When is everything going to stabilize?

Stomach groans and roars, shakes and rumbles. Can't seem to get ahead of the drinking sips and drinking protein shakes, and keeping it all in balance. Diarrhea. Headache. Feeling uber crappy.

This is the bottom of day 4. I am fighting to improve, but I am losing my patience. Priority is to drink but still struggling with it. Liquids do not want to go down. I'm forcing it anyhow.

is it usually after a week that things improve? I feel like a mess.

Day 6 or 7 things started to look for me and by day 14 I was mostly back to normal. Some things existed for a long time. Grumbling/Rumbling and the need to eat really slow stuck around until at least 8-10 weeks. I had this feeling of a burp being stuck that made me feel vaguely ill, that stuck around several weeks too.

Have you tried all sorts of liquids at different temps? I couldn't do water at first, so I experimented with Mio and Crystal Light until I found ones that worked. Sometime around 8 weeks I tried water again and it was fine, so that's pretty much all I drink now (except protein drinks). Some people can only do warm drinks, some room temp, some cold. I could do room temp only.

It will get better!

I am trying lots of temps with drinking, but any of them only allow two sips. Just feeling so discouraged. Just ate two tablespoons of sf yogurt. Now the stomach is making very earnest sounds. Loud. I'm glad to hear around day 14 it may be better. I hope so.

Two sips is good enough, as long as you do that every 5 minutes or so. Once the swelling goes down it will get easier. The most important thing is to NOT get dehydrated! Just do the best you can.

As for the grumbling tummy--are you taking a PPI? Even with daily Prilosec OTC, at the beginning I had terrible rumbling tummy; can't imagine how bad it would have been without it. I finally figured out the whey protein caused me excess acid and gas. I took GasX as well to combat it when it was extra gurgly. I just dealt with it until I was able to eat enough protein to stop drinking shakes.

Yes, I take a ppi every morning. I'm not sure my stomach likes whey protein that much. I'm sipping too, all day. Just having a little break after my spoons of yogurt.

Cant wait for things to improve. Maybe the mushy diet coming up after a while will help. Have to say, I was thinking of some soup today but not going to ru**** How much can you eat of soup?

At your stage, soup would have to be pureed in a blender. Once you do, treat it as a liquid like water or your protein drink. I wasn't allowed soups or yogurt until I was a week from surgery (I was clear liquids and protein shakes only for Week 1), so I can't say for sure how you will take it.

I was eating strained soup at that point. Panera's french onion was a favorite. I'd strain it and just drink the broth and it was delicious.

You just had major surgery, it'll take a while to recover from that! Your job right now is to rest, hydrate, and recover.

By the end of the second week I was feeling great. I couldn't tell you when in those 14 days things changed - it was a gradual process :) I did see a movie in the theater 8 days post-op. So that's cool.

Protein drinks count toward your liquid totals so my surgeon had me prioritize them. Also, it was much easier for me to drink those than water, which still at times doesn't feel good in my stomach. Staying hydrated will help with the headache. Start early in the morning with drinking and attack it like it's your only responsibility right now because it'll make you feel better. It'll get easier!

Sorry to hear you are going through such a difficult time. Honestly, its varies with everyone when we turn that corner.

I'm 7 weeks post op and until last week, I wasn't getting my minimum amount of fluid in consistently. It's hard. I think the first few weeks I was barely getting 4 cups in. That was the bare minimum at that stage where if I was getting under 4 I needed to contact my doctor.

Everyday does get a bit better. Sometimes that better is slower or faster for others. I didn't deal with diarrhea, or headaches, but I had horrible gas pains that even my pain killers barely masked the pain. About a week after my surgery that went away, and just dealing with the recovering from surgery.

I hope you'll feel better soon! It will get better! Take it one day at a time, I know it can be hard.

Good luck to you!