Having briefly mentioned how emotionally and physically tough yesterday was, I feel it’s important for people to realise why.

There’s a number of factors at play here I felt I was prepared for but still knocked me and sipping water only was one of them. Here’s the thing, I feel ‘full’ and in fact struggle to get 100mls of water in an hour, however, I’m sat watching the Olympics in my hospital bed, and I see an ad with some eating. My mouth is suddenly watering for a poached egg on sourdough bread with butter. My stomach is gurgling and full and clearly saying ‘ABSOLUTELY NOT’ but my eyes and mouth are begging me.

It’s not an uncommon thing, we hear ‘our eyes are bigger than our belly’ frequently. In this case, this is something that I will have to manage going forward. A little wave of frustration and then sadness passed over me as I fought back the mental images of the yoke of the egg oozing onto the butter on the bread in my mind as I realised this is going to be a daily challenge.

Bread is not my friend, nor is butter. But in a few weeks eggs will be. However, hospital catering arrived along with the dietician and after a good conversation, a hit cup of beef broth was sat In front of me… And although it was only 100mls of beef broth, it tasted as delicious and satisfying as a beef dinner.

Pain. Although it’s to be expected, the discomfort after surgery, I feel, can vary from person to person. I was in quite a bit of pain. Perhaps because this was a revision of my origin Roux en Y from 16 years previous, but either way, abdominal pain is quite uncomfortable. Thankfully the nurses were all over it and the pain relief took the edge off.

Tiredness. My better half Matt would say ‘Vicki could fall asleep on a clothesline, and he’s correct. Since my original surgery I’ve struggled with anaemia, nap most days and I now self inject my vitamin B12 3 monthly, but I still struggle with tiredness. Post-surgery this was a whole new ball game as I felt shattered tired. Naturally, general anaesthesia played a huge role, but my advice would be to nap when you can in the hospital bed.

Loneliness. I’m not a lonely person, I’m an introverted extrovert (it’s a thing, Google it). Covid times have really done a number on hospital stays, unfortunately. ‘No visitors’ signs and reminders are everywhere, so despite wanting my other half Matt to sit beside me and hold my hand, I sat by myself most of the day. I’m a talker and as we all know, talking on the phone  Isn’t the same however,  one positive I took from this was the constant update from my visiting surgeon and team who practically counted me down to my release from the hospital. My surgeon actually came by an hour early to give me the all-clear to be discharged which meant I was out by 11 am!

This brings me to the later part of day 3 and into day 4. Discharged and home with Matt I was relieved. All my vitals were good, my surgeon was happy, I felt much better but I was hungry (mentally…again).

Matt had done some shopping for me so I made a vegetable broth and a chicken broth. The smell was outstanding and after a few hours of them simmering away, I scooped off 100mls of the clear broth from the top of the pot and sipped. Part of my reasoning for this was the awareness of the lack of nutrients my body was receiving on the liquid diet whilst internally I recover from my surgeon’s excellent work. Bone broth is a great source of nutrients, it’s also known to be good for digestion and have anti-inflammatory effects, and let’s face it, when you’re on a liquid diet you need flavour! Naturally, Matt had the chunky part of the broth with the chicken, celery, carrot, leek etc. I was just content with my sips of broth that went down a treat.