RWJ part IV

Okay....so I've had an update lined up and I even took some pictures and actually planned out my thoughts and put some effort into what I was going to write and I just haven't been able to get around to it. That blog is gonna be put on hold a little because this one takes a little more priority and is a little more current being that I am sitting in a hospital bed right now and I haven't eaten anything since this past Friday morning. Not like I'm hungry, but it sounds really cool when you consider how it's about to be Wednesday and shit.
So of course there can always be complications with an illeostomy bag, even if it's not directly Crohn's related you can still have a problem. That little pooper is only so big so if you swallow whole pieces of food or quarters or something chances are you will end up in a jackpot. Unfortunately this was the case for me Thursday night. After a trip to the local Cinnabon/Food Court at Menlo Park mall I woke up the next day and realized that I had barely passed any food from the night before, which is usually never the case...I usually wake up like twice in the middle of the night to empty my shit just so I don't have to worry about waking up being sauteed (sp?) in it. So I woke up on Friday, didn't completely realize yet, went out to do some work and stopped to get breakfast while I was out. By like 2pm I'm starting to feel some stomach cramps and I look to see one of the scariest things I have seen wrong with my body in a while...

...a severe lack of shit. An illeostomy bag should NEVER really look that clean unless you haven't eaten in like a day and/or you just put a new one on. This pic is actually taken from Friday night, but this was what I was looking at all day.
However, cramping does not really get that intense or bad and of course me thinking I can fix everything by myself I google stoma obstructions and learn that they can pass on their own within 6-8 hours, but if they don't by then you should seek medical attention. I keep doing some reading even though the pain still is not even really there except for maybe like five minutes out of every sixty, and I find a tip that if you feel you have an obstruction and it might possibly be near the end of your intestine/beginning of your stoma, you can stick a part of your fingertip in your stoma to try and break up some of the food.
A few hours later, a combination of my fear of returning to the hospital for the fourth time combined with the amount of marijuana in my body at this moment of time lead to some of the sickest fucking pictures ever.

Ready and...

Fire! Hell yeah. Even though I was slightly worried at this point in time I still had to take advantage of this photo op and send a text to a few friends. Plus this is the most action I've really gotten in a while from anything so it was def a fun time.

After a few minutes of finger wiggling to no avail, I pack it up and head home. By now it's like 4pm and I have a show this night in north NJ.

Keep in mind that although I knew I had a possibility of going to the hospital, I'm not really worried at all. The pain by now is at most like 10 percent of what it was the other times I was hospitalized, so I'm really feeling fine and walking around and stuff. I was at least smart enough this day to NOT eat anything after breakfast and pass up on buffalo wings for lunch. For the rest of the day I'm drinking plenty of water to try and flush everything out.

At the show I think I'm feeling alright and then suddenly walk outside and puke up all the water I just drank. Slightly stubborn I feel like I still might have a chance at passing this thing and decide that I will go home right after we play which is like in twenty minutes anyway. During our set I'm feeling pretty alright until towards the end, one of the last songs I'm playing really weak (but still almost in time!) and as I'm playing I fucking puke up water all over my snare drum. The greater part about this was that it was so much that as I'm hitting my drum it is all splashing up in my face. After this song we wrap it up and I head home with my friends. I'm still actually feeling really okay but I know I should try and take care of this. After a last attempt of trying to take a bath and relax, we decide I should go to the hospital after my sister walks into the bathroom and I'm standing up naked and puking all over my dick. I put a new bag on, make sure I grab a camera and things, and we're off.
So around 11 pm/midnight I'm in the hospital chilling out. I remember as I walk in the ER drop off I feel the urge to puke and I go up to a garbage can and apologetically tell the sick people around it: "excuse me, I'm really sorry...I have to throw up" ralphralphralph a few minutes later after a bunch of people leave from being grossed out I am on my way towards the ER. I was really only puking up water and maybe some bile, but I guess watching a stranger throw up is a little strange to do, unless you're soneone who watches awful things on the internet.

...Which brings me to this video. This is me waiting to get dispatched into a room upstairs on the adoloscent floor. The video is a few minutes long so if you just wanna see the good stuff I would fast foward a little bit. This is an NG Tube (nasal gastro), being inserted up my nose and down into my stomach. Fortunately I have the fucking coolest sister ever and she hid the camera under her sweatshirt and got this footage.



Sorry if that's a bummer to anyone or a little sad! I've really had fairly high spirits most of my stay here. If you see me sticking my tongue out in this video, that is not being extremely sick, but that is my effort to try and be the funny guy and make sexy faces while they fuck my nose with a plastic hose. I think I explained what this tube is like in my first blog, but as a refresher: it's there to suck the shit out of my stomach, and it feels like you have a popsicle stick in your throat. The tube sucks up bile blood mucus and any blockage and sucks it into a nice tidy bin where you can add a tap and serve it to any of you friends.

What was kind of a bummer was that this tube and this obstruction caused some awkward pressure buildup and interfered with my diaphragm somehow and gave me a bad case of the hiccups that I had for probably about 40% of my first few days here. I would even wake up in the middle of the night and just start hiccuping.

After I get this tube in I'm off to get a CatScan. As you might be able to hear in the video I'm on the "no drink or eat" diet so they pump the formula down my tube so there is good contrast on the tests. Fortunately I held it down right up until about 10 seconds after the scan, this is me in the hallway after.


Yum yum gotta love that gritted ass attempt at a smile!

Okay let's fast forward a little bit, because nothing really happens for the next day or two...which is maybe something to even talk about. It gets a little worse for the next day and a half...I'm still walking and moving around but the pain becomes a little more intense. It's still nothing compared to what it ever was, but it's starting to get bothersome. This time in the hospital, I was a little more open to taking painkiller drugs to deal with some of the pain, because really after four times you don't want to deal with this shit any more haha. I still DID pass it up plenty of times, and I probably only got morphine like 4 times and that's it, compared to people who would milk the shit out of my situation and just be fucked up all day I think I'm alright...however I did think I was a ghost with "butter hands" at one point and I woke up later and had no idea what was going on.

A highlight of those two days was that the old associate of my old GI doctor came in, the one we chose not to see anymore...and the one I think I wrote about previously a few blogs ago and said something like "fuck you". He was like "what happened? we were scheduled to come and then you cancelled!" And I was so happy that I got to tell him that I started seeing another doctor and I thought the situation was handled very maturely especially on my end because this guy was kind of a jerk but I just told him the deal. He said it was fine and that he wishes the best and said he was gonna find the GI resident for the hospital who was taking care of me and give them the scoop so they can help me more.

