My Ostomy Diary

A colostomy is an important, lifesaving procedure that does not come without its challenges and at times, its complications. Understanding these complications includes being able to identify them and electing the proper response to the complications in question. 

One of the complications from a colostomy is the issue of discharge from the rectal area. Even though the bowel is no longer in use post-colostomy, it still produces mucus on the bowel’s lining. Discharge color and consistency varies but is often an off-white color. Seeing discharge is not a reason to be alarmed since its a natural bodily function, however if blood or pus is evident in the discharge then contacting your general practitioner or GP is the best course of action. 

If there is no blood or pus present in the discharge, then expelling the discharge is highly recommended. This is crucial in order to prevent mucus buildup which could cause further complication. Doctors recommend sitting on the toilet and expelling mucus in a similar manner as making a bowel movement. This of course can be more difficult for those who have lost sensation in rectal and anal regions. Barrier skin creams are also another option for those feeling discomfort or lack of any sensation in order to assist with passing mucus. 

Another potential complication to watch out for are parastomal hernias. These type of hernias occur due to muscles weakening after surgery. Fortunately, parastomal hernias do not usually require surgery and can be prevented by wearing support belts, avoiding heavy lifting and maintaining a healthier weight. Even in the cases of surgery, sometimes the hernia can reappear. 

The next issue that can arise from colostomy, is stoma blockage due to food build-up. There are signs and symptoms of a blockage such as stomach swelling, lack of stool passage, nausea, vomiting and stoma swelling. In the event the stoma is obstructed, there are in-home methods in order to alleviate the issue. Massaging the belly in addition to taking a hot bath for at least 15-20 minutes as solutions for relaxing the abdominal muscles. Abstaining from solid foods and transitioning to a liquid based diet temporarily is another potential solution in order to remove the stoma blockage. If these things do not work within a few hours, the next step would be to seek a medical professional such as a general practitioner, a stoma nurse or even the A&E. The A&E is the Accident and Emergency services which as its name implies, takes on emergency calls. Seeking a medical professional in this case is crucial due to the risk of the colon bursting. 

Other albeit less serious complications include skin irritation, stoma fistula, stoma protraction and stoma prolapse. These things can be easily corrected with the help of a stoma care team that guides you on post-op care and procedure. 

Understanding and identifying the risks of post-op complications puts a patient in the best position in seeking the proper care and management of their condition while leading a healthy and normal life. 

So you just recovered from your ostomy and you are deciding what to wear? Well, I have some good news for you. The good news is that I am writing this article just for you and am going to be able to address all your current fears, worries, and problems in the next few paragraphs. So let’s get started! First, I would like to address the main concern that you might be having right now, which is that none of your old clothes are going to fit anymore because of the addition of your ostomy pouch. Well, I can say with full certainty that this is simply not the case.

You are definitely going to be able to wear your old clothes again with a little bit of improvisation and a little bit of gusto. So if you are worried about what you are going to wear with your ostomy pouch, you really should just take a deep breath and relax. Another thing that I see people in your situation do is try to get rid of all their old clothes right away and buy new ones, because they are sure that none of their old clothes will be able to fit anymore. Well, I can just tell you right now that seeing people do that makes me so sad because there is really no need for it. Just follow my simple instructions and you will be able to dress fashionably and discreetly in no time!

For many people who have just gotten ostomies, their main goal is to dress in a way that simply hides the fact that they have an ostomy pouch at all. This makes sense, since it can be a bit embarrassing at first for people who are still getting used to walking around with an ostomy pouch. For people like me who have had a stoma for quite some time, I really don’t mind when people notice or stare at my ostomy pouch. To be honest with you, it is just a part of life at this point and I don’t care much about what other people are thinking about me or my ostomy pouch. However, I totally understand where you are coming from if you are feeling very embarrassed to be seen in public with your ostomy pouch. That is why I have some tips and tricks for you about being able to dress fashionably and still hide your ostomy pouch. The most crucial piece of information that you will need is about the world of ostomy pouch accessories. More specifically, I am going to be talking about wraps and belts that are made for ostomy pouches.

These ostomy pouch wraps and belts can work wonders for hiding your ostomy pouch and convincing people that you don’t even have one at all. If you are not quite sure how they work, ostomy wraps just strap around your abdomen and will keep the ostomy pouch nice and snug against your body. Do you know what this means? It means that, even if you are trying to wear clothing that is a bit more form fitting, you can totally conceal your ostomy pouch against your body! It is also true that most people with ostomies are a bit overweight, so it makes it even easier to hide the pouch among your belly rolls and all that.

