemesis was apparently not letting me go without a fight. While such an event would have been a source of frustration two months ago, now as I was so close to being relieved of my omnipresent burden, it was nothing more than an annoyance and slightly comical.

The remainder of that night was spent without incident. I awoke this morning, eager to get to the hospital. We arrived at 7:40 AM and were told to check in at admissions. After giving my name to the hospital worker, I was offered the information that I was at the wrong facility. I say 'offered' because I replied with, "No, you are wrong lady." She said that I was wrong (big mistake) and that I had an appointment on the other side of town at a non-surgical facility with a doctor who wasn't a surgeon. I replied with, "Well, I am having surgery, and it is not happening there. So thanks, but no thanks." I immediately left and went to the office where I knew my surgeon worked out of. I asked a woman there to look up my appointment and admit me. Shortly after this, the previously mentioned ignoramous came chasing after me and telling me that she found the appointment for today. The other appointment that she was looking at was scheduled for January of 2009. Way to instill me with confidence. If they can't even find the right appointment, how would they find the right body part to operate on? Fortunately, I have the utmost confidence in my surgical staff. Nonetheless, I did double check several times that they would be performing the correct procedure.

I then checked in for my surgery and was quickly ushered off to my prep room. After dispensing with the regular pleasantries, we jumped right into sticking me with as many needles as possible. First, we needed to get some baseline blood tests. Normally, not an issue. Remember the high output in my ostomy bag the night before, well apparently that resulted in me being pretty well dehydrated. Unknown to me, a side-effect of dehydration is that your veins are not very full, and don't really put out much blood. We arrived at this conclusion after attempting twice in vain to get some blood out of me. Then another old friend arrived to welcome me, the heparin shot. The nurse wasted no time in reaquainting us. We were then down to the IV. This is also not a big deal normally these days as I have received more than I can remember. The IV went in without a hitch. However (there is always a however), the anesthesiologist who put it in must have found the one good vein left in my body, and it resulted in my blood leaking all over myself, the bed, and the floor. I chose not to observe these events, but I would imagine that it would look something like a butcher shop counter right before the Fourth of July. After cleaning up my blood with what I believe was a spill kit normally intended for jack-knifed tankers on the interstate, I was given my IV cocktail to relax me and then was whisked off to the operating room.

After receiving my cocktail, they could have done anything to me. But they just operated. The last thing that I remember is being told to breath four times with a mask over my mouth. I made it to about 2 1/2.

I woke up in the recovery room feeling pretty good. The procedure took under two hours. I was pretty sleepy, but I was excited to be rid of the ostomy, so I didn't sleep too much. I hung out down there with a bunch of really ornery patients. I overheard many patients complaining, and many doctors trying to satiate them. One of my favorite lines was delivered very deadpan from a doctor. He said, "We can't give you that much pain killer. It would result in death." Needless to say, the doctors and nurses were sorry to see me go.

I was then brought up to the familiar confines of the F4 section of the hospital. This is the same area that I stayed in before. I got checked in, met the new residents, said hi to some of my old nurses, and began to settle in. Before long, I was visited by yet another old friend, the familiar feeling of liquid leaking from my ostomy site. "That is impossible," I thought, "I no longer have an ostomy." To my relief, if was merely blood leaking from my dressing. Oddly enough, that is much less distressing than fecal matter. Well, maybe not too oddly. The blood continued to be a problem, but with an absurd amount of gauze taped to my belly, we got it under control. I guess that it is supposed to drain a little bit. Shortly after we stopped all of my bleeding, I was finally visited by my surgeon, Dr. Heise. He was pleased with how the operation went, but was pretty annoyed when he noticed what appeared to be a hematoma in my incision site.

Quick medical lesson. A hematoma can be caused by many things, one of these is an infection in part of your body. Apparently, there may be a little infected area under my skin, but over my muscle. The body seals this little infected area off, and then it needs to be opened up and drained at some point. I inquired as to how this is performed. Dr. Heise said that I would just come in to the clinic and they just slice it open, not really much anesthesia. So that should be fun. He did say that if we could get it to bleed out, then it would be okay. I would have to apply a lot of pressure to my incision site though. All of this after finally getting it to stop bleeding. I'll probably opt for the under-sedated slicing.

