Surgery Date

Got some news this week on the date of my next surgery – Monday, Aug 7th. I’ve been anxious about getting a date for this surgery. It’s nice to see some kind of finish line.

The surgery is a dual-specialty all day long affair. I’ll be asleep, so I won’t care.

First, Dr. John Migaly will be doing the GI stuff, which is the hard part. He’s got to find each hole in my small intestine (and there are at least 4). He’ll then cut a little before the hole and a little after the hole and join the cut sections together. This joint is called an anastomosis. In theory, he’ll have to do that 4 times. In practice, could be between 2 and 6. After restoring continuity to my small bowel, he’s got to stuff what’s left back in my abdomen in a way such that it doesn’t kink over on itself.

This part of the surgery is dicey - Teasing out the small bowel tissue from the abdomen is made difficult by the scar tissue left over from the previous operations. The reason this surgery needed to wait for a year is because we need that time to allow the scar tissue around the bowel to dissipate. Waiting for a year increases the odds of a successful result on the first try.

Once that’s done, Dr. Ash Patel from plastics gets a go at me. His job is to seal up my abdomen so it looks less like the medical curiosity that it has been for the last year. Getting my stomach muscles to meet again will require implanting a mesh that will dissolve over time. I’ve been assured that all of this is the easy part. Whether or not I’ll have a bellybutton anymore is an open question - My ambivalence on the matter is boundless. Presence/absence of navel is not on my list of success metrics. I’d be more interested in being able to do a sit-up sometime in 2024.

The last estimate I got for the hospital stay was 5 to 10 days. Pulled a 40 day bid last time. Five to ten? I can that kind of time standing up. Especially if I get to eat during part of it.

Likely to be on a clear liquid diet for at least the first few days in the hospital. Not sure on the timing of when I’ll get to eat real food.

So, that’s the update. The next 5 weeks are full of medical appointments, a quick beach trip, and kid camp transport. Plus wrapping up some work projects that need my attention. Hoping to neither relay nor relate any additional news until after the surgery.

~Ed