After the Ostomy-Will It Be Safe to Exercise

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It Will Never Be the Same Again

So in the aftermath of all of the things you are going through, like before the surgery, the surgery, the 6 days recovery in the hospital and then the healing at home you start thinking.

About What You Say?

Well, there are a ton of thoughts that you are living with.

Questions first?……..

What do I do now? Where do I go from here? Well, the answer to that one I am still trying to grab onto. I was told be everyone, that you can resume your normal life. Well for me that really hasn’t worked out.

What do I mean?

Let’s start with the fact that at the time of surgery I was 61 years old.

Next I had made my living, pushing racks of bread, baked cake goods by Entenmann’s and SB Thomas’s english muffins and bagels on and off trucks for almost 18 years.

How do I follow that up with the limits I now have on me. Very Different…..

Time To Get Up & Going Again

After I had to shut down it was going to be hard to get going again. Every day for those years I was up at 3 am and off and running for 4 days a week of anywhere from 10-12 hours a work day delivering to accounts. Saturdays were usually only an 8 hour delivery day.

That was my exercise. It had gotten to be a tiresome thing. So being shut down the previous 5 months plus with the Chemo-radiation treatments, and then two months after that my (6 hours plus surgery) had me where I was now.

What Now, I tried to gather up my thoughts. Time to get some goals and dreams going again.

You find that while you are going through the treatments you are focused in on a daily goal. One more day I need to get through.

Then one more week, etc, etc. Or sometimes only two more days of not feeling so well, before I should be feeling better again.

So you are in survival mode much more than looking at things 6 months, a year or 5 years out in front of you.

So I Didn’t Forget the Exercise Question

So as I recovered I still needed chemo treatments every 2 weeks from February until the end of May. I planned on exercising as soon as I had the energy. But that took a good 4 to 5 months after the chemo treatments were completed.

Now I deeply considered what I felt comfortable doing as far as workouts. I knew I wasn’t comfortable bending and folding up, nor putting much strain on the abdomen or lower stomach area.

I had deep concerns about hurting anything or a strains on muscles as well.

So I limited myself to walking, and lifting weights with my arms only, like arm curls and again moderate weights nothing really heavy. I would get my cardio from walking at the mall.

So with time I did discover that I did indeed have two hernias, even though I had been really careful with physical activities.

You can read about my hernias on Discussing My Parastomal Hernia and my other post titled Hernia Belts-Do They Provide Hope or Am I a Dope?.

So I guess returning to my normal work wasn’t going to happen. I couldn’t bend over like I used to. I certainly wasn’t going to be able to push racks of product anymore.

I also wasn’t able to do all of the lifting I used to do. I now had an ostomy in my lower abdomen this does prevent me from doing this type of work.

Determining Exercise For You

So I guess you will need to measure yourself for the following areas.

• Your age and your physical shape going into this
• Your ability to focus on the task at hand and have a positive outlook
• The size and amount of chemo that you are getting. How often are your treatments
• Your response to the chemo side- effects that do accompany the treatments you receive
• I found out just how important my faith in God was to me as well. Are you a believer? Do you have a religion or a faith to hang on to?

What I Discovered

I found during my year that often I drew strength to continue from my believe in an eternal God and my faith in him as a loving and healing God as well.

Prayers do help and they can be felt. I was told numerous times by the doctors that I was responding in the upper 95 percentile. They were very pleased with how I was dealing with the chemo and the side effects.

I would respond that “prayer does work”.

Take Good Care Of Yourself It Is Worth It For You and Those Around You.

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