Questions from new J-Poucher

I take Lomotil at bedtime, in addition to Metamucil with dinner. The combination helps a lot. Imodium should work similarly to Lomotil - Imodium is OTC. Surgeons vary about how they feel about both of these, but my surgeon offered both when I was discharged from the hospital.

The leakage may be due to excessive peristalsis aka a spasmodic bowel in the aftermath of surgery. I had it for months. As Scott suggested, lomotil, which has anti-spasmodic properties, should help. I found that Donnatal worked better. If you are also noticing machine gun like bursts of BMs after eating meals, this would tend to confirm that issue. Eventually your peristalsis should return to normal, but whenever bowels get cut and shut down, they could be out of whack for a while. You're not that far out from surgery. My recollection is having spasmodic bowel issues for many months after takedown.

Hi Dave,,

first congratulations on your takedown. Things will get better over time.

I experience very slight leakage, so I keep a large cotton ball btw my cheeks at all times.

some drugs like flomax nor only relax the prostate, but also my pelvic floor.  I change my dosage to the morning instead of evening and that helped.

i take Imodium 3x/day including bedtime. I get up maybe once in the wee hours depending when my last meal was.

i wish you the best.

Hi there.
Besides what the others have written you could consider how late you eat and drink, and experiment a bit with what foods makes you leak more. It takes a while to get to know your new gut and how your eating habits influence your system

It's been 20 years, but I remember the beginning being like you describe. I took a lot of imodium/loperamide initially. The best trick I learned was to not drink while you're eating. After that last bite of a meal, you can immediately drink something, but just not in between bites.

I remember my surgeon telling me that leaking at night every so often was normal ... but he told me that after the surgery. Knowing that beforehand wouldn't have changed my decision, but I wish I would have been prepared for something like that.

Imodium helped me tremendously with leakage and accidents while sleeping. I took 8 pills per day for the first year. Now, 8 years later, I just take 2 before bed to slow things down and prevent accidents.