Cody Updates by Mom

That would be this girl!   And……….the noodles were still in their noodle shape when they went into my mouth.  Yay!

As you have probably guessed they were able to figure out what was going wrong.  I had a stricture.  If you remember from a post awhile ago my connection of the esophagus and small intestine was sewed at 11 millimeters.  For reference there are 10 millimeters in a centimeter.  My body had formed a scar at the connection point and caused the stricture.  This had caused my opening to get smaller over time.  Today the opening was between 3 and 4 millimeters.  No wonder I was having so much difficulty.  To give you a frame of reference, the body part (or handle) of a QTip is about 3-4 millimeters.

Here’s how today went.  We got to Mayo and I was brought back fairly quick to start the prep for the procedure.  There was a good 15-20 min period where I went over a whole bunch of information with a nurse, they checked my vitals and gave me all the necessary information for the upcoming procedure.  Usually they only let you keep your shoes and socks on but with my surgery this last Friday they let me keep my special breast cancer bra to help protect my incisions from my recent surgery.

Once back in the room I met my care team that would perform the scope.  There were two doctors, two nurses and a nurse in training.  Since the room was about the size of a typical bathroom there was not a lot of room to move.  The only unfortunate part was that I had to lay on my left side.  My right side, which weirdly enough had more work done on it, has been healing better.  My left arm is still very sore and not very mobile.  They gave me the time to get into position.  Unfortunately the nurse in training, trying to help, went and moved my arm out from underneath me telling me it would be more comfortable.  Oy, that one hurt.  After a plethora of apologies she let me put my arm back to reduce my pain.  It was an honest mistake and I wasn’t upset just trying to treat my left side very nicely.  She asked what else she could do to help the pain and I said that I was ready for the sedation to start any time now.  Everyone was extremely nice.  They talked to me the whole time and kept me in the loop of everything going on.  Then, they put me to sleep.  At some level I remember very vague images of them talking to me but for the most part it was nappy time.

Once in recovery they let me know that they had dilated me and I had to wait in recovery an hour after they had brought me back.  They said I still had a good 45 minutes so back to napping.  The sedation was wearing off so the nap wasn’t very long and within a short period of time I was pretty awake.  They let me have some ice water.  I was so thrilled that I could drink without the gurgling slow passage through that area.  Once it was an hour they let me dress and go.  They said I should keep lunch to soft things like pasta.  Insert mac and cheese here.

After lunch we met with Michelle and she let us know how small the size had gotten and how they dilated it.  Basically they take a balloon and put it into the small part and slowly inflate it to make it bigger and then pull it through to increase the size all the way through the stricture.  My opening is now at a whopping 8 millimeters.  They can only go that far with the gentle dilation when the patient is under sedation.  The doctors that performed the procedure have recommended that I come back next week for a more aggressive dilation procedure that would open it even more.  This would require anesthesia and a different process for dilation.  Michelle is going to check with Dr. Kendrick to ensure that he is okay with this path and set up the next appointment.  She felt that he would likely want to do this as they do not want me to lose any more weight.  Nothing happens without his okay.  I’m good with that.

She recommended that I stay with a fairly soft diet of puddings, liquids etc.  Oops.  We then told her what I had for lunch.  She said to just take is slow.  For the next 48 hours the dilated area can be a bit sore and swollen so I could have an issue.  After that I could increase my diet slowly to include more foods.  She said to stay away from bread for now.  Likely after the next dilation I could bring that back in.  She did say that she wished I was one of the patients that she works with to lose weight because I follow their directions very well and have really taken my eating seriously.

We did ask why this happened.  I was concerned that the infamous “polish dog incident” was going to be the culprit.  She said that I couldn’t actually cause the issue to happen.  It is just how my body healed.  That’s good news.  She mentioned that if I have this issue in the future for more than a couple days in a row to contact them and not wait until it gets so small.

After all that we got home, I had some of my enchilada soup and then we crashed.  It wasn’t full sleep but I was able to rest my body and eyes for quite a few hours.  I also had to get back on my meds as they had me stop them yesterday and put ice my incision areas from surgery.  I did all that curled up in my recliner with a nice soft heavy blanket.  Yay!  I am still pretty wore out but am not feeling quite as fuzzy as I did earlier.

So, tomorrow they will likely call with my appointment for next week and I will be on the road to better eating.  If not, Michelle will call me with specifics from Dr. Kendrick and what my next steps are.  With the recommendation from todays docs we are pretty certain that we are headed back down.  I would actually prefer this as I have been going backwards for so long that I am wanting to keep moving forward as they see fit for my recovery plan.

I am planning to be back at work tomorrow and back to my old, new eating normal soon.  🙂

Caring Bridge Comments

Janette McCalvy|Mar 25, 2015 5:50pm
Keep up the good work. You are amazing through all you are enduring. And your are your wonderful self about it. Keeping you in our prayers that you continue to improve and stay on your recovery plan.