The remainder of my evening was spent attempting to urinate under the threat of having a catheter inserted (I didn't have ANY tubes coming out of me when I woke up this time) and ambulating. I think that nurses always use the catheter as a threat in order to scare the pee out of me. I went for a pretty long walk with my nursing assistant. We walked all around the floor. Upon return to my room, I noticed a slight, but increasing pain in my right side. She said that it was gas that had moved from when I was walking. I guess that I never realized it before, but trapped gas can be extremely painful. On the frowning face scale of pain, it was definitely a frown with some water come out of its eyes. I explained this to my NA, who responded with a look that seemed to say, "Are you serious? What a wuss." After continuing to complain of what must have felt like a heart attack, she supplied me with some heating pads which were supposed to help. The pain receded after a few minutes, and now I am fine, but man, it was no fun for a little bit.

Anyway, I am getting tired, and that is probably more than anyone wants to read anyway. I'll provide another update in the morrow.

69 days down, 5 to go

I know, it has been so long and you have all been met with disappointment upon each viewing of my blog that results in yet another updateless day. Well, half of that is correct anyway. "What have I been up to?" You ask. I would be happy to fill you in on all of the exciting details of my life over the past several weeks. This should take about three sentences (but I do tend to be a bit long-winded, even while typing). Basically, I have felt excellent since my last update. I have been biking and exercising any day that I have had time to. Also, everyone kind of came through for me when I said that I was insanely bored. Over the past several weeks, I have spent probably about 36 combined hours in La Crosse because friends in either the Dells or The Cities have provided me with assorted means to stay occupied. I have only had maybe one or two mornings to my self over this period of time. I have been pretty busy painting, working on the Dells house, catching up with old friends, making new ones, and of course eating/drinking on the patio at Salut.

But enough catching up, lets get down to the proverbial brass tacks (does anyone even know what that means?). A few weeks ago I had my barium test. It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected. The tube was not very large at all, and it only had one mishap when it shot out of where it was supposed to stay put and sprayed barium everywhere. While I would LOVE to describe this in every offensive detail that I can muster, I am attempting to keep this thing PG, or maybe PG-13, so just use your imaginations. Anyway, it was a pretty interesting procedure. I even watched on the monitor as the barium slowly crept up my new "colon" and then spilled out into my ostomy bag like the spring flood waters reaching the Mississippi River Delta. Also during this procedure, I stumbled upon the perfect joke for any procedure involving anything being inserted into an individual's rectum. I have tried many one-liners in an attempt to make the medical staff more uncomfortable than I. After all, why should I be completely at their mercy? You are all free to use this one. So the younger doctor that was overseeing the test tried to sympathize and say that all of these procedures must be pretty uncomfortable for me. I replied with, "Yea, this whole experience would be a lot more enjoyable if I were some sort of sexual deviant." The uncomfortable laughter that this was met with was pure beauty.

So that test went well, and everything is on track. Just five days to go from today. It is all pretty crazy. While I would love to embark onto a retrospective diatribe concerning the ups and downs of the past 2+ months, I fear that I must save that for after the surgery sometime. I go in on the 15th for my takedown. I did get some excellent details on how this procedures is performed. I asked the doctors if they just shove everything back in and sew it up. Apparently it is not that simple. What they do is pull a portion of my intestines out of my body (I know, sweet), and then cut out the part that goes to the ostomy, then they sew the two ends back together and shove it all back in. I think that flux and solder are involved somehow, but I am not sure. I was hoping to get some sort of camouflage hospital gown and perhaps a WWII military surplus helmet in order to finally re-enact that beginning scene from Saving Private Ryan (how is that for foreshadowing? I only wish that I had planned it [see blog entry #2 if you are confused]) After that, I will basically be good to go. I will have to stay at the hospital until I have a bowel movement (the beauty never ends). This can range from two to perhaps nine days. It all depends when my GI track feels like waking up. So I will probably feel great for as long as I am there, which with any luck will only be two or three days. I foresee a very boring stay.

I guess that is about it for now. I will let everyone know how it goes on Friday as I will probably be up and about pretty quickly. It is only a 2 or 2 1/2 hour procedure. Until then, thanks for all of the support.

