Third Ostomy and Job Challenges with Crohn's Disease

Hello there.

New here to the forum just here to  listen,rant a little.

On my now 3rd ostomy in my 23 yr battle w crohns. 

With now 18 yrs in my job they are now ready to gheow me out,despite me having FMLA paperwork they have fudged it up now 3 times! Not wanting to recognize their own errors. So tough to deal w this horrible ostomy,had to operated on to change from a highly prolapsed loop ostomy to end ostomy and now that after a couple monyhs dosent feel placed right. Constant pain and now a' crohns an ostomy' made crisis from my employer rabidly trying to fire me despite great performance and 18yrs in. Just sime support here and rant w each other sometimes.

Thanks group

Hello Sean.

It doesn't sound like a good place to bein for you right now either with the ostomy or with the sh-t that your employers are throwing at you.

Not much we can do for you on that front. However, we do like to think that we can listen to rants and I for one think that they can be very therapeutic.

So feel free to rant as much as you like on here and we will do our best to understand and respond accordingly.

Best wishers

Bill

Sean - I am new to this world too.  And I can empathize with the FMLA issue - they cannot fire you while you are on short term disability. 

I will share with you what was recommended to me when I came here the first time...try to take one issue at a time.  And come here and rant all you want.  These wonderful people here have walked the walk and will support you...

Hang in there Sean....things will get better. 

Sorry to hear you're in pain, that's the worst.  And you say you've been battling Crohn's...I had an ileostomy just over 6 years ago for UC, which was flaring uncontrollably.  But I can remember thinking, even when I was sickest, "At least you don't have Crohn's, they can take it out and you'll be done with it!"  Which is pretty much how it turned out.  I'm on FMLA right now myself for surgery (semi related to the UC but not nearly as major as that was) but having no problems I know of.  But I realize how crappy employers can be about chronic health problems.  

Hello and thank you all for the encouragement. Yes, the return to the ostomy makes me feel cheated and tricked into it. The last surgery was a fistulectomy for a subcutaneous fistula that the 'surgeon' decided, based on his 'expert opinion and 38 years of experience,' that it's best to ignore it, 'medication will heal it.' That was over 2 years ago. Guess what? If a subcutaneous fistula doesn't heal from medicine the first year and just gets bigger, then it won't heal without surgical intervention. So, the fistula, despite my best efforts to keep it plugged up plus taking medicines, led the gastroenterologist to eventually admit that medicine isn't working and methotrexate probably caused your once-a-month ER visits, but 'still like to take the medicine?' So, I was nearly promised by the surgeon, 'Oh, don't worry, don't worry, an ostomy is highly unlikely, exceedingly unlikely, minuscule chance, teeny tiny teensy weensy chance, and even if it'd just be temporary.' I woke up with the horrible thing again and here I am. After a few months of X-rays and lower GI, oops, yep, you're permanently this way, too many internal fistulas and blockage below in your ileopouch bypass. If he'd told me that it was probable (as his resident surgeon later admitted, 'Oh, in fistulectomies we always give an ostomy'), I would have forgone a third ostomy and went off somewhere to part this earth. My life has been hell, and I've considered myself dead the day I woke up with an ostomy again. It constantly pours and squirts out acids; I'm lucky if I can get the bag to stick for 2 days, and after day 1, it's already under the wafer. I've tried nearly everything. I'm at my limits. I only wish to stay around on earth until my new wife (I thought I was going to be okay after the last ostomy was done 2 years ago, so I got married and brought my wife and little girl out from the Philippines) had I known I'd been this way, I wouldn't have done so to bring so much burden and suffering on us. I just want her established here so I can at least have given something positive. Sorry, that's how I feel.

Living with Your Ostomy | Hollister