He then leaves and comes back 10 seconds later with the female GI resident that def had some respect for me since I usually know what I'm talking about when it comes to Crohn's and we had a good talk earlier that day... and he pretty much just tries to make me look like a dick head, calls me a "puttz" for going to the hospital so late the 3rd time that I got a preforation, and calls me a "rock star" because I left for tour a few days after coming out of the hospital the first time. There's a difference between being parently and being a fucking asshole, and I really don't think you are either of my parents you fucking tool. I was totally content with where we left off two minutes ago and I was planning on never having to see you face again, but I guess if you need the last word to an 18 year old kid that's totally fine. Fuck you schmuck.


For the rest my time the next few days some of my friends kept company with me and hung out which was great. I didn't try to tell a lot of people I was here again...not like I didn't want to tell people I was in the hospital, but really I wasn't trying to. There's a lot going on right now, and this shit just gets in the way I feel like. I always know I'll be fine especially with my loved ones around, and it's not like my friends aren't important! It's just this happened four times, I know the drill, and I know my friends care a lot. A bunch of them still came to visit and did nice things like stay for long and talk, send nice texts, bring video games, and even a porno magazine (Black Lust baby!). Even the whole Maroney family was with me in some kind of way! I texted Mike Maroney Photography(R) this picture and told him to tell his dad I said thanks since I got to stay in his sick ass sponsored hospital room.

Hospital stays for me aren't as scary as they are for a lot of people. Just because I'm in the hospital doesn't mean I'm deathly sick or dying or fucked for life...it means that I can't take care of my problem on my own and need all those neat facilities and gadgets the hospital has to offer. I was telling my sis "dude if I had IV and a suction thing and some steroids and drugs I would totally be able to handle this, I just don't. " The medical plan was pretty similar to the plans the other times, bowel rest, then some steroids, then some antibiotics. Of course if this shit didn't pass this time it would result in another surgery, not as severe really as the other one, but still surgery. A day and a half in, my doctors start getting worried that nothing was passing still. Then on monday afternoon, I finally pass a respectable amount of liquids. That night I walk around the floor with my sister for a while and feel everything breaking up, I even wake up in the middle of the night from a huge gas blurt let out from my stoma and just say "holy shit noelle did you hear that?"

The next day (today!) I go for another walk and then the GI doctor on this floor comes to talk to me to try and work out a plan to try and get more to pass from my body. Her planning is interrupted by a huge ass fart and me filling up like more than half of my bag with a huge ejaculatory diarrheal 14 second poop shot in which she stops talking and we both just stare at my stoma. Right after this, she stops, smiles and says "okay never mind you're good!" And just leaves the room laughing out loud. I wish I could of recorded how much shit came out of me, I mean we recorded the number since we had to, like 600CCsor something, but I wish I taped it haha.

More friends came to hang today, magicians came and did magic. And then we finally got to take this NG tube out. Hopefully this video is a little more uplifting, I keep getting that clown-pulling-an-endless-ribbon-out-of- his-mouth vibe from this footage but it's so great!


Better days are coming, they always are. Tom I prob will be put on liquids and maybe solids and the latest I should be out of here by is probably Thursday night! Just in time for the weekend! PARTY!

freak.

I can't do this anymore. I know I usually don't get emotional in my blogs or express my feelings but I think it's time I do it, it could help a lot. I'm sick of being looked at as a freak. I can't even go in public without someone noticing it. You think it wouldn't be that big of a deal and people would be understanding, but that is never the case. People don't even realize how hard they are staring, some people even fucking laugh right in my face. I need someone to talk to that can help me be alright with myself and how I look again, this is getting too hard and I can't take this much longer. This has become more of a burden than I ever thought it would be.

I got used to it, why can't other people....


Before you even ask yourself, the answer is YES THAT IS A FUCKING MUSTACHE, AND YES I AM THE MAN. Also if you didn't get the joke, I was whining about my mustache, and no it didn't get that many laughs, most people thought it was sick as shit, most of my friends did at least haha. Plus it made me look like I was 35 which was pretty sweet. Also if you are one of my friends you know that this is being written in the past tense as I shaved my mustache about a week and a half ago, but I did have this sick ass picture of it, and I will keep it as proof forever.

Now I'm rocking the clean face for a while, giving the beard a rest. I figured the shitbag was already enough a woman determent (oh man but it's not always, ask for the story), and a mustache I thought would just make it even harder talk to the honeys. Not like I'm really trying to anyway but whatev.

Anyway, sorry I don't update this that much! I've been enjoying the shit out of my summer. I find myself almost everyday saying or at least thinking "fuck I love my life". Chillin with friends, sickest job, and more chilling and playing shows. I could probably do this forever. For anyone wondering I'm a driver for my dad, so I'm either driving a big van delivering bread with the radio on or driving around collecting money in a car with cds playing. As long I have some music I'm alright, plus I already love driving so it's very fun. I actually just came home from six hours of driving all around central NJ and figured since I'm in work mode I should try and be productive with this blog. But the thing is, there's not that much going on. I don't wanna just update everytime I think of a funny poop joke or something, then I'll feel like an illeostomy whore. But then again, me and my friends have been thinking of pretty awful videos to make that we probably will film by the end of summer and that I will def put up.

I did visit my doctor a few weeks ago and he told me I'm doing great. I gained so much weight and I keep gaining it, I'm probably close to 160 now, which is the most I've ever weighed. I've been pigging out on everything haha, I'm about to actually start watching what I eat so I don't get too chubby. I have an appointment with my surgeon next week and then June 29th I'm going to my other doctor in NY, where I'll be getting a colonoscopy and an illeoscopy. Fun new exciting! If you can't guess, an illeoscopy is where they stick a camera down your stoma and check out your small intestine. I'm gonna try to bring my camera and talk my doctor into taking pictures or something, but I feel like he'll be like lawsuit skeptical or I'll have to sign papers.

My sister came home from a 3 and half month stay in China last week. She left two days before I was rushed into the ER and had surgery done, and we didn't tell her until about a month into her stay. Once she found out, it was during the time I also gotten that nut-tube infection, so she mailed me this nice poem from China:



Isn't she the best?! I'm really happy her and her "boo" John are home because they are both great. Here is a pic of them taking advantage of all the touristy happenings and putting on some fly ass Shanghai-gear:


This is also one of the funniest pictures I have ever seen, ever.