The end is in sight

So there are a couple of reasons for this sooner than planned for post. The first, and unfortunately mostly informational, is that the last two dates for my last two procedures have finally been determined. On July 25th, I will be get my barium test. I don't foresee too many problems with that one. The other procedure which is for my (drumroll please) takedown is scheduled for August 15th. That is a little later than I had hoped, but I am over halfway there. It is definitely a workable date. The best part is I will be back together for the state fair. Hopefully everything will be up and working for the biggest test ANY gastrointestinal track can face.

The other reason for this post is that a few people (as well as myself) have noticed a decreasing entertainment value in my blog. I will do my best for my fans. So lets see...I do have one story that I excluded from the previous post. I will set the stage. You know when you go to a grand opening at some crappy store or perhaps auto dealer and they serve grade "D" hot dogs, popcorn, and have brightly colored balloons filled with helium? Well, think about those balloons filling with air from the helium tank, but replace the helium tank with a long flexible tube with a camera on the end and the balloon with my ostomy bag, and then just sandwich me in the middle somewhere. That was basically the effect that my last flex sig had on my system. I guess that I was naive when I thought that gas only went one way through the human body. Apparently, if you really try, it can also go the opposite way of what we all think of as natural. And not only that, if you happen to have your intestines sticking out of your body with a hole in them, the gas will escape. So lets paint a picture of my ultimate indignity (well not quite, but bare with me anyway because we all know there have been worse). There I am in a room full of doctors and students with my pants down, a camera in my rear end, and what is essentially a balloon attached to me which is filling up more and more with each additional refreshing burst of air dispensed by said camera into my "colon." I don't know what was going on there, but I am pretty sure that every hole in my body was serving a purpose other than what was intended and was thoroughly confused in the process. Good times.

So that's the only other story that I have. I hoped that I juiced it up enough to hold people over until I get an element from the periodic table squirted into my rectum. With any luck there will be some great stories when I get to the takedown. We can only hope...

Its all downhill from here

I know that these updates are becoming few and far between. This is mainly for two reasons. One, I doubt the attention span of the vast majority of my audience can last for a continuous month. The other is that my activities have basically consisted of nothing. Oh, if only I was lying. As much as everyone complains about having too much work and not enough free time, it is actually much better than the alternative. The slow train to boredom and insanity has already left the station. Sure, I have tried to keep busy with assorted chores, but it certainly does not occupy 40 hours per week.

On to the main reason for this update. Last Thursday (the 3rd) I had my follow-up flex sig. I believe that we all recall my earlier explanation. It didn't go too badly. Unfortunately, I do not have the rapport with this particular surgeon that I have had with previous doctors, so I had to watch my language. As with any procedure that is performed on me, there was a small audience to observe this medical oddity. It wouldn't be the same if there wasn't. Dr. Heise tried to reassure me once I disrobed that they were there to look in my backside, not at it. This was not reassuring at all. I expect nothing less than to be ogled.

Once the camera was inside and past the staples, I ventured a peek at the monitor. It didn't look too bad compared to other pictures I have seen of my dearly departed diseased and ulcerated colon. He said that everything looked good and that we would schedule the next step (the barium test) in a couple of weeks. If everything looks good with that, I might have the takedown done by the end of July. That would be the last step, at least for a while. He also mentioned that things may need to be...stretched out down there. This process is similar to basically a colonoscopy, but with much more barbaric intentions. If that is the worst that I need to worry about though, I can handle it.

So to sum everything up, I am doing well (except for the boredom), and everything is on schedule and looking good. I will update again in a couple of weeks once the barium test is done and hopefully the takedown is scheduled.

Follow-up appointment #1

This past Thursday I had my first follow-up appointment in Madison with Dr. Heise. Since my last update I have continued to improve and have finally been released into my own custody (as opposed to forced convalescence with my family). So the appointment was pretty short and sweet. Everyone said that I looked good. This isn't saying much as their only basis for comparison was me unbathed in an open-backed hospital gown with messy hair and assorted tubes coming out of me. I took the compliment either way. We ran through the next couple of months and what they were expected to entail. Basically, it goes like this: in 2-3 weeks I go back for a flexible sigmoidoscopy (flex sig) in order for them to examine my new pouch and see how it is doing. For anyone that hasn't had the pleasure of one of these guys, basically it is like a colonoscopy, but they don't go as far and there is no sedation. In my past experiences this procedure has largely involved me swearing at the medical staff and calling them sadists.

