Day 4

So far day four is going well. My pain control by means of the
epidural has been exemplary. The plan is to take the epidural out
tomorrow (eek!) and use narcotics in pill form to control the pain.
Removal of the epidural equals removal of the foley catheter which I'm
happy about. The part I'm not thrilled about is having to deal with
more pain.

I don't think I gave details of the surgery and the hardware it left
me with so I'll do that now. The surgery went as well as it could go.
They made the incision in the same place as before (pubic bone to 2
inches above the belly button) so I didn't end up with any new scars.
Once I was cut open like a cod, he could see that one loop of small
bowel had slipped down into the pelvis and had become fused to the
abscess. Once he separated the two, he could see that the small
intestine was in really good shape with only a small hole that had
connected it to the fistula. So instead of having to cut a couple of
inches of bowel out completely, all he had to do was stitch up the
hole. This small fix is likely the reason that I didn't have problems
with my digestive system starting up again. While he was in there dr
Buie also removed a bunch of adhesions (scar tissue) from my bowels.
This will hopefully reduce the chance of getting a blockage in the
future.

Once he was finished with the scar tissues he flushed out the abscess
with saline and placed a different kind of drain called a Jaxson-Pratt
drain into the abscess. Instead of coming out my butt cheek, this
drain comes out my stomach and connects to a small bulb-like device
for storing any fluid that might come out. So far this new drain is
much more comfortable than the old drain. I just hope it does it's job.

The only other thing dr Buie said about the surgery was that they had
a "good look around in there" and there was no sign of recurrent
cancer. He also said that overall my pelvis looked good (why thank
you!) and it is very likely that if the abscess heals, I will be able
to have surgery at some point in the future to reverse my ileostomy.
Yahoo!

I've had a few visitors already which has been a good change from the
usual hospital actvities which are either lie in bed and stare at the
ceiling or slouch around the halls pushing my iv looking like an ugly
bearded scantily clad hunchback pole dancer. So if you have nothing to
do, I would appreciate a visit. Foothills hospital, 10th floor, unit
102, room 1072. That's all for now.