Struggling Mightily

[If you’re uncomfortable knowing too much about someone else’s bodily functions, please feel free to skip this post.]

So in my last post I talked about starting the PARP inhibitor. Everything was going along reasonably well.  But after awhile I began to notice irregularities in my, ahem, regularity.

And then I got in an argument with my cat, and he bit me pretty good, and it got infected, so I started a pretty strong antibiotic.

Well, the result, I think, of the combination of the two drugs, has been pretty traumatic constipation, even fecal impaction. I won’t go in to all the TMI (too much information) details (maybe I’m too late already). But I thought it should be put out there that constipation is a side effect of Rubraca.

I have NEVER experienced anything like this and it’s utterly miserable.

I’ve been to Urgent Care, the ER, a colonic hydrotherapist, taking a lot of magnesium salts baths, been taking stool softeners, laxatives, doing enemas, drinking teas with castor oil, doing castor oil heat packs on my belly, not eating solid food for a number of days now, and generally hobbling around like an old person because it hurts like h*ll. An option I’m trying to avoid is a colonoscopy where they go in and manually take the poop out, because there’s a risk of bowel perforation. But man, I don’t know how much more of this I can take. At what point is it worth that risk?

The colonic hydrotherapist, Matta, from Iceland, sees this reasonably often, but even she was saying by the end of our session yesterday that I was really blocked. It feels like a little piece of concrete in the vicinity of the hepatic flexure of my colon.

Colonic hydrotherapy basically just flows lots of warm water up into and throughout the whole colon, which is a lot more deep and effective than an enema. It costs a lot more than an enema, but if it will save me from this, it will be worth it. Thanks to my partner for helping me cover the cost this time.

Various docs early on asked about my appendix, but I no longer have it due to the cancer debulking surgery, so it’s not that.

It’s just stuck poop.

So if you can send me pooping thoughts, prayers, and energy, it would be greatly appreciated!

UPDATE: Went to see Tim the rolfer, and man, is he gifted. It doesn’t feel at the time that he is doing anything but after an hour I was in a lot less pain. He was working to get the digestive system back online. I told him afterward that it had felt like the whole thing had just gone offline, and he said, “Yes! That’s a good way to describe it.” But on the way home I was feeling more gurgling and movement, and glory be, had a small poop when I got home. Maybe we’re getting somewhere now!