Journal entry by Kristine Hammerstrand —
Hello from home in Urbana!
The medical team at Northwestern thought I had made enough recovery progress from the reconstructive surgery after only one night in the hospital to be discharged. We got home yesterday (Wed. 2/16) afternoon, grateful to be able to travel before the rain/ice/snow storm started this morning.
As expected, I've got some real sore abdominal muscles and it hurts when I change position from seated to standing, etc., and coughing or sneezing are very painful. What I didn't expect is the method they use for healing the hole in my belly where the ostomy bag used to attach. They pack the hole in iodine gauze at the end of the surgery and bandage you up and leave it like that for a couple days. When ready to be discharged, they remove the gauze packing (an amazing amount of it) and apply gauze bandages over the circular opening.They do not stitch up or otherwise seal up the opening, but rather leave it to heal itself closed. Apparently this works better for healing and reducing infection. So I have about a 1 inch diameter opening in my abdominal skin that I need to keep bandaged for the duration of the healing process. It's quite strange, actually. You would think that your insides would leak, if not pour, out of an opening like this, but they don't. I will do you all a favor and not share any pictures, but take my word for it, it's weird.
I'm back on the bland low fiber diet again for a month, not allowed to lift anything over 10 lbs. for 6 weeks, and have been told to expect to be low energy for a while, too. I will have a followup appointment by phone with the doctor's team tomorrow, and then an in person visit on March 30.
Thanks again for all the good wishes and support. I am a very lucky person.
The medical team at Northwestern thought I had made enough recovery progress from the reconstructive surgery after only one night in the hospital to be discharged. We got home yesterday (Wed. 2/16) afternoon, grateful to be able to travel before the rain/ice/snow storm started this morning.
As expected, I've got some real sore abdominal muscles and it hurts when I change position from seated to standing, etc., and coughing or sneezing are very painful. What I didn't expect is the method they use for healing the hole in my belly where the ostomy bag used to attach. They pack the hole in iodine gauze at the end of the surgery and bandage you up and leave it like that for a couple days. When ready to be discharged, they remove the gauze packing (an amazing amount of it) and apply gauze bandages over the circular opening.They do not stitch up or otherwise seal up the opening, but rather leave it to heal itself closed. Apparently this works better for healing and reducing infection. So I have about a 1 inch diameter opening in my abdominal skin that I need to keep bandaged for the duration of the healing process. It's quite strange, actually. You would think that your insides would leak, if not pour, out of an opening like this, but they don't. I will do you all a favor and not share any pictures, but take my word for it, it's weird.
I'm back on the bland low fiber diet again for a month, not allowed to lift anything over 10 lbs. for 6 weeks, and have been told to expect to be low energy for a while, too. I will have a followup appointment by phone with the doctor's team tomorrow, and then an in person visit on March 30.
Thanks again for all the good wishes and support. I am a very lucky person.
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