Anyway, about a week ago someone told me how much my blog is helping their friend who is going through the same thing, and it felt really awesome to know that me talking about shitting on stuff and making jokes actually helped someone, and it totally made this whole thing worth it. Hopefully people will keep reading even though I don't consistently update, and hopefully my plan to be on Oprah and fingerbang the shit out of her will fall into place.

Stay shitty.

tests.

I've been to at least 6 different doctors to try to figure out my Crohn's disease situation. Most of the time I change doctors because my parents don't like the doctor or what they are saying, or because I'm feeling, but honestly most of the time I am feeling worse because I tend to eat whatever I want which is a bad idea. Being that I am 18 and trying to do things, going to so many different doctors is not fucking cool. But what tends to be worse is the various tests that have been given to me over the past year and a half. A lot of them were very similar, a lot of them were very pointless, and all of them pretty much were very silly. I understand that over time your Crohn's Disease can progress or get worse and it's good to check up on it, but some of these tests def did not need to happen.

I don't ever know what this first one ever given to me was called. All I know is that I had to drink a lot of barium. "Oh you mean barium? Like the fucking element?" Yes. White gooey drink that tasted like Sunny D, only it was white and tasted a little worse. So after drinking about like 2 bottles of barium for this test, I think one might have even been the night before, they put me on the table and try to get x-rays of me. But then this usually happens whenever I have to drink barium for tests: "Lol you need to drink more barium, you intestines are like swollen and enough of it hasn't gone through". The first time this happened I drank more barium and still no good so they were like "go get food or something" so I did. I must have taken at least seven tests involving barium or drinking bullshit for catscans, and at least 4 of the times I probably had to drink more.

Eventually for this first test enough barium goes through and I'm good to go and this guy is holding a stick with like a bouncy ball on the end and pressing down on my stomach. "Tell me where it hurts". And he's like looking at my insides and trying to figure out what the problem is. I don't remember if they found anything out during this test. I don' t really remember this test well at all, all I really remember is that it was the first time I was introduced to my new favorite drink, barium smoothie coolata.

Another test I took was a colonoscopy, I think I probably described it before, but I'll give a quick run through. Don't eat for x amount of hours prior to the test (this is actualy the case for most stomach, but tests for obvious reasons), take 2 enemas at x and y hours prior to the test (luckily i had practiced giving myself an enema before I even had crohn's for no reason at all), come in to the hospital, iv anestetic, sleep, long camera on a bendy wire in your butt, wake up, fart little air poofs, go home. No big deal, I probably have to get one every few years or something, probably the easiest procedure for me to go through, all I do is sleep. They actually printed me out some pictures from this test, but my mom took them away from me because I kept showing my friends because I am a whore. If I do get them I will put them up for sure!

Another test I took was a mother fucker for sure. capsule endoscopy I think it's called. Here's what happened, they make you not eat for like a day, and probably you have to give yourself an enema because you usually have to, and why not? Then you go into the hospital very hungry and they put all these sticky things on your chest that are connected to wires, and all of these wires are connected to what looks like an overly sized beeper which goes on a belt which is strapped around you. Then you swallow a pill with a camera built into it that keeps flashing. The pill isn't really THAT big. I did choke a little because I was just eager to swallow it and I mostly just choked on the cup of water they make you drink to chase it down after, wrong pipe or something. When they first took the pill out of the package it was in this large protective cone thing and I remember seeing it and being like "WHAT THE FUCK" because I though I had to swallow a 4 by 2 inch orange cone. Here is a picture of the actual pill next to a coin that is a shitty reference of size because I have no idea what the fuck kind of coin it is.
Haha but seriously, it couldn't have been longer than two inches.

Once you swallow the pillit runs through your whole digestive tract and sends pictures to the sticky things on your chest which then store the pictures in that large battery thing. You have to wear like a large apparatus over you which looks like a bomb is strapped to you. I actually had a note in school so people didn't ask questions, but I just wore a large hoodie all day anyway. You go back at the end of the 2nd day (halfway through the second day I think you can start eating jello or something) and then they rip all the sticky things off of your hairy 17 year old chest and you go home and shit out the pill, which I never found haha.

Here is why this test was fucking stupid to do at the time. I understand it was a new doctor and he wanted to see what was going on, but a few weeks later I received a phone call and got the results.

"Hi is this Joseph? Hi this is ____ from Dr. ____'s office, we're just calling to follow up your endoscopic capsule procedure. Turns out you DO have Crohn's disease. Yep! It's confirmed!"

You fucking mother fucker. I'm pretty sure we know that when I had a a grapefruit sized abcess in my butt, and then we went in with a camera and took pictures and we found ulcers and inflammation. I don't understand why they thought they would find something if they went in from my mouth instead of my butt. That was so fucking stupid, fucking dick head.

Does anyone know what a holistic doctor is? I went in and this guy tells me to lay down. Everything seems normal until he tells me to put my arm up and pushes it down and tells me to resist him pushing it down. Then he holds capsules of different foods to my head and tells me to resist and notes that for some foods I have a harder time resisting. Honestly, I don't know if this is real or a scam, this guy kinda creeped me out and we never gave him a chance, plus our insurance at the time didn't cover it and the first (and also last) visit was like $250. We kinda blew it off as "wtf was that hippie shit" at the time, only because we were in there for like two hours and this guy seemed so into holding samples of lobster on my head. A lot of people swear by holistic doctors so I guess it could have been worth a shot, but one of the first things he said to me was "your diet needs to completely change". He recommended all gluten free foods. I remember gluten free bread tasted like 30 day old corn bread only like very bland and that peanut butter was very watery. I probably could have gotten used to it, but we just never went back to see this guy anyway so I stopped. I will note that Crohn's probably has to do something with food allergies or some kind of reaction to food. And if you're a doctor reading this right now and you disagree: fuck you, and come see me.

Sorry, writing all this is making me realize how much I fucking hate some doctors haha.

Anyway, easiest test I've ever done is the x-ray where I just drink a cup of fizz and stand there and they take it, both of those were done to me in the hospital both times. I've also been administered the "gay test" by friends, where they would put their arms around me and time the seconds that I would allow it to happen. Turns out that x seconds is equivalent to x% of how gay I am, usually somewhere in the 200's.

