One Week Post Surgery

Thanks to each of you for your care and support as I progress on this journey with cancer.

I’m trying to provide a frank, unblinking view of what is going on, and I realize some of you would prefer it be a little less frank with an occasional blink or even eyes squeezed shut. So I’ll try to arrange this post with the less frank, easier to gaze upon thoughts early and progress to the tougher stuff. I’ll even include headings to warn you what is next. And for those of you who really love the nitty gritty of all this, waaaaay down at the end, far past any text, will be a picture of my 10 incisions.

Yesterday, a week post-surgery and five days since I came home, was a day of a lot of firsts. Near the end of the day, I got to go upstairs in our home for first time. (Hint: this is where our only shower is.) I drove for the first time since surgery, and it went fairly well (aside from missing an exit then being distracted in figuring out how to recover). And they removed my catheter. All good things, at least on the surface.

Also on the upside, I’ve had very little pain post-surgery. I haven’t had to use any of the narcotic pain reliever they sent home with me and I’m currently investigating its value on the streets. I’m only taking extra strength Tylenol every 6 to 8 hours. The only pain in recent days is associated with my incisions which means I’ve likely cleared most of the CO2 they used to blow up inflate my abdomen.

Incontinence: The Downside of Catheter Removal

Don’t get me wrong, no longer having a catheter is great! But… I now have to wear Depends until I figure out how to use a new set of muscles to control urine flow. To put it mildly, I leak. I leak when I stand up. I leak when I walk; when I climb stairs; when I cough, sneeze, or laugh; and sometimes when I shift my position while seated. So now I’m wearing Depends.

It's frustrating. It is quite possibly causing me more stress/anxiety than the cancer diagnoses or the surgery. I don’t want to be concerned about whether I can make it to an appointment and back without leaking past the capacity of the Depends and ‘baptizing’ whatever it is I’m sitting on. I don’t want to have an alarm set every 3 hours to hopefully make sure I stay within said capacity. I just want things to be “normal.”

For the most part, daily urine output of 3000ml since surgery has been a very positive sign that my remaining kidney is more than up to the job of filtering my blood. But for the time being, dealing with all that output is a pain. Supposedly this will all get better over time. Supposedly there is physical therapy that can help, but I have a tough time imagining just what that therapy would look like.

Originally I had another section here, but my wife, no doubt wisely, suggested the content might be too frank, too nitty gritty, and too personal for this blog. Apparently, spending a couple of days in a hospital where anyone can walk into your room and say, “I’m going to check your catheter,” can erase whatever remnants of modesty and decorum I had possessed.

And now… for the picture some of you have been waiting for, but most have wanted to avoid.

Keep scrolling.