It has been 3 months since having the J tube placed in August. If you don't know from previous posts, my tube had a bit of a malfunction starting the day after it was put in. A small pin hole barely seen by the eye was discovered when I went to flush the tube out. Instead of flowing through easily it clogged and squirted out the side. Since then the doctors had me wrap special tape around it, which, ghetto as it may have looked, has for the most part worked.
Recently, however, the tube began getting shorter and shorter, retracting into the depths of the unknown somewhere in my abdomen. On top of that the tape wasn't consistently plugging up the hole. So, yesterday my husband and I took a trip to UW in Seattle to visit the IR department where the tube was originally placed. After waiting for 2 hours due to an emergency operation, the doctors finally came in to take a look and basically left it up to me. They could either pull the tube out a bit if I thought that would feel better, tape it up again, or replace it. This was frustrating because I wanted to make the best decision and wasn't sure what to do. Being that we drove an hour and a half, the constant taping that was getting to be annoying, and a future trip to Mexico in January where nothing is allowed to go wrong, I decided to go ahead and have it replaced. This was supposed to be a simple in and out procedure that would take about 20 - 30 minutes. I chose sedation just to make it as comfortable as possible and thank God I did. My nurse was really cool and made me feel confident going in. Once they began and my sleepiness settled in I found myself waking up over and over wondering what was taking so long. I remember asking lots of questions and trying to see the picture on the monitor which I'm sure annoyed them. What can I say, I'm a curious person, especially when someone is putting foreign objects through a hole in my jejunum!
Over 2 hours later the procedure finally ended and I was wheeled up to a room to recover with fluids for an hour. I was then told by the nurse that there were complications with the hole closing up the moment the old tube came out and it took some extra poking around to get the new one in. The ride home was not pleasant but with the support of my husband and a funny episode of Modern Family on Hulu, I felt like I could survive the night.
So, here I am, back to taking it easy and watching my intake of food while I heal. The biggest challenge besides being deprived of a world of food and drinks? I'm bored! Lots of people would love the chance to rest and have nothing to do but I am so OVER it. I'm ready to live life, be busy and active and of course eat what I want to when I want to. Until that day comes I'll keep myself occupied with blogging, knitting, movies. good books, scrabble apps, dog walks and most importantly, remembering to breath.
Today's blog was more of a need to release than to inform so thanks for listening!
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