blueglass said...
I think my surgeon said I needed 1000 calories a day for healing at first ... And of course you can't really eat that much extra hence the weight loss. You do need a lot of extra protein for healing so if you can drink some protein shakes that can help. Hang in.
A 1000 calories in total or 1000 calories on top of what you'd normally eat?
After my first surgery, I was eating again very quickly. By the second or third day, my parents were bringing me in Tesco sandwiches 'cos the meagre hospital food wasn't sufficient. The surgeon also prescribed me 3 Fortisips a day (Ensure-type drink). The Fortisips alone were 300 calories each so I probably was getting nearly 1000 extra calories a day.
After my second surgery, it was a completely different story. I felt sick as a dog from day 1 and it didn't lift. Vomited daily and had the most godawful cramping abdominal pain, which painkillers didn't touch at times. Zero appetite, couldn't eat a thing. Even sipping liquids was difficult. I became convinced I had caught a stomach bug (because one had been going round the ward), but my docs kept on telling me it was an ileus. In retrospect I think they were right and I was wrong.
I only forced myself to eat because it was the only way I was getting off that ward and after a week I was desperate to go home. Started with a slice of toast and marmite each morning - it took 2 hours to get it down and was about
all I could manage for the day, aside from 3 bites of lunch. After three days of that my appetite did begin to return. Slowly at fast, but
much faster once I got home and could eat food that I actually liked, instead of horrible NHS food.
All in all, I lost a stone (14lb) during that first week. The nurse who weighed me was so concerned she re-weighed me and got another nurse to check it out. I was less surprised, not least because it was the single most brutal experience I've been through in my life. I'd never lost my appetite so profoundly before, it was quite a scary experience.