If everything looks good in the flex sig, then a couple of weeks later we do that fun barium test thing. I have never done it before, but I have heard that the barium tastes horrible. Which brings me to my next point. I asked Dr. Heise how that test would work as I currently have a bypass and the barium wouldn't be able to make it to my pouch. The answer to this had already occurred to me before he answered. The inevitable barium enema was explained. Good times. At least I don't have to taste it. If that test looks good, then we schedule my takedown (hooking everything back up and getting rid of the ostomy) a couple of weeks after that.

That is about all of the excitement for now. Things are pretty status quo. I am getting more comfortable with changing my appliance everyday. I also feel a little better and have more energy each day that I get up. I had heard from multiple sources how they felt better immediately after the surgery because their diseased colon was gone. I thought that they were crazy, but now I have to agree. There is a lot that I feel like I can do that I haven't been able to in a long while. Unfortunately, things are still healing and I have to take it slow, but overall I am beginning to feel pretty good.

Settling in

I am not going to lie and say that I was 100% comfortable with everything when I left the hospital. I don't think that I ever would have been, no matter how long I stayed. At some point though, you have to leave the proverbial nest and survive on your own. It is a big change to go from having a nurse available 24/7 to attend to any problem you may have with a pharmacy of medications at their disposal to taking care of yourself with limited support. With this in mind, I settled into my Middleton hotel room which would serve as home for the next few days. My biggest concern by far was the fact that I hadn't made it 24 hours in the hospital without having to put a new appliance (ostomy bag) on. I held out little hope that anything would be different once I left.

The next few days passed with little excitement. My appliance never leaked (thank goodness) and I had a couple of visits from Home Health Care nurses. The first nurse weighed me, which hadn't been done since before I checked into the hospital. Apparently I had lost about 13 pounds over my hospital stay. It may have been more because I hadn't weighed myself after my gorging episodes several days before the surgery, but I guess that this question is lost to history. The second nurse and I changed my appliance, which I am becoming uncomfortably comfortable with. When the day arrives that the sight of my intestines sticking out of my abdomen doesn't phase me, it will truly be a disturbing day. Other than that, not too much else happened. I busied myself with various daytime television programs, but one can only watch so much syndicated programming, and I am afraid that I simply cannot stomach much of what network television has to offer before 3:00 PM.

On Wednesday, I begrudgingly headed up to the Twin Cities. Although I firmly held to the idea that I could take care of myself in La Crosse, the overwhelming tide of conflicting views that came from everyone I knew eventually wore me down. So for at least the next week or so, I will be staying in The Cities and then going to my follow-up appointment in Madison on June 19th. After that, I plan on staying on my own in La Crosse. One can convalesce for only so long. Until then, I will continue to recuperate (and improve) and hopefully receive some visits from those few individuals who could not make the trek to Madison.

Filling in a few blanks

I know that it has been a few days, but I assure you that they have been action packed. Let's jump right into the gory details. So Thursday started out great, but ended mostly with me being covered in assorted bodily fluids at semi-regular intervals. The main culprit this time was my JP tube, which is a tube used to drain fluid from a surgery site I guess. It just continued to leak no matter how many times we changed the dressings. I think that there must have been some ostomy leakage interspersed in there, but it has been a few days and I can't recall as vividly. Much of this clean-up/laundry duty fell on the unlucky nurse assigned to me that evening, Amanda (pictured obviously much before I became a pain). She was quite the trooper that evening, even as my returning sarcasm became sharper and more haphazard. We must have changed my sheets and gown half a dozen times. The remainder of that day passed without too much more excitement, other than I was beginning to feel much, much better.

