Small bowel obstruction

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KFalvey
KFalvey Member Posts: 118 Member
edited March 2014 in Colorectal Cancer #1
Hi to everyone,
On Sunday night, I had severe abdominal pains start in 2 spots. At 10pm. I had a BM, one of the pains went away, but the other stayed and got worse overnight. I called the doctor, she had me get an X-ray showing a blockage in the bowel, admitted me in the hospital, put me on IV, nothing by mouth to see if it would clear. I had a Cat scan which showed the blockage at the anastomosis. Pain continued until about 3 AM the next morning. Still no BM though. The next day they X-rayed me again and still blocked. They did a gastrografin enema. That cleared it thank God. I need to know how often this is going to happen, and what foods I should avoid. Thanks for any advice. Kandy

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  • neon356
    neon356 Member Posts: 137 Member
    #2
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    Hi Kandy,
    I feel tht I should preface this note by saying, as you often have folks say here, that every one is different. I suffered from blockages for four years after my initial colostomy for stage 3 rectal Ca, and over that time period it got to the point where I would end up in the ER as much as twice a week getting IV fluids to rehydrate me, compazine for the nausea, and pain killers. I would get upset when caring people always told me that it must have been because of what I was eating but the fact was that it didn't seem to matter what I ate. The problem was being caused by a section of bowel that no longer was able to anastimose, and if food got caught there I would block. My surgeon was very reluctant to operate, because he felt that removing more bowel would possibly lead to poor vitamin absorption which would require shots for the rest of my life, and constant diarhea which is a real problem for ostomates. But the quality of my life had reached the point where further surgery was necessary and the surgeon removed another couple of feet of bowel. Once that was done I haven't has a single problem since. Fortunately I don't need regular B12 shots, and my body functions are pretty normal with very few bouts of diarrhea. The best advice I can give is to give it time and see what happens. Hopefully your gut will get back to normal. Certainly watch what you eat, but I'm sure that you do that anyway, but I doubt that what you eat is the major problem. My experience may not be typical, I'm just relating what can happen in some cases. I hope this doesn't happen in your case. Good luck,
    Carl

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