Recovering From the Transplant, Distended Belly

Recovering From the Transplant, Distended Belly

 

I woke up in the PACU. I felt horrible. Anesthesia always makes me feel so sick and nauseous. Zofran rarely helps. I had to spend the night here. My sister thankfully had gotten a room on the transplant floor. The next day they had me up and walking. I was drinking and I might have eaten just a tiny bit of food. I had a catheter in and it took a while but soon enough, I was seeing pink urine collecting in the bag. I was elated to see that. I hadn’t been able to pee for quite some time. I was looking forward to the day I didn’t need the catheter and I could pee normally. It wasn’t long before I noticed my stomach was distended, and even though I was voiding, in my opinion, it wasn’t equivalent to the amount I was taking in. The doctors were concerned about my stomach. They asked me if something like this ever happened before. I said the last time my stomach was like this was when I was on dialysis. Fluid would fill my belly and it would be distended. I also told them I wasn’t voiding as much as I should be. They decided I needed to do a CT scan of my stomach. The scan determined my ileum was paralyzed from the anesthesia and from this they deduced that I must be constipated. The treatment included that I stop eating. I was to begin a regimen of laxatives and stool softeners. I was put on everything under the sun, with no luck. I was taking MiraLAX three times a day, Colace, Lactulose, Golytely and anything else they could think of. I was in terrible pain from all the gas this generated, namely from the MiraLAX. They gave me a lot of gas pills which gave me no relief at all. I had such pain I just moaned and stayed rolled up in a ball. Eventually, they gave me a mild dose of pain meds via IV and I finally had some relief. It was decided by the team that I would need to start enemas three times a day. I would be woken up around 6am for my morning enema, receive a midday enema, and have my night time enema around 10pm. The only thing that came of this was much aggravation and sleep disruption. Finally, after a week, without any bowel movements, and never being allowed to eat, I was allowed to go home. They removed my chest catheter as it was clear my kidney was working and I would not need further dialysis. As soon as I got home, I grabbed my old prescription of Lasix, and over the course of two days, I lost 7 pounds of fluid. I knew all along this was what the real problem was. I was retaining fluid. I also promptly ate all the foods I wasn’t allowed to eat while on my restricted diet. At last, I was happy!