This is my first post to J-Pouch and I hope I selected the correct Forum. It seems as though most of the posts relate to after take-down the second operation. Maybe there is a an appropriate forum for issues after surgery #1? My surgery was July 24 where temp ileostomy was created. Surgery #2 will be end of October. Today is seven days post-op and I am doing very well from what others have experienced.

But I have two issues: I don't want to eat at all. I feel so close to the output as the bag just sits there on my abdomen and fills and puffs gas non-stop. Its always slightly puffy with a little air. I am eating everything. First it was liquids, soups, noodles then I tried toast and other solid stuff just fine. I eat tiny amounts and am immediately full. Everything's coming out just fine so long as I mix the right amount of solid food with liquid. Otherwise, very liquid. I am tired of analyzing the results because I carry with me later, unable to detach and then don't want to eay.I feel I should be trying to do healthy food but all that tastes decent is saltine crackers, toast, soft beef taco from Taco Time, and watered orange juice.

My second issue is what I think is restless leg syndrome. I am normally very active physically in good shape. The last six or eight weeks I have cut back alot. The last week with surgery I am only walking. When I fall asleep at night I am consumed with restlessness in my legs and it goes on for hours. Anyone else had this? I went for a long walk today outside even did some wading in the lake. It was fabulous but when I came back home to nap I still had the restless shaking syndrome.

Any tips on either of these issues would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks everyone.

Welcome to the board. I am sure you will find lots of answers to many questions as time goes by. There is another site you might try that I got alot of good info from before I found this site. it is http://www.uoaa.org/forum/

As to the restless leg, I had a brief problem with it and found out it was tied to my anemia.
I took a short coarse of slo-fe and havn't had any problems since. It wouldn't hurt to have that checked. Again welcome and good health to you.

My daughter had her first operation june 3rd. She also had the same symptoms as far as not being hungry and the bag always seemed puffy. Than will disappear in time. They also have bags with filters and when it gets puffy just open release the gas by separating the bag from the flange a little like a tupperware bowl. As far as the consistency it is liquidy at the beginning. That will change. My daughter found that eating marshmellows or jelly beans helped to solidify the bowel movement. Now she eats everything and feels great. Don't forget to drink alot. She drinks a lot of gaterade so she never has become dehydrated. Good Luck.

i just recently switche from a regular convatec drainable bag to a convatec filtered drainable bag and am loving it. i too had a lot of gas and got really tired of it. i had my surgery on july 11th so i totally understand how you feel. don't worry too much right now about what you eat as long as you are eating. i didn't eat anything except what you are describing along with potatoes, pasta and rice for about 2 weeks or more. the 1st time i ate real food was lasagna and whoa did that bother me! caused so much gas for 2 days. when you are ready, just introduce one thing at a time and if it bothers you, try again later. i'll try lasagna again, but not for a while. are you o.k. with the surgery otherwise? i'm personally loving it, yet will look forward to step 2 to get rid of the bag!

Oh yes, anemia. That explains it becuase I also have a low hematocrit (28) and had a transfusion during my surgery. Thanks all for your help!

Low iron is a known cause of RLS. While you're waiting for it to resolve, try heat and massage. (Thomas--my j-poucher--and I both have had this from time to time.)

Try not to stress too much about the food issues. You ARE doing very well so early in your recovery. Everything will improve.

When I had ulcerative colitis my diet was so restricted because of the symptoms caused by eating just about anything. So, when I had the baggie....I enjoyed eating and drinking everything. I learned to pop the seal on my wafer/baggie to expel the gas. No odor, fortunately! I'd even do this in movie theaters! I hope no one wondered what I was doing with my hands in my pants! Sounds like all is going well with you. Liquidy output in the baggie was normal for me no matter what I ate. Once reconnected I was able to have more control over that. Best wishes!

Thank you all. I think I understnad now not to wrooy so much about the bag output at this point. I am going to investigate those 'tupperware' bags at my 13 day follow-up on wednesday. Also, I learned a hard lesson yesterday, woke up with bad headache, lethargy and nauseaa and no bag output. I hadn't eaten enough and I was really miserable. My girlfriend came by right then. She made a protien shake and toast and bananas. Withn in an hour I was back to my old colorful self. I must eat even though I may not feel like it!

I am glad that I am not the only one that had RLS after the first surgery. It took awhile to admit to myself that it was RLS but after a couple of nights without sleep battling it I finally did some research. I found that getting up and walking around worked the best for me when my legs started going crazy in the middle of the night. Staying in bed trying to massage or try and pysch myself out didn't work at all. I thought for awhile it was mental until I started to get up and walk around for awhile. This usually worked for me. I didn't have RLS for long and haven't had it in the three years since.

As for eating....just take your time. Everything in that department will get back to normal with time. Good luck and I hope everything works out well for you.

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ut the food issues. You ARE doing very well so early in your recovery. Everything will improve.

My appetite has improved. I eat smaller meals, slowly and I drink alot of water. That really seems to help. The RLS has improved to and that could be due to my taking an iron supplement. Not really sure. I am taking Ambien to sleep and that seems to help. Plus I sleep with a heating pad on low. I just switich in on and the warmth seems to help me relax. I tried walking and it did nothing. But you are right, lying in bed and trying to talk myself out of it didn;t help either. Once I get to that point I might as well just get up and do something else but sleep.