The next day (Friday) began with a rude awakening (as my surgeon, Dr. Heise had forecasted). We began the "no epidural" experiment this morning at about 6:00. We replaced the epidural with oxycodone. I have heard that people supposedly abuse this stuff, but after trying two doses, I really don't get it. It basically completely wiped me out and made me want to vomit all morning. At this point I was getting a bit frustrated. It did not seem like I would ever get out of the hospital. Shortly after my horrific morning, we decided to stop using the oxycodone. I told them that I never wanted that garbage again. They made a note in my file. After my detox, I began feeling much better and even had my first solid meal since Saturday, a grilled cheese sandwich and some mashed potatoes. I was also graced by a visit from my brother Derek, and his wife Sheryl. Their aid was indispensable in running interference with my mother. Unfortunately, my excitement over my returning energy and new visitors was short-lived as we still had the task of removing my remaining tubes. First was the JP tube, which if you don't remember was a decent-sized tube sticking out of my abdomen for drainage. I had expressed some concern over getting this removed to Amanda, she said that it wouldn't be bad except for it has a fish-hook like thing on the end. I had to think for a moment before I realized that she was joking. Hilarious. So to take the JP tube out, one of the ever-sensitive residents came in and basically said roll to the side a little bit, and then just started pulling it out like she was Mary Poppins unpacking her luggage. I didn't look, but Derek said he thought that it was three feet long. It kind of felt like someone was pulling my guts out. Good stuff. Once that one was done we still had the epidural and catheter. The epidural itself wasn't bad, but it was affixed to my body basically by tape all over my entire back, the good surgical stuff. On the plus side, I got a free back wax. So then just the catheter was left. That wasn't so bad, but it did burn a bit. Thank goodness it wasn't as long as the JP tube. That would have been bad news. I was left with the task of urinating under my own power within the next six hours with the threat of reinserting a catheter if I didn't. This was not as easy as one would think after not having done so for five days. With much patience and fluids, that task was accomplished and I faded off to sleep...but wait! I wasn't about to get off that easy. Once before the day was done I was awakened by yet another bag leakage, and a night nurse who wasn't as patient as those saintly day nurses. We made it through though, and I eventually got to sleep.

Saturday I woke up feeling pretty good. One of the well-polished residents greeted me this morning with, "How you would like to go home today?" I thought that she was kind of nuts. It seemed like I hadn't felt decent for two days in a row, so inevitably this day would turn. Once Robyn and I talked about it, we decided that there really was no reason for me to stay other than to continue to be a pain in the butt to the staff and to have someone to change my ostomy stuff. After an early morning visit from my brother Jason, his girlfriend Abby, my uncle Ron, and his wife Jean, we began the discharge process. Robyn walked me through changing my ostomy. Once again she was infinitely patient. The change was a success with a few added modifications, including a sporty new belt. Newly fitted with my hospital issued pajama bottom type pants and Obama '08 t-shirt, Jason wheeled me down the hallway and out of the hospital. All in all, it was a pretty decent stay for a pretty crappy procedure (pun only sort of intended, the adjective definitely applies). The nurses for the most part where excellent, even if they did not demonstrate mastery of the English language all of the time, which as a future English educator I take as a personal affront. If any of the nurses happen to be reading this (as I am sure they have much more free time now that I have been discharged and my mother was sure to give everyone the blog address with the zest of a door-to-door encyclopedia salesperson), I just wanted to say thanks for putting up with all of my complaining, whining, pissing, and moaning (well, not so much pissing, that was largely taken care of by the aforementioned catheter), but nonetheless they did an excellent job. That is it for the hospital stay for now (I hope). I would love to update further, but I have a date with a couple of vicodin.

The post-colon era

Creating suspense! That's exactly what I have been trying to do. It is exactly how I have learned it from the great Hollywood producers of yester-year. You build, and build, and build, and then nothing. For a bit. So obviously, I am alive. The surgery went for about 8 1/2 hours for everyone in the real world. It was about one minute for me. It went pretty well I think. I'll run down what I can recall. First we checked in at the First Day Surgery department at 5:30 AM. Shortly after, I was whisked away to a curtained area where I proceeded to get my gown and robe mixed up and put them on backwards. A word of advice, the gown has snaps, the robe doesn't. Otherwise they are exactly the same. Both equally sexy. After meeting with the various teams that would be working on me (I like the idea of a team, like when somebody makes an error in baseball someone is there to fix their mistake). The anesthesiologists were very pleasant. They brought me first to "cocktail hour" where they doped me up on something that allowed them to stick an epidural in my spine. I would imagine that would have been a bit uncomfortable without the initial pain killer. They had to wiggle around for a while to find the right spot. It did start working almost immediately though. That was pretty good. They then wheeled me into the OR where I scooted onto the operating table. It was a pretty cold, white room with a lot of lights and cameras. After moving onto the table the next thing that I remember is waking up in a haze and not really knowing what was going on.

