Hello Steve67,

                     welcome to the fellow reversal travellers from uranus club, you are still a novice a few weeks out and have still to attain full statearse. it helps to have a sense of humour since it will be tested over the coming months.What you describe is perfectly normal, and will improve with time,all that is at question is how much and for how long ?, since we are all individual and the only way to find out is with hindsight.Your bowel is surrounded by muscle that works in a continuous sequential wave motion interacting with the brain to expel waste.By your own admission you have just had a chunk removed,disrupting the sequence,which needs to re-establish a working understanding.Further complicating the issue is a period of inactivity whilst the stoma was in situ.l personally feel the length of time can have a bearing on recovery.Mine was in for 14 months and l feel l suffered from muscle memory fade.Think of a newborn who arrives with no programming ,just expels as needed,and gradually links bowel and brain to work in unison.

                                                                                                                                       l am back to my "new normal" of one to two visits a day,with usually a second quick secondary visit in the evening.My record was fifteen in 45 minutes,stand up and rapidly sit again,so if you can go an hour between you are well ahead of my curve,which was complicated by gallbladder removal leading to no control of excessive bile production and proctitis from radiotherapy.

                                                                                                     Fear not you are on the right road and as long you stay WC,well connected and close by, things will improve and you get back on the move,but in the right direction!,

                                                  in the meantime just keep practising the Linford Christie method of movements

                    David,

Hi David,

Thanks for your very full and informative reply which does give me considerable comfort. I guess I'll just have to remain patient and await my brain and bowel getting into gear togther. I just hadn't been warned it could be this bad at the beginning and even generalised descriptions I've read on relevant websites don't really give the full picture in simply referring  to frequency and reduced quantities. I just didn't realise it could be this bad. Thanks a lot for taking the time and trouble to provide me with tis re-asurance. As for sense of humour, I'll do my best, although in these difficult times even that's not so eay, is it?!

Thanks again

Steve67 

Hello David,

I'm Steve's wife and just wanted to say how very much we appreciate your reply.  It was a sudden impulse last night to try googling forums when Steve was in despair.  The only time I ever went on a forum was when I started keeping chickens 12 years ago and it helped then - and certainly has now!

We will hang on to what you say and wait patiently - and I'll keep thinking of the newborn analogy.  I was going to ask what the Linford Christie comment meant (wondering about exercises) but just now the penny suddenly dropped!!!

So cheers and thank you again

Frankie

Hello Frankie,

                     thank you for such a lovely response,its always good to hear that you have helped others in a small way. So l guess your penny might have dropped as Steve went dashing past on his way to fulfil an important mission.l hope everything continues to gradually improve for both of you,theres never just the one hit hard by this nasty invader.if l can ever be of further help you know where to find me,which thankfully these days is not so much in the little boys room, l am only too pleased to be of assistance,

                        David

                                      Ps  --got rid of my chickens and became more ambitious with sheep and belted galloway cattle                                                                         

Hello steve67,

                    just a thought,presumably your medical team would have mentioned loperimide to you to slow the bowel down should it not settle down over the coming weeks,which they can prescribe.l had to resort to them and indeed to this day still take a single tablet per day to keep my bowel steady.So if things get to the point where you cannot cope,speak to your team,

                                                                                                         David

Thanks David. Yes, I have tried a loperimide on medical advice in an attempt to get an uninterrupted night's sleep, which worked once it kicked in during the second half of the night, but then constipated me for much of the next day. Actually, my problem isn't diarrhoea or extreme urgency but the inability to evacuate anything other than a small quantity, whch having been done is followed shortly after by the feeling of needing to go again, with similar results. So the frequency is it seems to me a neessary and healthy consequence of what's really wrong, the grossly insufficient evacuation. So loperamide inhibiting evacuation didn't help and I don't think is the answer to my particular problem. Many thanks anyway.

Frankie enjoyed your reply and regrets that in a London garden sadly there's not sufficient space for sheep or cattle - but we hope yours are thriving!

Steve

Hi there I am new to this too only 6 days post op and was looking for reassurance that I was normal i had most of my rectum removed due to cancer last year and delayed reversal due to Covid.  Thanks it is good to read i am not alone and that things will get better. First night home so very anxious.

Hello Tuppenny,

                        look at my previous posts on this thread to give you an idea.l have little doubt that somewhere in your surgical journey the phrase "new normal" will have been expressed. Since each persons "new normal will be unique to them,its hard to pin a definitive timeframe down. In my case l spent two years with fifteen consecutive rapid sittings ,three times a day, and five years before bowel could distinguish between wind or poo .l would have been on the extreme side of the tracks, but if you are thinking it will settle in a few short weeks, you will become a very stressed and disappointed person.Start thinking multiple months, Brian the Snail and not Zebedee as you continue your magic roundabout of cutting a trench to the little room in your house.----It will get better,just on its timetable and not the one you had in mind.

Typically early months consist of super strong multiple urges that yield very small amounts, and you will physically feel washed out.One sure way of making matters even worse is to raise your stress levels as it will lead to much increased bowel ACTIVITY. Best look upon it as increased exercise,for the body, and for the mind consider the bullet you dodged with your treatment, with the bill being paid with effort not cash. The day will arrive when you can look back as a better ,calmer person and acknowledge it has improved your life with a second chance that you will live to the full,

                                                              enjoy, 

                                                                            David

Hi my name is Adrian I had exactly  the same problem  as you I was going 40 times a day I actually  slept on the toilet floor for two wks after I came out of hospital. My bottom was so sore with a anul fisure the pain was incredible so much that I would call for my mum to help me but she passed 15 yrs ago, but the tide turned when my wife who works in bladder and bowel for the nhs did some research of her own and found that sitting in a sitz bath ie a bowl of hot water with coconut  all worked wonders. So to cut a long story short your body will recover  just give it time my life is nearly back to normal just keep positive. 

All the best Adrian.