When he finally went to the doctor to find out why he was having rectal bleeding, he was quickly admitted to the hospital for tests and then just as quickly to be scheduled for and to have surgery.
What was the result of his surgery? He had a malignant tumor the size of a tennis ball in his colon !! Yes, I said the size of a tennis ball !! He had to have most of his colon surgically removed - as a result of his delay in going to the doctor.
Ten days after my husband's surgery, I received a phone call from his surgeon - after 9 PM that night!! The surgeon told me that I needed to come to the hospital so that I could give my permission for my husband to undergo emergency surgery that night.
I had been to see my husband that same afternoon. While I was there, I watched as a nurse attended to the drainage tube which was in his abdomen. I noticed that the liquid draining through that tube was not clear, but rather a light tan in color. I wondered if that was okay; but not being a very assertive person at that time, I did not question anybody about it.
It was not okay!!! The 9 PM call from his surgeon was an emergency call !!
The surgeon located and repaired the leak which had developed from my husband's first surgery. Then the surgeon fashioned an external outlet for the colon, known as a colostomy: He made an opening in the remaining healthy colon and then brought this to the surface of my husband's abdomen - where the surgeon created an external outlet for the elimination of body wastes.
Following his release from the hospital (he was in the hospital for 5 weeks), he had to have a colonoscopy done every month for 6 months. Six months later the surgeon reconnected my husband's colon. That was in 1989! Since then he has to have colonoscopies, as scheduled by his surgeon. He is due for another colonscopy in October - almost two years have gone by since his last colonoscopy.
Ten years have gone by without a reoccurence of cancer. But they have not been quality years!!!!!!!! My husband has experienced pain ever since those two surgeries - with the pain being the worst whenever he has to eliminate body wastes following a meal. Since he lost most of his colon as a result of cancer, he has also lost the storage ability of the colon - which is the purpose of the colon.
As the result of losing most of his colon, he better be near a bathroom whenever he eats a meal !! This is the time when I can tell that he is in a lot of pain! Consequently, eating - at home or away from home - gives him no pleasure.
It never occurred to me until about a week ago (10 years later) that he might be a victim of adhesions too! The more I read about adhesions I am now almost sure that adhesions are causing his daily pain. I would never have made this connection if I had not decided to do research on adhesions.
I have read that some women have what is known a "frozen pelvic" or a "concrete stomach" - as a result of adhesions. Our intestines are meant to move freely and cannot do this when adhesions are involved.
I encourage each one of you to educate yourself about your particular adhesion problem. When we can understand why we are hurting, we no longer need to be anxious about our adhesion problem. We can then focus more on what we can do to help ourselves live more comfortably in spite of our pain. A decision to give a pain clinic a chance to help us, can be the first step toward bringing our chronic pain down to a level that we can be able live with more comfortably.
-- The purpose of medicine is: * To cure sometimes, to relieve often, to comfort always. *