To the right is a picture of me looking pretty doped up and chubby right after surgery. Certainly not the most flattering of pictures, but it kind of sums up how I felt. The nurses appeared to have a bit more energy. There are some even less appealing pictures if you can believe that. I don't remember the first day too well. I basically laid on a bed in my room and drifted in and out of consciousness. I couldn't really drink or eat anything yet, not that I was very interested in that. Doctors and residents stopped by and checked on me, and I eventually fell asleep for a few hours at a time that night. I ran a fever of 103 for most of that evening and night, but we eventually got it under control.

The second day I started feeling quite a bit better. I managed to sit up a little bit and even walk a couple of times. I made it about 30 feet, which was pretty good I guess. At least according to the nurses. Much to the dismay of everyone around me, I also got my NG tube taken out. For those of you not familiar with such a device, it is about a two foot long piece of tubing (maybe 1/4 inch) that goes down your throat and into your stomach. The intention is to suck out various substances that can make you nauseous and perhaps vomit, which would not be comfortable for someone with recently made incisions in their stomach. Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for others, this tubing made it a bit difficult to talk. By the second day it was making my throat pretty sore. We decided that the output wasn't very high and that we would take it out. While pulling it out, I decided that the four seconds that my nurse was taking to perform this task was not enough and just pulled it out myself as fast as possible after about half a second of this lovely experience. Definitely not pleasant either way. The faster the better though. The end result was a slightly sore throat and a piece of tubing covered in mucus and snot. With my newly recovered vocal abilities, I returned to my usual abrasive and sarcastic self. Additional activities that I enjoyed this day include changing my ostomy bag and being bathed by an intimidating nursing assistant from South Africa.

The third day was filled with ups and downs. I was able to start sipping clear liquids. This was a nice change. I tried to get up that morning for a towel bath, but got very light-headed and ended up laying in bed for a bit. Unfortunately, my position made my ostomy connection begin to leak and within a few moments I was enjoying laying in a pool of my own waste material. Very comforting. Thank goodness for my nurse Robyn (right). She was very patient with cleaning everything multiple times that day and never complaining about it. It was truly repulsive. One thing that I have learned is to have no shame in terms of medical care. You really have to be open to whatever in order to get proper care. I basically took it easy the rest of the day. It was decided by a team of residents (much like you can imagine from any popular medical television show, i.e. ER, Scrubs, or House, but without the entertainment value) that my fluids were low which was making me light-headed. So we increased that and I began to feel much better.

Today is the fourth day (Thursday). It has been a much better day today. I discussed with the anesthesiologists about making a new cocktail for my epidural yesterday. We started that last night and it has been working wonderfully. I went for two walks today, and even had some clear liquids. This is the first form of food that I have had since Saturday morning, but I fear that I did not loose as much weight on the famed starvation/take out an organ diet as I had hoped. We have begun discussing a discharge date, which still seems a bit sudden to me. I gauge how I am doing by how many apparatuses are attached to me. I still have the epidural, a catheter, a wound drainage device, and an IV. It seems that there is still a ways to go. We will see though. Perhaps late tomorrow or Monday. I am supposed to start on full liquids, which I believe are those that you cannot see through, later this evening. I am definitely looking forward to that. Anyway, now that I am a bit more mobile and coherent I will update more often and hopefully more entertainingly. Until then, thanks for all of the support.

The colon's swan song

It is Sunday evening. I don't think that my colon is expecting anything. It has put up relatively little resistance thus far. We may succeed at this surprise attack yet. I finished the initial stages of my bowel cleanse. All that is left is an enema in the morning. Well, at least I have something left to look forward to. As anyone in this family will attest to, the lack of regular feedings of any member of the Bettini clan results in irritability at a much higher level than normal (hard to believe I know). In order to prep for the surgery, I had to stop eating after breakfast yesterday. This has had the expected result. I tried to plan for the expected physical and mental effects. I thought, "Where could I go that would not only leave me feeling full, but also not wanting to eat again for the foreseeable future?" The only possible answer was the Old Country Buffet. While the food there is only moderately sub-par, the clientele leaves something to be desired. I think that I officially finished my meal shortly after I observed a woman in line for a made-to-order omelet who apparently could not wait to return to her seat before devouring a fried chicken leg. Did I mention that this lady did not appear to need the extra fried chicken leg too badly or that it was 10:30 in the morning? Who eats fried chicken for breakfast? While in line for more breakfast? The image of that slovenly member of society has helped to keep the hunger at bay.

