1. < Colorectal Cancer

Sigmoid colon resection: What to expect for recovery?

Posted by virgo1952 @virgo1952, Dec 1, 2019

It’s been 4+weeks since my resection. Found a cancerous polyp during a routine screening. Some frustration over the lack of information given by the surgeon as to what to expect afterwards. Late 60’s so I know the healing will take time. Mostly, struggling with bowel urgency/frequency and experiencing stomach pain from gas (pretty sure) is three months s realistic time frame for returning to “normal”? I’ve seen some posts that talk about two years? No further treatment so I was lucky. If anyone has had this surgery and went through or is going through the healing process, I would love to hear from you. Just kind of out there.

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Colorectal Cancer Support Group.

nouveaustyle | @nouveaustyle | Dec 27, 2023
In reply to @bamagirlxyz "Oh gosh, congrats on finding treatable issues, and having them taken care of. My issues were..." + (show)
@bamagirlxyz

Oh gosh, congrats on finding treatable issues, and having them taken care of. My issues were different than yours, but here is my story. I had a radical hysterectomy along with radiation and chemo in 2001, due to uterine cancer. All good, but in 2017 I began having excruciating pains. It was found, with difficulty, that I had adhesions wrapped around the small colon, and I had a resection of about 7 to 8” Of the small intestine. Two years later, I am still dealing with diarrhea, sometimes gas pain that is overwhelming. But, I am ‘healthy’ and exercise, walk, and play tennis. I have to be able to ‘escape’ When in groups, due to gas. You will adjust - it is never ‘the same’, but you are alive!

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Same happened to me. I’m one month past 12 inches of sigmoid colon removed due to adhesions from my hysterectomy.
It’s been a rough recovery. My sigmoid colon was twisted and stuck to my side wall, I spent two years begging doctors to go in to see what’s going on and being dismissed. Eventually they did and an extensive 7 hour surgery was done. I’m now adjusting and worried I will have reoccurrence of adhesions. Did you? How are you now?
These were some of my adhesions.

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Teresa, Volunteer Mentor | @hopeful33250 | Dec 28, 2023
In reply to @nouveaustyle "Same happened to me. I’m one month past 12 inches of sigmoid colon removed due to..." + (show)
@nouveaustyle

Same happened to me. I’m one month past 12 inches of sigmoid colon removed due to adhesions from my hysterectomy.
It’s been a rough recovery. My sigmoid colon was twisted and stuck to my side wall, I spent two years begging doctors to go in to see what’s going on and being dismissed. Eventually they did and an extensive 7 hour surgery was done. I’m now adjusting and worried I will have reoccurrence of adhesions. Did you? How are you now?
These were some of my adhesions.

Jump to this post

Hello @nouveaustyle and welcome to Mayo Connect. As you posted your experience in the Colorectal Cancer support group, I'm assuming that the sigmoid colon surgery was cancer-related? I ask, because not all sigmoid surgeries are related to cancer.

If you could provide more information as to the type of cancer, I can connect you with others who have had a similar experience. If you do not have colorectal cancer, I'd be happy to direct you to other discussions in the Digestive Health support group that deal with sigmoid surgeries and adhesions.

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phylicaf22 | @phylicaf22 | Feb 5 7:31pm

Yes I went through it and that’s good about 2-3 months. How are you doing now

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les2024 | @les2024 | Feb 7 7:32pm

Rectocele surgery?
Can anyone elaborate? Gynecologist, urogynocologist or proctologist to repair. Finding out I have one of these and curious about the surgery and which type of Dr. used?
Down time? Reoccurrence?

Taking Linzess for motility issues.

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magsbrad | @magsbrad | Feb 8 9:17am

I had surgery to remove polyps. The removed my sigmoid colon and some lymph nodes. They sent it off for biopsy (it’s just normal procedure in UK) They found stage 3 colon cancer
Apparently it was not seen when colon was removed as I was an emergency (my polyps had burst and I collapsed in pain). So if it hadn’t been for my collapse, the cancer would have spread. That was nearly 3 years ago. I now have regular scans/bloods. So please be careful and ask for a biopsy if any polyps removed. My overall recovery was 3 months. 7 weeks in hospital, the next 5 weeks at home.

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