Barrier Creams and Morphine
Yes, it sounds like an unusual mix, but it’s pretty much par for the course when you’ve had an ileostomy reversal and have never passed fecal matter from where the rest of us do.
What you might have also gathered from that last statement is that the surgery went according to the textbook. The bowel surgery reported no issues, and everything has gone back together the way it should. Our ENT specialist that removed the epiglotal cyst at Matthew’s last surgery was also on hand to take a look and ensure that everything has resolved nicely in his throat.
Now back to morphine and creams. Naturally, being a fairly invasive and lifestyle changing procedure, Matthew was put on a fair bit of morphine which he will continue to be on for the next day or so. His nutrition is currently being provided by a drip, but we will slowly be reintroducing formula throughout the day tomorrow, until we’re back to his usual 750 mls. (Actually, we’ve been told by the dietician to really try to push it up to a litre). Once that happens, he’ll start to have motions, and I suspect that this is gonna kind of freak him out. The other issue of course is that the phrase ‘as smooth as a baby’s bum’ is extreme in Matthew’s case. His botty skin is very sensitive as it’s never had to cope with faeces before. As a result, we’re now into a regime of applying two different types of barrier and protective creams at every nappy change.
The other interesting news from today is that after a very long discussion with another of our dieticians (i think it’s our 6th or 7th one) we were very pleased to find out that Matthew has caught up to somewhere between the 5th and 10th centile for his corrected age. That’s pretty good considering his birth weight put him well below the 1st centile.