Seriously, it was a wedding party for P& H who I hope will be very happy together. Anyway, it was a really nice evening spent with friends and I was lucky enough to catch up with a few people who I haven’t seen for ages. Almost every one of them commented on how well I looked!
You see, the thing is, I haven’t seen most of them since very early in the year – before I went into hospital to get the surgery to help deal with my achalasia symptoms (note how I don’t say it was a cure!). At that time, I was very thin (for me) and had been poorly nutritionally supported for almost a year. For 12 months, I had been eating a progressively more and more liquid diet and the last time I had seen some of these people I was living on pots of custard, soup and mashed potato (um, but not all mixed together!). I didn’t feel particularly well and plainly (judging by all the comments on Saturday) I didn’t look that well either. Heck, even my surgeon said I looked “gaunt” when I went in for my op, so I guess that’s not good!
The surgery has been a life saver (in fact, when your body is starving you to death, it quite literally was a life saver!) but as I was told beforehand, it’s not a cure. It’s true, that my stomach valve is no longer welded shut, but I still have no peristalsis and that has its own complications – as does, in fact, now having my stomach valve welded open instead. Regarding my swallow, no peristalsis means that some foods are just hopeless – apples are a non starter (or more a starter and then stick-fast) and lettuce leaves are like little parachutes that just go nowhere once they are past your throat. I am aware of hot drinks in a strange way in that they simply slide down. I don’t go swallow – thump into my stomach any longer – coffee takes a smooth passage and a mouthful takes until a count of nine before it hits bottom!
The other thing that is odd is that my stomach doesn’t stretch when it fills up – with no valve to hold it shut it simply overflows up into my oesophagus and I become very aware of the food level as it approaches my mid chest. At that point, I simply cannot eat any more as I just don’t have space. Hubby has dubbed this imaginary line that it reaches as the plimsoll line as it simply isn’t safe to overload me past this!
The upshot of all of this is that I now eat slower and can’t eat as much so my weight is not piling back on. I have however put on enough weight to stop looking gaunt and start looking well if everyone is to be believed.
Apart from the fact that all this is simply curious, something else nice (apart from the compliments) came out of the party. I actually wore a dress that I haven't even tried on for a while and it made me see how I am now rather smaller as I looked like a small child in big sister's hand me downs! Now you may not think that this is nice at all, but it is! - You see, now I have to go out and buy new clothes...just in case I get invited to any more parties...!
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