Am I the only one who thinks that shopping for ostomy supplies is way harder than it needs to be? Not only is everything expensive, but certain brands and products can be hard to find depending on where you live. This country’s healthcare system is so messed up; to be honest, I have no idea what I would do if I didn’t have such a good paying job that I can work from home, because I spend a lot of money on ostomy supplies every month. You’d think that my disposable income would be going to something more exciting, right? Like maybe an addition to my house, maybe a new car, some nice watches or whatever. Nope. It all goes to ostomy supplies. Well, that may have been a slight exaggeration, but you hopefully get what I mean when I’m saying this. I know that not many people can understand my sentiment and experiences with buying ostomy supplies, because not many people I know have stomas. So hopefully I can write this article and find more people like me who also have a stoma and struggle to find the right ostomy supplies at a decent price. 

One thing I can tell you right off the bat is that I absolutely despise going to Walmart. In this instance, I’m not even talking about just for ostomy supplies – I hate Walmart in general. I don’t like the way Walmart treats its employees, I don’t like that it buys out all of the competition that it can, I don’t like that it runs small businesses to the ground, and I especially hate the people that you find at Walmart on any given day. Walmart is truly one of the more depressing places to shop at. In addition to all this, Walmart also has a very poor selection of ostomy gear and related accessories. I have even talked to their pharmacists to see if I can order ostomy supplies from them online (because I would rather drive a car into a brick wall than step foot into a Walmart) but they told me that what they have in the store is only what they are allowed to sell. Well, I guess this just gives me another reason to avoid Walmart entirely.

Another place that I’ve looked for specific ostomy supplies and related accessories is at different pharmacies. Now there is a bit of a better selection at certain stores like Walgreens and RiteAid, but still not as much as I would like there to be. I mean, at a store that only sells medical supplies and other types of stuff like that, why the heck don’t they have more ostomy supplies? Well, that left me with only one other place to buy my ostomy supplies. That’s right, I started exclusively ordering my ostomy gear online through different websites that I have researched.

The good thing about shopping online is that the variety of products is just endless and the prices are very competitive. As long as you don’t mind waiting a few days or weeks to get the stuff you ordered, it seems that shopping online for your stoma related products is the way to go about it. Plus, I never have to leave my couch to order ostomy pouches ever again.

Well I am officially 6 months into my new life with a stoma. That’s right, I had an operation about half a year ago in which I had a big old hole put in my abdomen. Some people don’t really know what an ostomy is, and that’s okay. All you need to know is that my life has significantly changed for the worse, and I wish that I didn’t have to wear an ostomy bag all the time and deal with all the problems associated with a stoma. One of the biggest problems associated with an ostomy is having to worry about finding, researching, and buying ostomy supplies for the rest of your life. Literally, I will be ordering more and more ostomy supplies until the day I die, and that is a sobering and slightly depressing thought. If you haven’t had an ostomy or don’t know anyone who has had one, I can tell you that the first few weeks after surgery are pretty rough. Not only does your body hurt everywhere and you’re trying to acclimate to your new life, but you also have to deal with getting used to applying different ostomy products and bags every day and night.

The biggest problem for me was trying to find places to buy the ostomy supplies that I so badly needed. Shortly after surgery, the doctors sent me home with some of the supplies that I would need, including ostomy pouches, skin barriers, stoma powder, stoma lubricant, and a bunch of other products that you probably don’t want to hear about. Once those ran out, however, I was going to need to find a way to get more of the supplies I needed. The thing about ostomy supplies is that it isn’t super common in most stores. While supermarkets and pharmacies tend to have basic over-the-counter medical supplies that are useful for the general public in some way, they don’t like to carry the serious stuff like ostomy supplies. Maybe they are scared to commit to such a great group of people like ostomates who badly need ways to get their supplies. It was also hard to go out in public at first because I was embarrassed about my new ostomy pouches and was not sure what people would think of me.

So instead of facing my insecurities head on, I decided to go around all that by looking online for ostomy supplies instead. The internet is great because you can usually find just about anything you could ever want, and most of the time you can find it for a good price. The only factor involved is how long you’re willing to wait and if you don’t mind taking advantage of cheap labor in China, India, and the Pacific Islands. Personally, I don’t really have a problem with taking advantage of cheap labor so I order almost everything online.

I researched a lot of different ostomy supplies and products to make sure I was finding the right products for me, and I ended up getting some pretty good stuff at a decent price point. Going forward, I probably will only buy my ostomy products and supplies online because it is really the simplest way to go about it. I’m going to write this last sentence right here and then call it a day.