Probably the most frequent test I've taken though is the catscan, lots of barium to drink, then you lay down and they put you through a tube and it makes crazy noises. Sometimes they give you IV iodine too which makes your gooch tingle a lot for some reason. These catscans were done in the hospital a few times, and a lot of times doctors wanted to do them to see how I'm doing. I don't know why they just didn't share results I'm sure a lot of them were not necessary haha. However this picture does conclude one fact that I know is true about my body:




...And that is that my limp dick tends to hang to the left when I am laying down. ZING.

rockin out

So like I was saying, having an ileostomy bag is only as limiting as you let it be. I mean you can really do anything, but sometimes it will cause you to get shit all over yourself underneath your shirt. Recently my bags and sticker have been lasting for about 4 days, but I think instead of blaming that on the company, it's more been that I've been going to shows and playing drums and jumping around on people and stuff.

I played a show in Philly the other day, about a little over an hour away from home. This set was hot and sweaty as most of them are, but I recall saying into the mic in between songs :

"The only thing worse than playing in this heat is playing in this heat with a bag of shit strapped to your body."

It was pretty hot and I was pretty sweaty. After our set I stood up and was wondering why I was sweating in such an awkward pattern on my shirt. I stood up and realized that this sweat did not really smell like your regular sweat, I lifted my shirt and found shit smeared all over my stomach like you would only see on some exclusive websites. So of course I do what any musician covered in shit after a performance would do, I put it off to the side and packed up all of my drums and loaded them into a car. Out in the back in the trunk we found a shitty band's t-shirt. So I took off my moist shirt and put theirs on. I went into the bathroom and wiped myself down with a bunch of paper towels and then stuffed some toilet paper underneath my ostomy belt.


You can see the wet poop stains on the belt in that picture. It seeped through the belt and onto my shirt.

After I stuffed my belt and put a shirt on a put a hoodie on so I didn't look like I had a huge bulge underneath my shirt. I still had some wet poop on me and it was still leaking...once the wafer is off and poop has come out from underneath it's pretty hard to get it to stick since there is still poop on your skin. Of course, the longer shit would be on me the more irritated my skin would get. So I did what any avid music listener at a show covered in shit would do...I stayed for the 2 bands I wanted to see and then we left...there were only 3 left, but we don't really like the last band anyway so whatever.

We said bye to our friends from out of state and left for home. On the way home we stopped at Burger King, well because we were hungry. Eating food with a leaking ostomy bag isn't really the greatest idea, but it takes a few hours for everything to go through anyway. So we ate in the burger king and then got home like fifteen minutes later. So this was probably a total of two and a half hours of being semi-covered in shit. I got home, went into the bathroom and took a pic.



I threw my belt in the sink and soaked it in water, ripped whatever was still sticking on my bag and wafer off, put it in a plastic bag, and jumped in the shower. I stayed in the shower for a while, because I like taking long showers, especially because I don't really shower every day anymore. Then I went into my bed and started changing my stuff, which burned more than usual because I irritated a lot of skin. If you look right between my stoma and my hand youll see a lot of puffy irritated red skin. It itched a lot, and of course applying anything that contained alcohol onto it fucking burned so bad. I think I actually took this picture before I jumped in the shower which explains why there's still shit on around the base of my stoma.

Whatever, even if it's a fucking awful burning pain, it goes away in like 5 minutes. Temporary awful stinging pain seems to not be as bad when you realize it will be gone eventually, even though during those five minutes I was probably saying "fuck " a lot and punching my wall hard.

I go out for a little after and try to find somewhere smoke weed. Call it my vice, call me weak or dependent, I could really care less. Eat/drink my shit. I could certainly go through this all without smoking, but why should I? I'd rather go through it a little more relaxed and hungrier.

Anyway, we actually end up NOT smoking that night, and I just got to hang out with my friends a little which is just as good of a pick-me up.

Fast forward a few days and we are playing another show with out of state friends (myspace.com/abillionernies and www.myspace.com/wearetheunion. also check out communityrecords.org, awesome people, and i'm in a tour video explaining the bag!). Fun show, someone yelled at me for taking a shit in the girls bathroom, but I was very full and the boys bathroom was occupied, plus I made sure no girls were in there and had someone guard the door. I tried to be extra careful at this show because I didn't want to get shit on me, but it was really no help. After we played I packed and checked and the bottom corner of my wafer had lifted off of me a little. Whatever, I stuff myself with some more toilet paper, stay for the last two bands, go home, shower, change my stuff (in a record time of like fifteen minutes) and go out to grease trucks with my friends. Here's a pic of right before I change my stuff. Def not as bad as the time before, you can't really see the leaking from the bottom corner, but you can obviously see it got on the toilet paper haha. Notice how well I hide my dick in this picture, because I think I am completely naked. That took a few takes haha.


We ended up parking by the infamous house and are still in awe about how well that shit has stuck to the door and paneling of this house. One day there will be repurcussions for that I am sure, but until then, and even once that happens, that shit was still fucking awesome.

I went to a show last night in Long Island and saw our friends in The Tomahawk Chop play an awesome show. They just put out an awesome EP that I have been listening to on a loop the whole time I've been writing this. So if you're reading this you should probably listen to them (www.myspace.com/thetomahawkchop) and thank them for making awesome music because it made me stop being lazy and write this post.

Can't wait to do some weekend touring and be stuck in Georgia covered in shit! Jk, I'm probably gonna bring some extra supplies with me haha.

vent/thoughts.

fuck you convatec. you make shitty supplies that fall off anytime I try to do anything. A few days I went to the park to play some kickball with my friends. I'm not the most athletic person so I'm not even running that fast and I feel poop water seeping out under my wafer. Oh and thanks for sending the wrongs supplies 15 fucking times. And why the fuck would you make ostomy bags clear. Do you think anyone wants to look at shit. Really. I hope I meet your president one day so I can cover him in my leaky shit.

I was having such good runs with my wafers sticking to my body. Like 7-9 days on average. The past few times have only been like 4-6. The only thing I changed really is that I've been trying to shower every day. I guess that idea is out of the window...whatever in Europe it's like once a week anyway.

I get home and go in the shower, I conveniently ate buffalo wings 2 hours prior so I am spewing shit water out of my stoma with like 12 inch trajectory. Changing my bag was awesome. Spewing shit and chewed up chicken bits on my own chest is awesome. I took a sick picture on my phone of my stoma covered in chicken bits and shitwater but I just accidentally deleted it. Cool. This situation did give me a pretty sweet idea though that hopefully I'll be able to elaborate more on soon.

