I was hospitalised in November 2009 after a week of intense pain and being unable to eat solid food. I had put it off as it was not a total obstruction. Lots of pain in the lower to mid left quadrant around the area of the hernia repair earlier in the year. I was discharged after a few days in hospital (under instructions to page the surgeon if it got worse). I made it through Christmas still mostly on liquid or extremely soft, easily digested foods. A series of tests were done in the New Year but nothing conclusive was found ... yet the pain and lack of appetite or intense pain on eating continued. The barium follow through did take an abnormally (for me) 2.5 hours - the barium is normally through my altered plumbing in 20 mins tops! A CT Scan follow up was performed a month later but the problem was still a mystery - except a "congenital" (??? never been found in the dozens of Ct scans before) loop of small bowel was noted twisting from the bottom left of the abdomen and joining up at the top left side of the abdomen .... strange to say that is where all the pain was and where all the food appeared to get "stuck". If I did manage to eat the food would take up to a day to leave the stomach - during this time it was very uncomfortable - and then get stuck in that area on the left causing LOTS of intense pain ...
The good news is that - after 3 months of this - I have been relatively pain free in the abdomen over the last week and have been able to eat!!! I am still not sure of the cause ...
My surgeon was thinking
A. Hernia recurrence,
B. Adhesions causing partial obstruction ....
At this stage I have avoided more surgery ... because neither of these things showed up on the tests (the hernia that was repaired in April didn't show up on scans either)
So fingers crossed whatever it was has resolved itself and will NOT RETURN!!
I see my surgeon again on March 16th so will see what he thinks
Take care all,
Hugs, Kay xx