Let’s face it, 2020 was all around a weird year for everyone on planet earth. For most people that are alive today, COVID19 was the first pandemic that many of us have had to live through. Consequently, we have seen a lot of weird changes take place in our world due to the factors related to the pandemic. To start, we saw an unprecedented number of businesses closed down. As we all know, the government decided to shut down a lot of businesses when COVID numbers started to spike in order to prevent more widespread disease. There has been a lot of controversy about if this was a smart decision or not. Personally, the whole thing has gotten too divisive for me, and I think finding out real facts or truth from this whole situation is darn near impossible. Regardless, it is true that many of us had no way to go to stores in person, besides a few select businesses that were deemed as necessary to stay open.

Either way, I had a difficult time going out to different stores to buy ostomy supplies, since many of them were closed. In addition to this, I did not want to take any unnecessary risks since I was considered to be more at-risk due to my ostomy. The problem was that I needed a way to still get all the ostomy supplies I was used to even with the stores I normally go to being closed down. Ostomy supplies are more serious than many people realize, because once you find the stuff that works for you, you want to make sure that you stick with that brand or type of product. For me, I spent a long amount of time researching different ostomy products and trying to find the ones that work for me. Consequently, I have a very specific set of brands and products that I buy every time. I was worried that I would not be able to find these certain supplies during the pandemic, and I would have to settle for subpar ostomy supplies that would be bad for my stoma.

The workaround I found for this problem is that we live in a great technologically advanced society! Just about anything can be found online these days, and I mean anything. Under this umbrella is also the world of online medical supplies, including all the ostomy supplies, gear, and accessories I could ever dream about. Online shopping definitely became my way to go after COVID hit. I think this is the same for many people all over the world who suddenly found themselves at home with the inability to buy their normal consumer goods in person. I ended up finding a lot of different websites that I could buy ostomy supplies from. Even during a time like COVID, the customer service was still great and the customer service reps were extremely helpful when it came time to buy my products.

The best part of all this was that I never even had to leave the comfort of my home; more specifically, the comfort of my couch! Being able to buy my ostomy supplies online during the pandemic is a true blessing one can only afford in the 21st century. I feel bad for all those peasants still buying their ostomy supplies and accessories in a brick and mortar store.

A lot of people have no clue what an ostomy is. I don’t blame anyone for not being completely sure what a stoma is, because after all, it is a weird and unique procedure that not a lot of people will generally have to go through. However, if you yourself have had an ostomy and are living with a stoma, then I am sure you know all about how important it is to take care of your stoma from day to day and on a regular basis. In fact, many people do not realize the amount of upkeep that it takes to keep a stoma healthy and free from infection or irritation.

Can you imagine having a random hole coming out the side of your body? It is easy to see how something like that could create a lot of problems for an individual if one is not careful to properly clean it and take care of it. To be honest, there are a lot of resources out there on the internet that can help you learn how to properly take care of your stoma and make sure that everything down there is staying in tip-top shape. However, I understand that many people don’t necessarily have time to spend hours on the internet trying to learn about how to take care of their stoma. That is why I have done some of that research myself and am willing to spend some time writing about it here for you. So I hope you can find this article helpful about how to take care of your stoma. 

A really important thing to keep in mind when you are trying to take care of your stoma is that you have to try to keep it as clean as possible for the most part. Think of all the stuff that is constantly flowing out of your stoma and into the ostomy pouch. I mean, to put it simply, it is literally human waste like urine and feces that is making its way out of your body. It is easy to imagine the importance of cleaning out your stoma when you think about the reality of what an ostomy really does to somebody. That’s why it is recommended by most doctors everywhere that you should be cleaning your stoma everytime you change your ostomy pouch. In addition to this, there are a whole lot of various products out there that you might think would be good to clean your stoma with. Well, today I am here to tell you that the best thing to use to clean out your stoma is simply some fresh, clean water. No need to use any fancy soaps or products! In fact, it can be said that those things will simply irritate your stoma even further. That is the last thing you want to deal with, believe me! 

Another simple way that you can be taking care of yourself after an ostomy is to just watch what you are eating. As tempting as it is to eat all the foods you used to enjoy, it is true that a person with an ostomy can experience different issues from eating various foods. Some foods tend to increase your output, increase gas, or something else like that. These problems can cause you to have to change your ostomy pouch more often and can sometimes lead to blockages in your stoma or other complications. So make sure that you are eating a healthy, balanced diet and listening to your body! 

