Problems months after colon resection surgery: What Helps?

Sounds familiar! Those experiences should steadily improve. Keep a healthy diet going.

Eat some oatmeal more fiber, pear, prunes etc

@ahar1956, I hope you saw the helpful posts from @martin77 and @phylicaf22. It takes time to heal.

Are you finding that the gluten-free diet has helped? How are you doing?

Hi everyone,
I had a colon resection on 12/13/23 due to diverticulitis. I ended up dealing with hematoma and Seroma needing to have a tube to drain fluid in January. Tube was in for one week and was taken out because it stopped draining. CT shows I still have a little fluid but doctors say nothing to be alarmed about. Here I am still in pain and my CT and blood work show nothing major. My pain has been a 10 the entire time. The pain is in my pelvic area and has moved up to my belly button. There is a lot of pressure with sharp, achy and dull pain. It feels like I tore a muscle and some one is squeezing my muscle over and over causing more pain. It’s worse when I sleep.. walk.. sit. Doctor keeps telling me it’s because I’m not using the bathroom enough but this pain is what I first felt when I found out about the hematoma. I feel like my concerns are being pushed to the side. No medication works and he even sent me to pay management.

My wife is going through a similar thing. She had open bowel resection surgery for colon cancer 7 weeks ago and was feeling pretty good considering the incision healing well, then yesterday she suddenly has very sharp pains in her upper abdomen. We are calling the doctor today and will let you know what they say. She thinks it might be her hiatal hernia which got a lot worse after surgery. She probably needs that dealt with next. She goes back and forth between constipated and diarrhea. She takes metamucil for fiber and uses either Ducolax or Imodium depending on which she needs. Not a fun recovery, we thought she was improving daily until yesterday.

As it turns out it was her hiatal hernia that was being pinched or something. They were able to relieve the pain by messaging it into place and are setting her up with a surgery date to deal with the hernia. They now think the hernia was causing a lot of acid reflux which is probably what cause the benign polyps on her larynx that were removed last October. And it definitely got worse after her colon surgery, a reaction to surgery or coincidentally we have no idea.

I had lower anterior resection surgery with temp stoma in October 2023, followed by 4 months of chemotherapy and then finally stoma reversal ,end of February 2024.
After the stoma reversal surgery ( end feb 2024 ) , I suffered from intestinal blockage leading to another surgery 4 days after stoma reversal and then followed by ileus for 14 days , all this at the end of feb 2024.
I am a vegetarian mostly but occasionally eat egg and fish.
My problem is nutrition related -
I can only tolerate mashed white rice, and banana .
Absolutely cannot tolerate any lentils,milk or milk products, vegetables or fruits , nor any clear soups of fruit juices.
Therefore I have nil protein intake .
How do I deal with this ?

Hello @apuakumamma and welcome to the Digestive Health support group on Mayo Connect. I am glad that you found this group as Connect has many members who have had similar experiences, and this is a great way to share the journey. Here is a list of many of the discussions about post-resection surgery. I'd encourage you to go through these comments and discussions and then feel free to hit "Reply" to any of the comments and ask questions.

I see that you have had several surgeries, and the last one was earlier this year. As you know, it does take the digestive tract some time to heal and adjust to this new normal. One thing that might be very helpful to you would be to consult with a registered hospital dietitian. If you have not met with one of these professionals yet, I would highly encourage you to ask your doctor for a referral.

I've personally had three resection surgeries of the upper digestive tract and have found the suggestions and help of registered dietician to be valuable. Have you had this type of appointment?

Thankyou indeed for your prompt reply.
This is such a wonderful way to connect. I had begun feeling very isolated ,alone, and confused with my nutrition issue.
I did try to speak to a few dietitians but did not find their advice pointed enough to address my specific situation.
I wonder if there are onco- dietitians who can perceive my unique situation of zero tolerance to all protein foods…….

That is an interesting question, @apuakumamma, about oncology dieticians. I don't know the answer, but you might ask your oncology team and see what they say.

If you are able to eat pasta, I recently learned that there is a pasta made with chickpea flour and it is quite high in protein. Here is a link to some information about this, https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/chickpea-pasta#nutrition

I look forward to hearing from you again. Will you continue to post as you seek answers?