Oh man I just remembered something that happened when I was in the hospital.

So a representative from convatec came in to get our order for the bags and everything. I had already had the bag for a few days, we were just ordering for when I got home. She said something about changing the bag every day (which there is no need to do at all, I do every 3 usually, sometimes 2 or 4 even. but then it starts to smell after too long kinda.) We had already been visited by other nurses who said you should change the bag around every 2 or 3 days. My mom asked the lady, something like "I thought people changed it every few days, not every day." I swear this is what the lady replied:

"Yeah...if you don't have health insurance. Hah!."

Are you fucking serious. I should have punched you in the mouth. How is that funny. I fucking hate some people, and some companies.

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Doctors are really important with Crohn's disease, because if you have a shitty one you can end up really fucked, and Crohn's disease IS treatable and can be maintained. I really believe anyone that has it can get it under control it just might take some time.

One of my doctor's had the same mannerisms as the genie from aladdin. Really nice guy. A little...flamboyant? One of the first times I saw him he went to go stick his finger in my butt. Not like he was into me, like a medical procedure checking for like abcesses or swelling or anything, not my prostate. My mom just left the room, I'm still trying to like get a read of this guy. All of a sudden he saws those eight magic words:

"Now let's take a look at that fanny".


Whatever, at least he's cool about it. I'd rather have that than some straight ass man that'd be like "Okay, now we are going to take a look at your rectum". Fanny is way easier to digest, and sounds so much cuter!

One of his associates is a dickhead though. Fuck you sir.

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One of my other doctor's on my last visit told me he has an 80 year old patient who is looking at the possibility of getting a colostomy bag, which is like the same thing as an ileostomy bag, only more towards the end of your digestive tract. She possibly has colon cancer and if she does the only way to cure it is to take her colon out and get the bag.

She told her doctors that if they open her up and the only way to cure her is to give her a colostomy bag, she wants to be closed up and not touched.

Really? I think fucking being eaten away at by colon cancer is a million times worse than a colostomy bag. I understand she's old and might be okay with facing death or whatever, and the surgery might bang her up a little more than it did to me at first. But you get so used to it. I actually just compiled of list of things you aren't able to do once you have a colostomy/ileostomy bag:

1. Poop.

I'll add more to it if anything else comes to mind. But I'm pretty sure that's it. And you still even do poop every few days!

Idk, fortunately after two days of having this thing I was over it. And a lot of the reason was because I felt like shit and my shit smelt so bad and I was in the hospital and burping up a lot of shit. Unfortunately, since I don't really have to go through the "emotional stress" of an ileostomy bag, writing about it is a little harder. I could have so many heart to hearts about the struggle, but I really don't feel that way. Instead I'm really just a whore about it and I shit on things. Not saying no one has the right to be upset with this thing, people deal with this differently. Also I can imagine it being a lot harder for girls, since it's harder to feel "pretty" with a poop bag.

I actually looked in the mirror the other day with my favorite pair of boxers on (which I'm still wearing, ew) and felt great. I'm back at 150 pounds even. I'm so used to this thing I almost went out to get the mail in just my boxers, but I felt like it was rude just to have shit hanging off of me. Well actually I didn't feel like it was rude, but I felt like other people might feel like it was rude. Whatever, fuck those people anyway.

But seriously, I'm back to doing everything I can do. Which really only consists of playing drums and hanging out anyway. But I'm sure you can even get back into athletics and stuff if you really want to! Just don't get bags from convatec, what a shitty fucking company.

shit n' run

Alright, there's a lot of questions that can be asked about this piece of art I like to call "shit n' run".

"Why the fuck would you do that?" is probably the most common question. Are you angry at these people? Is it a metaphor? Is it to raise crohn's/ileostomy awareness? No. It is because I am 18 and it was fucking awesome as hell doing it. There's no justifying it really haha. For some reason the usual guilt i feel after doing something mean has not set in yet, I don't think it ever wil due to the hilarity of this video. There def was (and still is) a risk of me getting my ass kicked or in trouble somehow, but regardless this one of the funnest nights with friends chillin I've had in a while.


We actually did two houses but the first one had bad footage. So after grease trucks and a failed attempt I had to go down two cheeseburgers at McDonalds. Totally worth it. After almost puking them up I held them down and me and my friends sat in the parking lot for an hour and just hung out and talked.

One friend brought something up about how I can only get a blumpkin for the next few months and I thought it was the funniest thing ever.

On the way to the second house, I said "dude if there is a higher power that planned me having this disease, he had no idea what he was getting himself into." But then another friend said "nah he knew exactly what he was getting into. you're the perfect candidate." This is way more optimistic so I will go with that one.

Ironically, the one thing that embarasses me the most in this video is how big my nose appears to be. I hope it's really not that big in real life haha. The camera adds a few inches.

If anyone else with an ileostomy bag would like to attempt this here are some tips:

a) chew your food, but not too much. that's how you get all those nice chunks in there!
b) BRING WIPES WITH YOU AND WEAR PANTS YOU DON'T LIKE. Totally got shit all over my favorite black pants.


Me and a friend of course returned to the scene of the crime today:


Note the bottle of bleach outside. Looks like they were having a hard time scrubbing this stuff off.


If anyone in my family/from this house sees this I am so fucked.

the kicker.

THIS WILL PROBABLY GET GROSS. ADULTS SERIOUSLY I WOULDNT READ THIS.

Okay, so I've talked about my Crohn's and how it has affected my life and the pain in my stomach, the mental exhaustion, and the pain in my butt. What else is there to talk about? Oh, my balls.

So a few days before I was admitted to the hospital for surgery, I noticed a strong pressured pain that seemed to be in my pelvic area and felt a lot of weird pressure in my privates area. I just brushed it off as pain from pooping being really strong. The day I was admitted to the hospital, I still kept feeling this pain so I told the doctor and we did an ultrasound on my privates. One handful of warm jelly and five awkard minutes with a cute latino lady later, she concluded that I was fine and there seemed to be no problem.


Eventually the pain subsided until a few weeks later. To be more precise, probably a few days after being released from the hospital.

Okay so, I wasn't miserable at this point in time, but with such serious wound and still getting used to having a poop bag on you, there is not much you can enjoy. So I did what any 18 year old boy confined to many weeks of bed rest would do. You would think that the huge vag looking wound and the sack of shit would interfere or make it harder. But thanks to the internet, anything is possible! Anyway I noticed an aching pain in my testes afterwards, but of course me being stubborn, I kinda brushed it off. I figured I was just really backed up and it would go away for days.