I think that it is in our nature as human beings to feel embarrassed about something. Some people get more embarrassed than others about different things, but I think we all worry about how others are seeing and perceiving us on a regular basis. I think one of the biggest problems in my life was worrying about what other people were thinking about me. It is very interesting, because this did not just apply to only one part of my life; rather, almost every public or noticeable aspect of my life was layered in insecurities about what other people were thinking. This became an even bigger problem when I had an ostomy back in 2009. If you are not familiar with what an ostomy is, it is basically where your body is not functioning in the ways that it should be. Consequently, the doctors or surgeons will have to go in and try to fix up all that’s wrong with you. The way that they usually do this is by creating an incision in your abdomen and basically rerouting your intestines so that it is coming out of your body through your stomach.

I know that this sounds super gross, but that is truly what they do when performing ostomies. The hole that is created in the abdomen is called a stoma, and that is where your waste (yes, poop and urine) will exit your body into a pouch or bag referred to as an ostomy pouch. Now, not a whole lot of people are familiar with this surgery and therefore are not sure what they are looking at if they notice an ostomy pouch on someone. I imagine it just looks like some weird medical pouch and the purpose behind it is not clear. My ostomy has created a lot more insecurity and anxiety in my life about the way I am being perceived by other people. The first time I noticed people look at me differently was a few weeks after surgery when I was going to pick up ostomy supplies at my local Walgreens. I would feel stares and glances from across the store and even watched children point at my body with curious gazes. It definitely took a toll on my self esteem and made it hard for me to want to go out very often.

Fortunately there are lots of different ways that you can hide your ostomy pouch. I spent a lot of time researching different ways to hide my ostomy pouch. There are different things you can do like wear certain wraps or belts, wear less form fitting clothing, or research ostomy pouches that are more stealthy in appearance. As I have gotten more used to wearing an ostomy pouch, I have become more comfortable with wearing one and having people notice. One thing I’ve learned as I’ve gotten older is that people really are not paying as much attention to you as you might think. Honestly, most people are just worried about themselves, going about their own days, and thinking about their own problems. 

If I could give any advice to my younger self, I would definitely tell myself that there is no need to be so insecure about what people think about me. Even if people are looking at my ostomy pouch or wondering what it is, it is really not a big deal nor is it my problem.

Woah woah woah. If you just woke up from your ostomy surgery, then you probably have a lot of questions. One of the biggest questions I had is how my eating will be affected by my ostomy. I mean, it is a sensible question to ask, right? It’s only that you’ve gone and had a hole put in your body that the good Lord did not intend for. Well, if you are sitting in your hospital bed worried about what you can eat once you go home, I have some good news for you: it is totally possible to enjoy the foods that you used to. I remember being very worried that I would never be able to enjoy my favorite foods again now that I have a stoma. This is simply not true. I am writing this article to tell you about how eating after an ostomy works and hopefully give you some helpful tips about eating with a stoma.

The fact of the matter is that you are going to be a bit of a mess after your ostomy initially. I’m talking about lying on the couch for a good two weeks if you need to. Along with this, you are going to be eating much more bland foods than normal. That is okay and is a part of the recovery process from getting an ostomy. Your doctors will probably help you along the way and give a list of foods that would be good to eat while you are recovering.Your digestive system is most likely going to be royally upset with you, so make sure to eat slowly and eat foods that will be easy for you to digest. Similarly, it is helpful to chew your food extremely well and thoroughly to avoid any digestive problems.

When you start to try new foods as you continue recovering from surgery, keep in mind that you will again want to go very slowly. To ensure that you have no complications after your ostomy, you will want to do exactly what the doctors tell you. Introducing new foods slowly is the best way to determine how your digestive system is reacting to different foods. If you eat a whole bunch of new foods at once and your digestive system gets all messed up, you won’t be able to tell which foods are hurting your stoma and which ones are not. A good rule of thumb is to introduce a new food one meal at a time. This is honestly something that I lived by after my ostomy. That way, you don’t end up rushing the healing process and cause any damage to your stoma. 

Eventually you should be able to get back to eating all the things you used to eat! The key point to remember is that everybody’s body is different, and that means some foods will not sit right with you while they do with others. All I can say is that you have to do what is pleasing to your body and not take any unnecessary risks. Eating baked beans has always made me gassy, even before my ostomy. Consequently, I have cut baked beans out of my diet because I don’t want to deal with a gassy ostomy pouch after each meal, you know what I mean?