the Stomach Story, part 3 (last one...I promise!)

After getting my referral to Creighton, I called their office and talked with their amazing nurse, Kim.  I would love to give this woman an award because she is amazing!  She patiently listened to my whole story, what tests I had done, what doctors I had seen, what treatments I had tried.  She got me booked for a Barium Swallow test, a stomach emptying test, an endoscopy with the doctor, and an appointment in his clinic later in the day.  Stomach emptying tests are not too fun either.  You have to eat some nasty scrambled eggs laced with radioactive material and lay perfectly still on a rock hard table for two hours under an x-ray machine.  So after all the fun tests, I met my doctor.  He reviewed all my previous records and tests, along with the endoscopy he had done. I was up to my 4th endoscopy now so I was pretty much a pro at this point.

My options were laid out pretty clearly.  Medication wasn't able to control my reflux and it would only continue to damage my esophagus, which would do further damage and most likely lead to esophageal cancer. The other option was a surgical procedure called the Nissen Fundoplication.  The stomach is wrapped around itself to prevent anything from coming back up from the stomach.  However you have to find the perfect balance that allows food to go down, but not come back up. It does shrink the size of your stomach and usually prevents you from burping so you must be very careful about eating foods that expand (breads) and making sure your food is very well chewed so that it can go down.  It also makes it very difficult and painful if you were to throw up.  You are required to stay on top of any nausea-like symptoms by taking Zofran at the first sign of trouble.

Due to changing how your stomach works, the increased strain of pregnancy and the inability to throw up, it's not recommended until you are done having children.  When the surgeon said that we would need to be done having kids before having this done, I cried right there in the office...and the entire way home from Omaha.  I could not imaging being pregnant again with these symptoms.  My reflux was worse now than it was even with pregnancy.  What on earth would happen during a pregnancy!?!?  In true male form, Josh says 'well, how much worse could it get?'  Obviously, he wasn't the one choking on acid.  After some discussions and debate, we decided we did want to try to have another and would love to add to our family.
God had other plans and after a year of trying and three rounds of bronchitis, we weren't sure how much longer we could delay having surgery and weren't able to get pregnant.  On my last round of bronchitis, I ended up in the ER because medications weren't working and things were only getting worse.  This lead to a diagnosis of asthma and going to a pulmonologist several times.  We tried several medications, steroids, voodoo even, but I couldn't shake it.  After a pulmonary function test, it was determined I did not have asthma after all--it was all from acid reflux coming up and me aspirating into my lungs.  This seemed to be correlated to anytime I tried to work out and get in shape.  I couldn't even jog anymore without acid coming up.  After so many trips to doctors, tests, medications, and--of course--the medical bills, we decided we would schedule the surgery for this summer.

My surgery was July 1 and it was so strange waking up in the recovery room flat on a bed!  I can sleep on my right side.  I can lay flat.  I can bend over and even eat after 7pm--all without acid coming up!  One month out, I'm still on a liquid/soft food diet, but so far so good!  It has been such a relief not waking up choking or randomly having acid come up. And sleeping in my own bed--it's glorious!  I know I still have a ways to go in the recovery, but I'm already happy with the changes I've seen.  I hope I can continue on this great path and stay acid reflux free!