Mad March hares

Hello again. A few updates since last time.

1. I'm apparently all booked in for stage two - J-pouch creation. I went in to Mr Tekkis at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital a couple of weeks ago, and he decided I'd be ok to go ahead. I needed another two stages - one to get the pouch made, after which he'd do me a loop ileostomy (as opposed to Mr Stoma - he's currently an end ileostomy), and after ten days or so in hospital, I'd go home and rest for about two months in total. Then I'd be whisked back in to have my 'take-down' - for the unfamiliar, this is where they reconnect everything and you can start to export waste in a relatively normal way. Hooray!

2. Health insurance. It seems salient to discuss this given the exciting news in the US. After my meeting with Mr Tekkis, I toddled home to find out if my private health insurance would cover the next ops. For those not familiar with the UK health system, anyone can get pretty much anything they need for free (well, free at point of need - you pay for it with taxes etc but it seems nice and free at the time) - so you don't need private health insurance (and in fact, philosophically/politically I'm quite against the whole concept). However, I do have health insurance - my mother pays for it, which is one of the more embarrassing things that a 26 year old man can say. And despite my ethical objections, I'm more than willing to take advantage of a guaranteed private room, lax visiting hours and decent food when it's on offer. Champagne socialist, that's me.

Coincidentally - I also recently started reading Stephanie's Story, which is written by quite an amazing young American woman who has faced similar procedures to mine, and done so with an brilliantly cheery outlook, which is both excellent and inspirational. And a major concern for her had been being in between operations and illnesses but not having health insurance. Now, obviously, I'm not naive - I know a lot of people in the States are uninsured, which is what the whole legislative process that's just coming to an end has been all about. But actually reading about the different ways she's worked around this - it's completely unbelievable. Having hot showers and yoghurt in the hope of clearing blockages, because you can't go to A&E; not being able to see the stoma nurse; having to pay for medicines and stoma supplies... it's just bizarre that in the world's wealthiest country, that's happening for anyone at all!

So anyway, I give thanks for the NHS, which for all it's flaws has saved my life at least twice, kept me in free medication, free stoma supplies, excellent postoperative care and follow up, without once having to worry about whether I could afford it or not.

3. Stoma practicalities - I realise I haven't ever really spoken about the little things that make a difference to me, day-to-day. There's been a few things recently. In particular, I'd always had trouble getting the bag to stick to me successfully for a full day - I think this was partly because my stoma wasn't terribly well sited before the op, and partly because of both my pyoderma and the scarring that it's left behind. I tried an Oakmed 1-piece bag for a while, which were just super for adhesion, because they combined a tegaderm-type, really sticky, thin film type area with an ordinary yellowy zone (brilliant technical language, here - my apologies).

To be continued...