Emmzi

Christmas/new year we were expecting the worst and I wasn't going to make it. I was getting sicker and sicker by the day. I could barely walk, I could barely move, I was too tired to even open my eyes despite sleeping most of the day. I was in so much pain. For those that don't know I have familial adenomatous polypisis which is a genetic cancerous disease which causes benign polyps ( tumors) to grow in the colon up to the thousands which turn malignant/cancerous. 

Hospital was a fight in itself. In march I had to go in earlier than planned to get overnight iron through an IV as I was extremely anemic. A day after surgery it was the best day of my life I felt AMAZING. I finally understood what NORMAL felt like. What having ENERGY felt like. However, it was the day after that it all went wrong and my small intestine went into shut down - which most people experience when having their entire large intestine removed. My small intestine looped itself in multiple plaes causing extreme pain, they were ruluctant to give me morphine since that makes the small intestine shut down more and opiates were not helping at all. I was vomiting continiously from the pain. Most nights I was crying and even screaming I was in so much agony, so much so I had to get emergency MRIs during the night which was when they found my small intestine all tangled up and in shut down. Couple times I was given morphine just because the surgeon saw how much pain I was in. It dulled it down a little but not even that got rid of it. It was the worst pain I've ever felt in my entire life and probably will be the worst pain I'll ever experience. Then came vomiting feaces. That's when they tried to get the tube down me. They tried 7 times over a couple days but I just couldn't do it and I felt bad that I wasn't able to get the tube down me and I refused in the end it was horrible. One point it went in my lungs instead of my stomach and I coughed up blood. Another time it went in properly but I still didn't stop vomiting which the doctors were surprised about, so they decided to leave it. But they did warn me that I was at risk of my small intestine rupturing and I could die. 

I couldn't eat anything for 10 days. The most I could eat was ice cubes and even then my small intestine couldnt process the water and I vomited up. But eventually my small intestine started to work again and I was able to eat a bacon roll which was the best bacon roll I've ever had IN MY LIFE. I will never take food for granted again. You really start to appreciate food when you've truly not had anything for 2 weeks. I was so thin and gaunt. But when I was able to walk around the ward and get that bacon roll, actually able to WALK (although I was struggling) it was the best feeling ever. 

Now 4 months on I'm fully recovered. I have to get yearly checkups but that's nothing. I do have polyps in my small intestine and stomach. But I know the nhs are looking after me and if I do get cancer in the small intestine or stomach I will be well looked after. But I will pray it'll never come to that.