Of course, it didn't go away. Every time actually the pain grew worse, it was like an strong aching that lasted like a minute long. I also noticed something was up when (don't puke) the volume of my ejaculate seemed to be less, and came out in a more narrow stream. Now I knew something was up, so I did what any guy should do, I checked for lumps on my balls. I didn't find any really, but I noticed the tube on top of my nut, my epidymus, was tender. Me being the internet savy boy that I am (see: above), I typed my symptoms into google. I learned that I could possibly have epididymitis, which is pretty much the term for "clinical blue balls".


Obvy, when someone's in a lot of pain, they're not gonna think about pumpin out tadpoles. Unless you're into that (see: first blog). I must have not done it for at least three weeks by the time I got out of the hospital, and my friends can vouch for me that that is a personal best (sorry mom). So from being so backed up my epididymus got an infection and became swollen. Here's a picture of what that looks like:

And heres a picture of what that feels like:



So obviously I wasn't really a happy camper. I went to the doctor's and he in fact concluded that I had epidymitis. So from not getting enough action I ran into a problem. Sorry man, it's hard to mack it when you got a sack fulla shit (rhyme noted). Jeez, so what do priests do then? Oh yeah, they probably jerk off.

So to treat it, he told me to:

a) Wear briefs or tighter boxes so my balls don't hang and strain
b) Drink this NASTY antibiotic thing twice a day. I could've taken a pill but my doctor figured liquid would better absorb in my half-stomach.
c) Soak my balls in warm water twice a day.

Okay so by now my life is getting more and more ridic every day, so I just lol a lot, and do what he says. So now imagine a kid with a shitbag and vag wound, soaking his balls in a tubberware bowl filled with water. Laying in his bed on a laptop. Fortunately, I am an attention whore and I told all my friends immediately and we laughed about it. I offered them various amounts of money to drink my nut water, I think one said he would for seventy-five bucks. Sometimes I wouldn't empty the water after I was done and I would just put it on the table and go to sleep. The next day my mom would walk in and be like "what is that awful smell??!". Oh sry mom, that's just my dirty nut water.

So about a week goes by and the pain has lessened a lot. I actually didn't always soak my nuts twice a day, it was so awk trying to do that and lay down at the same time, so I kinda stopped doing it. But the doctor did say my testicles hang nicely (sup ladiez) and would be easier to soak. But it was still awkward and time consuming. Plus it led to a lot of itching and chafing that took like two more weeks to recover from haha.

So another chapter in my fucked up medical history is complete. Something else to put under my belt.

----------------------------------------

Here's what's going on with me now:

I'm going to get bloodwork once a week since I'm now taking 6MP and that lowers your white blood cells. I've been feeling fine from it, besides getting a pretty sick sinus infection. But that only lasted a few days and I'm on antibiotics now to treat that.

So I go to my doctor's today to what I though was to schedule my reveral surgery in May. Turns out that I'm actually not getting this thing reversed till August. Obviously I was a little upset, but I have grown to really be fine with this thing. I think I really just got bummed because I was telling myself I should be haha. But part of me was a little, just because I had believed for the past two months that this thing was gonna be gone by Summer. After driving home with my hand held down on the car horn for about twenty seconds I felt a lot better, and I'm over it now. Usually the time for a temp ileostomy is in fact 2-3 months, but the doctor said I was so fucked that he doesn't even wanna go near it till August. Whatever at least I don't have to cancel any shows or anything now.

I gained more weight, I think I'm at like 148 now. Fast food three days a week will do that, esp when you get like 3 burgers and shit. This thing was so bloated after a trip to checkers, we had to make a pit stop to empty it. The bag company fucked up again (fuck you convatec) and totally sent the wrong bags, so I had a clip bag with no gas filter. It felt like a pretty heavy brick on my body, and it even started leaking by the clip from all the pressure in the bag. In defense of my doctor, today I tried tucking my bag in my pants and it wasn't really that bad, until I ate food then it was a little more difficult, but only because my pants are too small for me.

Sorry for lack of updates! I am lazy.

swappin shit sacks.

If you get grossed out by poop/intestine, this blog/whole page isn't really for you.

So I'm getting dressed after playing drums and I'm about to be on my way out the door. As I'm changing I notice that my whole shitbag setup has sprung a leak and some shit has seeped from underneath the wafer onto the sticker surrounding it.
Not really the greatest pic, I'm still getting used to that camera. But hey, you see brown stuff right?...so you know something went wrong.

In the hospital the ileostomy nurse and doctor both said to change my bag about every 3 days. The bag clips onto to a wafer which is glued onto your skin. They said to change the wafer about every 7-10 days...but the best rule of thumb is: every 7-10 days, or until you realize you are covered in shit. Today was the longest run I had with a wafer, I think I was on day 8. It's hard for these things to stick on especially when/if you shower (cover the sticker with tape! blowdry after! but not too much, I melted a bag once while it was on me, and boiled my shit) or if you move around a lot.


So I took a bunch of pics today as I was changing all my stuff to try and explain how to change an ileostomy bag and wafer. First thing to do is to peel your wafer and everything off and throw it in the garbage. As you're peeling the wafer off hold your skin down, it helps. I didn't take a picture of me doing this because a) I had poop hands, b) I didn't really think to take pics for this yet and my camera was not charged. Before you pull everything off though, I would get all of the supplies you need to change the wafer ready, that way once you come out of the shower you can get right to work.


From left to right: toilet paper, anti sting barrier, adhesive remover, wafer adhesive, wafer, pen, bottle of brown stuff (benzoin compound), stoma measure, scissors.

OH! Make sure you have one of those small hospital blanket things so you dont get your bed dirty. Also I forgot to include one of the most important tools when it comes to having an ileostomy bag. If you don't know what it is you'll figure it out.

and here's the stoma uncovered...


Okay...to clear up some things:

1. Yes, that is my small intestine pulled through my skin with the outer edges folded outward and sewn down to my body. Also known as a stoma. It doesn't hurt if you touch it.

2. Yes, poop and farts come out of there. The farts kind of hiss sometimes.

3. Yes, it kind of does look like a dogs boner. (credit: James Haidacher)



The most important thing is to make sure you're relaxed whenever you get some leakage. Having poop on you is worse when you're freaking out about it. Although I was always worried since my exposed innards were about four centimeters away from my fecal spout, but hopefully when you get this surgery that's not an issue.