Seeing as this will be the last day for a while that I can foresee having much energy or patience, I thought that I would briefly go over a few more appetizing details concerning the procedure. So the big change over the next few months will be the introduction of an ostomy into my daily life. What's an ostomy you say? Well has anyone seen the opening scenes "Saving Private Ryan" with the Allied troops landing at Normandy? There is one gentleman in particular who is hit by mortar or some other explosive device and is holding his intestines inside his body. Well it is kind of like that except for the fact that I am overdramatic to a fault. Basically, I will have this new "colon" which is newly put together and full of sutures and doesn't know what to do. So while that is healing up, the doctors divert part of my ileum(part of the small intestines) so that it sticks out of my abdomen and then the waste comes out of there into what is essentially a zip-lock bag attached to my stomach with caulk. I know you are thinking, "How can I get one of these?" So that should be fun. After two or three months, I go in for surgery again at which point the doctors hook up my new colon and take out the ileostomy. My summer will largely be spent dealing with this new appliance as they call it. It's not a dishwasher. I think that they need a new term.

Right now it is about seven hours until I need to check in. I should probably get some sleep. I will try to post with an update whenever I am up for it. If anyone is worried in the meantime, you can feel free to call my Mom. Actually, it would probably help to keep her occupied. Her cell is 612-384-9190. Feel free to call for updates. Otherwise, I will see you cats on the flipside.

Welcome!

While I have traditionally shunned new technology and clung white-knuckled to outdated forms of communication and organization, I also believe firmly in accomplishing the greatest amount of work with the least amount of effort. Hence the blog. To be honest, I was also rather intrigued by the idea of having a captive audience. Rather than allow everyone to scamper about gathering information about my recovery (yes, I do think that I occupy such a pivotal role in the daily lives of my family members and casual acquaintances alike), I thought that I would provide updates straight from the proverbial horse's mouth. This is where the disclaimer comes in. While I constantly aspire to create Pulitzer-worthy material, a combination of starvation, pain, and narcotics may leave me with less control over my faculties than normal. This is when the truly interesting updates will occur. Either that or just nonsensical ramblings about social reform.

Here is a brief background for those who inevitably are still confused and uninformed. I have Ulcerative Colitis. Let's break it down. Anyone know Latin? Here we go anyway, everyone should know the suffix -itis. If just means inflammation, just like arthritis, meningitis, laryngitis, yada, yada, yada. So Colitis is inflammation of the colon. Ulcerative means having ulcers. So basically my colon is inflamed and has a bunch of open sores. Sweet. Inflammation is caused by the immune system. Everyone still with me? This is just like when someone gets a fever. Usually this is a normal and healthy body process. Sometimes things get a little wacky and the immune system attacks areas that are working just fine. So basically my body is attacking my colon. The most effective treatment for this is to lower the immune system (lymphocytes specifically) so that it does not attack said organ. I have taken a whole battery of immunosuppresants. Basically at this point, they have stopped being effective, and there really is no foreseeable benefit to taking more than I already am. The point of diminishing returns has been reached. So now we are just going to get rid of it.

I know what you are thinking. How is that possible? Well, through the miracle of modern science it can work. Here is a link that describes the gory details.
http://www.surgery.wisc.edu/general/patients/ileal.shtml

Monday, June 2nd I will be going under the knife for this wild ride at the UW-Madison Hospital. The recuperation time varies dramatically, but one thing is for sure, it sure is going to suck. At some point this will probably turn into a medium for me to complain about pain, my ostomy(more about that later), or any number of unforeseeable complications. In the meantime, I will let everyone know how it is going. I welcome comments and questions, but I do have one stipulation. If you are going to post anything remotely related to a medical concept, please be sure to research it. While it is widely understood that I loathe science as a discipline, I have been obligated to learn a great deal about the specifics that relate to me. I really, really do not want to hear anything about a "miracle cure," or possible causes. I can almost guarantee that it will only make you sound less educated in the end. And we all know that I would rather accomplish that goal on my own.