Waking up with drugs dripping through my veins to stem off the pain from having my entire colon and rectum removed, I had many hazy conversations but have only vague recollections of the details. Not the opportune time for an ostomy nurse to review all the “Do’s and Don’ts” of living with an ileostomy, but the gracious woman did leave a thick binder for me to reference once I was off the painkillers.
After leaving the hospital and re-reading that binder front to back several times, the rules became etched in my brain – avoid nuts, avoid raw vegetables and Chinese vegetables (OK, what the heck does that mean? Is that broccoli? Carrots? Zeesh. I decided to err on the side of caution and avoid them all), carbonated beverages can make you gassy, as can drinking through a straw. . . Blah BlahBlah Blah Blah.
Being the compliant patient I am, I studiously watched what I ate & avoided my favorite thing to drink – carbonated water and my second favorite - beer. Surprisingly, one item not on the list was shrimp, and I didn’t discover until eight months post-surgery that it is, indeed, difficult to digest. This hard-learned lesson came after scarfing several jumbo shrimp cocktail the size of my fist at Easter dinner. And I do mean “scarfing” because I was inhaling those suckers. Thank goodness I stopped after two because I caught my uncle double dipping in the cocktail sauce.
The day after the infamous double-dipping-shrimp-scarfing incident, momma woke up feeling a little backed up, to say the least. I felt progressively closer to having my intestines explode as the morning wore on because stuff wasn’t getting through the tight turn my intestines take to get out of my stomach wall. After a few tense calls to the ostomy nurse, I painfully and carefully drove home from work to try the few suggestions they had to help pass the dang shrimp – soak in a hot bath, drink tea, and massage my belly. By late that afternoon and yet another call, nothing was working so I decided it was time to head to the emergency room.
My appalled friend Heather got my kids from school so I could drive myself to the hospital. She couldn’t believe that I was going by myself. I never thought how that must sound to someone who had never spent the amount of time as I have in a hospital. I’ve learned over the course of twelve years of a chronic illness that severe pain is really a solitary thing. I have to admit, it wasn’t fun lying on my side across three chairs in the waiting room deep breathing my way through the waves of pain, but for me it wouldn’t have been any better to have a loved one watching my agony especially since I knew nurses would be there to care for me.
Later, after throwing up the awful solution they made me drink for the special x-rays I needed, the resident on duty told my husband, via my cell phone speakerphone, and me that my Crohn’s Disease had returned. Really, it was my worst nightmare come true. Even through the haze of painkillers they had finally given me, I was having my doubts about the diagnosis. It felt like I had been clogged. And none of my symptoms even remotely mimicked what I had experienced before having all my diseased parts surgically removed.
Fortunately, enough of that foul solution I had upchucked got into my system and dislodged the offending shrimp. Who knew it was also a diuretic? And soon the output from my stoma was flowing like a dam had burst. And I suppose it had. My poor little stoma was swollen and sore, but nonetheless in good working order again. Unfortunately, two residents and one gastroenterologist had misdiagnosed me and scared the bejeebies out of me saying it was Crohn’s. Fortunately, my colon surgeon immediately fingered the shrimp as the culprit during an office visit days later.
The lessons I learned? Shrimp and lobster are hard to digest. Beware of any doctor not intimately familiar with ostomies. Be more demanding of pain meds if forced to wait in an emergency room writhing in pain. And for goodness sakes, chew my stinking food!
Over the 4 years since my surgery, I slowly introduced the no-no foods. Carbonated beverages were my first. Really, I could tell no difference in gassiness. Popcorn was next, and I was very slow about that. Nuts followed and then my beloved carrots. Last was the dreaded shrimp. I’ve learned that if I chew my food really, really well, then I can pretty much eat anything. Except for some raw veggies which I don’t think I’ll ever have the nerve to eat. Nope. Raw celery & broccoli ain’t happenin’.
Now for crying out loud fellow ostomates, don’t go scarfing a bunch of stuff and then blame me because you got a blockage, and God forbid have to have it surgically corrected. I was lucky. And I’m smart about what I eat. I know if I eat a bunch of nuts, I have to chew them until they are like peanut butter and drink a lot of water. Same with popcorn. Same with everything. I can drink alcohol as long as I stay hydrated otherwise I get a bitch of a headache. Actually, I always have to stay hydrated to avoid a bitch of a headache.
Introducing no-no foods was a slow process. I didn’t jump in and don’t suggest that you do. But for me, having my popcorn and carbonated beverages back have been a bit of heaven – one very small, well chewed bit at a time.