Once everything is off of you, you should probably shower. If you don't you're a fucking weirdo. One thing you can do before you shower is to wipe down the area with adhesive remover and start scraping off all the glue from the wafer that just came off.


Okay as you get out of the shower,keep the roll of toilet paper handy, because that thing shits without your control. They had me using gauze in the hospital, but you have to open those up individually and I feel like I'm always wasting them because I use a lot to keep everything clean. But if you use gauze and fold it up and put it on over your stoma it will absorb a lot and you can do work without having to keep stopping to clean up poop.


A good idea would be to review on how to change your bag a lot before you actually do it, that way you can do everything really quick and won't get a lot of poop on yourself. Another good idea is to not spend a shitload time taking a bunch of pictures for your internet blog.

The best time to really change this is in the morning , because most of the food you ate will already be out and you won't have a constant stream of poop or poop water coming out.


Okay so now I would get in bed, with all of my tools next to me and get to work. But first make sure something good is on tv to help pass for later when you need to wait. Your best bet is probably TBS. Seriously everything on that channel rules pretty much.

Next thing you can do is rub the anti sting barrier around the area. This is so your skin doesn't get irrateted from shit and blood sitting on it around the area. I also put benzoin compound on the area too, it also protects the skin, but it also burns a bunch when you put it on. Like serious writhing in pain and rolling around burning.




Now you need to measure your stoma to cut a hole in your wafer. You need to meaure it the first few weeks of having it out because it shrinks over time. I've kinda leveled out at around an inch and 1/8 but it was prob almost 2 inches at first. After that you trace your stoma size onto the back of a wafer with a pen, and cut the hole. The cut doesnt have to be perfectly round (I have the craft skill of an 6 year old)...but you want a tight fit when you put the wafer over your stoma, because if you have a lot of space between your stoma and the wafer then poop will just sit on your skin for days, and that burns and itches a lot. Then you have to get this powder to put on everything and then it burns next time you change it a lot too.

After you cut a hole in the wafer, peel the white sticky paper on the back of it off and put some "Stomahesive" on it. I was having problems with my wafer sticking until I used it. Let the adhesive dry and air out for a few minutes, then smack that sucker down over your stoma.



























Delicious! Once this is down you should push down on it for a few minutes. Keep in mind that if you use benzoin, this will push into your skin and will fucking burn again. But by now it's no big, I mean if you already got a shitload of intestine cut out of you, nothing really seems like that big of a deal anymore. As you can see in one of the pictures above, there is also a white sticker on the paper around the wafer, so you should peel that off and stick that down on you too.

Keep pushing down and then grab a bag and clip it down to the wafer. I usually forget to grab my bag and this step usually involes me getting up from my bed to get one. A very important thing to remember is that you should CLOSE YOUR BAG BEFORE YOU PUT IT ON. Or at least as soon as you do. I ruined a good pair of shoes doing this. (Note: If you know me, you know I didn't really "ruin" these shoes in my standards of the word, being that they are still totally functional shoes. You probably even can guess that I haven't even cleaned them that well, and I probably bragged about having dirty shoelaces to you and showed them off like some sweet trophy.)

Clip the bag down and then put pressure all around the clip by pressing down in one spot then moving clockwise or counterclockwise. Most doctor's (including mine) will tell you to put the bag vertical and tuck it into your pants. There's different companies that make different bags so some are easier than others...and most people will just wear looser clothes. But I am kinda stubborn, and I hate buying new clothes...so put mine on horizaontally and use my ostomy belt.

As you're putting pressure around the clip you should hear some "clicks" which is the clip snapping on. This is important because the bag needs to be completely snapped on. Shit, every step is important, or else we'd skip it. Okay so you're done now! Finish up Raymond or whatever's on TV, and stand up and go back to doing whatever you would be doing.

That's really all there is to it. The whole process can take anywhere between 10-30 minutes depending on how slow you are. Trying to take good pictures with good focus will make the process take about an hour and a half. I'll admit that I still make mistakes when changing my bag. Ironically, in this " how-to session", after I put my wafer down and sticky paper down, some poop leaked and I had to do everything again. I also didn't completely clip my bag down and I went out and came home later with some poop underneath my belt.
I think I was just too distracted with my camera, plus a really good episode of Seinfeld came on.

That's all for now. I started a new medicine today after a week's worth of hesitancy. It's called 6-mp, it lowers your immunity and white blood cells. I just have to get bloodwork every week for a month then every month then every three months. There's also a cancer warning on it which made me not take it for a week even though we had the prescription. But there are cancer warnings on EVERYTHING, and it's supposed to work really well with Crohn's. I read that it works especially well with people who had a hard time getting off of the steroid prednisone, or with people who weren't responding to prednisone in a flare up. Both of which I had a problem with. And most of the medical complications were in the 2-3 percent range. Plus it's only a pill a day! Just like birth control!

A pill a day isn't that bad...who the fuck would want to use one of those vaginal rings anyway.

there's something in my butt.

disclaimer: not for the weak stomachs, more for the diseased ones.


Holy shit, so I opened my toothpaste drawer and I realized that I had still left something in it from like a year before. I just never remembered to bring it back downstairs:






If you're wondering what that is, it's a marshmallow roaster. Built to be stuck into marshmallows and roasted over a campfire. Unfortunately the last time I held this marshmallow roaster, I had no intentions of sticking it in any marshmallows.

Welcome to the awful fucking world of perianal abcesses.

For those of you who don't know what an abcess is, it's like a big pus ball that grows under your skin. If left untreated for long they can get pretty big and painful. It pretty much feels like a man with big hands has pinched your skin between his thumb and forefinger as hard as he could and refuses to let go. You can get abcesses of course anywhere, but when talking about perianal ones, (use your greek etymology roots bro) we're talking about ones near your butthole.

The first time I got perianal abcesses I thought they were hemorrhoids. (Luckily, thanks to Crohn's I've now also gotten hemorrhoids and can now distinguish between huge abcesses and ragin butt blisters). All of my abcesses I've gotten were perianal, and the first time I got them I was actually on the distance track team, so this was about two years ago. Like I said, giant hands pinching your butt. Imagine running with that, not so great. Any tightening movement that contracted my perineal (gooch) muscles would kill. So coughing or squeezing the rest of my pee out hurt pretty bad.

