Sigh.

I'd actually been getting along quite well...no leaks for weeks and weeks. Finally seem to have found not one, but two functional setups: Coloplast and Convatec, both with the most convex wafers available.

Then yesterday evening, for no reason I can understand, I developed really severe gas. Didn't eat anything obviously problematic, either, although dinner was pork roast w/ gravy (which I hadn't had since the surgery) on a bun.

The gas went on literally all night. During the evening, while awake, I was burping the bag every half-hour, it seemed, and emptying every hour or so. Usually I can go 3 hours without emptying.

Crawled into bed around midnight, read for a while, kept burping regularly. Finally dozed off for about half a second, and woke to find the bag rock-hard and ballooned way out.

Okay, no problem, I thought. Been here before. So I get up to go to the loo. On the way there, the bag's closure literally burst. Stool shot all over the place. Fortunately, my apt has parquet tile floors--no carpet. Even so, cleaning up was quite a production, involving nearly a whole roll of paper towels.

Back to bed eventually, and this time to sleep for much longer...right through the alarm I keep set for 3 a.m. so that I can burp and/or empty if needed.

Woke just before 5, again with the rock-hard bag. Grabbed the closure before getting out of bed, thinking to prevent a recurrence of the earlier disaster...and guess what?

The flippin' *wafer* explodes! Stool shoots sideways, all over me, the bed, the floor...even the wastebasket several feet away from the bed.

Waaaaaahhhhhhh!

Obviously this time, I had to change the appliance. Cleaned up once again.

Finally remembered that I might have some Gas-X buried in the vanity under the bathroom sink. Dug it out and took some.

Back to bed: read for a bit, while heating the freshly applied wafer with my hand, as I'd been taught.

And doesn't *this* one start to leak maybe half an hour later?????

Sigh.

Now, I know this isn't the end of the world. In the grand scheme of things, lots worse stuff could happen to a person. But it sure as shootin' (pun intended) isn't my idea of fun.

I live alone, so nobody else was inconvenienced. Well, maybe my next-door neighbours, who might have heard me cursing and wailing in the wee hours.

Don't really need advice this time--though of course I'll happily accept any brilliant preventive measures anyone may wish to offer. I mainly just wanted to vent a bit. My friends are sweet, but they don't really and truly get it, you know?

Hi Chelydra,

I can fully commiserate so vent away!

When I had my first loop ileostomy I suffered a lot with gas and have had exactly the same thing happen in the small hours where the bag did a fair impersonation of the Hindenberg airship. Back then velcro fastening hadn't been invented so the pressure would literally blow the plastic clip off the tail.

I would put my money on the pork being the culprit for your gas problem. To this day it always gives me gas and higher volume output.

Thankfully for the most part I don't really suffer from gas much these days. I do eat a lot of probiotic yoghurts as well as taking probiotic capsules every day and I swear that is why I don't produce much gas. Also I think that the air filters on the bags I use help a great deal.

Hope that the gas has subsided by now and that you are back to your confident peaceful self and that hopefully as things tend to happen in 3's you should be ok for leaks for a while yet.

Take care.

Shell

Chelydra, I can sympathize, too. And how about when the velcro closing comes undone when you're pulling down your underwear? Or am I the only klutz that happens to?

Hmmmm...... Can't say that's ever happened to me. (she says touching everything wooden in sight! )

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I wear my bag at an angle across my belly so there's no build-up of pressure on the velcros fastening?

Just a thought.

Shell

Oddly, nothing on the post-ileo diet sheets I was given mentioned pork as potentially problematic. I eat ham without difficulty, so it never even occurred to me that I might be inviting trouble.

Live and learn!

And yes, thanks, the gas did subside. Biggest lesson--keep the Gas-X handy!

No it doesn't mention it on any diet sheets that I've read either.

Come to think of it I can eat ham and gammon without any problems but I will only eat it if it's really lean. I try to avoid pork because I love the crackling (also known as pork scratchings which is the crispy skin when roasted) and apart from the gas problem I also have gastritis so can't really tolerate fatty food.

Perhaps it's the fat part of the pork that gave you the problem too?

Strangely my Mum has never been able to eat pork either without it giving her terrible diarrhoea and she still has her colon. It must be one of those very individual things.

Shell

OK, this reminds me of a funny story that I meant to post awhile ago. I have a loop ileo now (my second one) and a couple of months ago I woke up in the night with the rock hard, gas filled bag and I made a beeline for the bathroom. I have no idea what I ate to do that, but nonetheless...

So I managed to get the bag opened and emptied into the toilet and I was pushing to expel the mucous from my bum and ...... I FARTED!! It was the strangest sensation to fart with an ileo! I can only imagine that the bag got so full that it started pushing air down into the lower section. Weird!

As far as gas, one thing that seems to work for me is charcoal pills. I don't get the capsules but get the "candy"-coated ones. I know they're supposed to disolve in the colons of regular people and since I don't have one, I just take it with a drink and bite down on it to break it open before I swallow it. There's no taste at all so don't worry. It reduces gas and odor and really seems to help me. Might be worth a try. I don't use them all the time but I do when I have something I know will cause me gas or when I have a work function and want to make sure to reduce the stoma noises. I take it with my meal and sometimes in-between.

Good luck!

Erin