I also have had my ileostomy for 30 years. I have only 3.5 meters of small bowel.
I too no matter how gentle I am cleaning my ileostomy get a little blood from it. I thought this was normal?
I also tend to get over granulation (proud flesh) which I need to burn off with a silver nitrate stick, as it bleeds like a pig, is very painful, and it will grow if I do not use silver nitrate.
Recently my peristomal skin has been very badly excoriated and it needs constant watching which is why I change my appliance every four days.
Because I forgot to add that after having so many operations for bowel obstructions, my gut does not work properly and has dismotily problems. i’ve undergone over 33 laparotomies. I’m at end stage IV access failure. And I will not survive another operation
I am unable to eat solid food as it causes too much pain. I live of 6 200ml Fortsip every day, I used to have a feeding tube but it failed due to my stomach leakage causing my skin around my Mickle Button to become infected, so my surgical specialist had to remove it, even though I used to get my food through it.