These abcesses weren't as serious as they would later get, but they were still painful. I didn't really know exactly what hemorrhoids were either at this time, but I thought I had them. All I knew was something was in/around my butt that didn't feel great, and that felt like little bubbles. So I did what anyone would do, I squeezed the shit (literally I guess) out of them. I guess this caused some leakage because eventually they went away.

Fast forward a few months later, same problem comes up, only this time it's one bigger abcess. I try the same squeeze thing but am not as successful. I think the problem will keep going away if I keep rubbing hemorrhoid cream on it but obviously that doesn't do shit. Eventually it's to the point where I can't walk and I'm spreading my legs so they won't rub together and cause any discomfort. After a few days of sitting around and being an idiot in pain and kinda putting off the doctor, we decide to go.

We go to a regular doctor who just goes to take a look at my butt. We get a younger newer guy...he spreads my butt cheeks with my hand and I scream. He touches the area and I scream more. All he says was "I don't see anything really, it's just a little red and tender."

Okay, I understand my ass is probably hairy, like really. But holy shit dude I'm fucking dying and all you can say is "its a little tender". Wow. Anyway, that guy actually lost his job eventually so I guess it's all good.

That night I go home and get in the bath, and the pain is so bad I decide to call my brave sister in Noelle to take a look at my butthole. But realizing that my hairy ass could have been a factor in fully seeing my puss pocket, I decide to shave a little around the area. Eventually I call her in...she said something along the lines of:


"HOLY FUCKING SHIT DUDE YOU HAVE A GOLF BALL IN YOUR ASS."

Okay so now we know something's up for real and that doctor was for sure a piece of shit. We schedule something was a colon/rectal surgeon for the next day...a good ol' fashioned lancing. The rest of the night is spent by me waking up every hour from a cough or sudden movement and jumping in pain...and then proceeding to rub "Boil Ease" all over my butt.

The next day we go to the doctors, by now I'm not really sitting down on anything, more of an awkward hovering thing or sitting on my tailbone everywhere kinda like laying down.

We meet the doctor, and I tell him the situation. He says something like "okay, let's take a look and see if we can see if it's an abcess or what's going on." So I lean forward onto this table like thing and drop em and he takes a look. I remember him spreading my butt and just saying in the most serious Indian accent

"Oh. Yeah. Yes, he definitely has an abcess."

So they were going to need to lance it, by now my mom is across the room. I'm still leaning over on this table thing. And the doctor and his assistant are both getting ready to wage war on my asshole. Once again, like with the surgery, I am in so much pain I am just like "just do it."

All of a sudden, this table thing tilts 45 degrees forward and my ass is in the air pointed at their faces like a cannon. By now this thing had to be fucking huge, extremely tender, and really painful. So when I hear "okay we're going to inject a local anaesthetic," I am not stoked.

"MOTHER FUCKER OW OW OW OW FUCK".

Okay so the numb juice is in this thing that's in my butt so things can't really hurt more. Next thing I hear is something like: "alright we're going to make an incision at the top of the abcess and we will squeeze the puss out."

"FUCK FUCK SHIT MOTHERFUCKER SORRY OW FUCK SORRY."

Tears are rolling down my face. My asshole is in the air with the hands of two strangers going to town on it. I am screaming obscenities in a small office, but I still am courteous and apologize for cursing. I feel warm stuff running down my leg, lots of blood and puss. And I am punching the metal base of this table thing as hard as I fucking can. I really wish someone videotaped this shit.

Probably only like a minute later, the worst is over. The nurse then proceeds to TAPE MY BUTT CLOSED. She packs it with gauze, then tapes it from buttcheek to buttcheek. She then tells me to try to not poop for like 24 hours. Which actually wasn't that bad. I get one of those yellow cushion things to sit on for a few days.

The next day I remember taking the gauze out, and looking at it. This is also one of those times where I said "holy shit", and took a picture with my cell phone...but unfortunately this was two years ago and I go through like 3 cell phones in a year. But my friends can vouch for me, the gauze was completely drenched, from top to bottom in blood. Like, more serious than any kind of menstruation ever.

A few days later things aren't so bad and I'm feeling better and moving around. A follow up colonoscopy (butt camera) confirms that I do have Crohn's disease. Colonoscopy's aren't bad at all, they knock you out and stick a camera in your butt, and they snap a few pics. You wake up and that's it pretty much, you make air poofs out of your butt a little because they blow air in to get the camera.

Another thing to watch out for after draining an abcess is getting a fistula. Which is when a tube forms between two places and puss is draining from one place to another. I still don't really know, I think I had one for a little and it went away. Google it, fuck.

After this awful experience, abcesses came back again like a few months later. Of course, I try to handle it myself, which is where that marshmallow poker comes in. Fed up with my persisten abcesses, I throw my hands up, maybe say "mother fucker", and go upstairs into the bathroom, locked and loaded with my sick ass weapon of choice. I get a hot wash cloth and put it on the abcess to make the skin soft, and I poke it hard. No drainage or blood. I keep trying but it's not really working, then I just try to grab the abcess between my two hands and squeeze as hard as I can. This hurts a lot. But I wipe the abcess with some toilet paper and there's yellow/green stuff on it. Pus! Yum. So I get some pus out and this relieves the pain, but I'm not really trying to squeeze juice out of things in my butt every few days. So I go to the doctor and he gives me antiparasitic pills, and maybe some antibiotics too. The thing goes away in a few days and all the puss drains out.

The moral of this story is really just don't be an asshole or you'll have a throbbing one. If you think you MAY have an abcess, you should probably just go to a gastro doctor asap to take care of it...before it gets way worse. DIY stuff is only cool when it involves you not sticking stuff in your butt, you're better off leaving it up to a doctor..it's their job.


-------------

Anyway...update on my life. I went to the doctor's last week and he said he wants to meet with me in a month to talk about starting to reverse this bag. Already! Kinda bummed, there are so many more good jokes to be made. Living with this thing has become really too easy to even write about, but maybe I'll take some action shots of me doing things with the belt on.

I also went to another doctor to talk about how we're going to medicate my Crohn's from now. He recommended 6MP which is a pill you take once a day. It's anti-immunal, so it'll lower my white blood cells...but it should also reduce my chances of going into any Crohn's recurrence by 50 percent. At least that's what the doctor said.

So I'm just doing in a little more reading up on 6mp now and then we'll probably call my doctor for the prescription, I didn't want to tell him definitely right then and there because you never know!

I feel good, incision is almost closed completely, I'm eating like a champ, and my epididymitis has gone away. I will write about my adventures with epididymitis another time.

later.