Petersen's Hernia

Hi folks. It's been for-EVER since I was last here. I've been thinking of checking in for a while. In June I got to the point where I didn't want to eat. I didn't want to lose weight but eating just seemed so "yuck". Food would grow fuzzy in the fridge while I stared at it and wouldn't eat it. I was, at the start of summer, about 45 pounds heavier than my optimum weight. But I was completely un-motivated to lose weight in addition to eating. One of the deterrants to eating was that I was never "comfortable" when eating.

I had thought to come here to share my new weird experience, but it was so nebulous I never quite did. 

I started to lose weight. 40 pounds between June 1 and October 12. Then on October 12, the discomfort turned to pain. When the pain wouldn't stop I decided to lie down....but that took bad pain into screaming-at-the-top-of-my-lungs-worst-pain-in-my-life territory. 

Hubby drove me to the hospital (I worried that an ambulance would make me lie down and put me into solid agony for the 30 minute drive to the hospital).... and due to the whole "screaming at the top of my lungs" they did see me quite quickly. 

A CAT scan gave the verdict -- petersen's Hernia. With no bariatric surgeons anywhere local, they life-flighted me 150 miles to the nearest bariatric surgeon who could see me (my former bariatric surgeon was more than 1000 miles away).... and that surgeon vetoed most of the pre-op tests -- he said "There are no results from these tests that would stop us from going into surgery, because if we don't go in, you're going to die".... and he basically said "even if you do go in to surgery, there are no guarantees... you might come out of surgery with no functional intestines or future" 

So I went under. 

And I lucked out. Doc said that my intestines were all swollen about 5 times their normal diameter, had no color and looked dead weeping a type of lymph called chyle. Doc said that if there had been even a 12 hour delay, I would not have survived. 

This isn't to scare newbies... I'm 8 1/2 years out from RNY, but I think it's important to pay attention to pain and changes in appetite and eating habits. 

I had surgery to repair this type of hernia a few months ago.  The pain was wicked evil.  Have been feeling much better since.  I am so glad you are recovering well!

~E

Hey!  Sorry to hear you had this horrible problem, but it's really good to see you 

I dealt with that...  mine was diagnosed before it got that bad.... and i had surgery. 

watch for the hernia - it can open again (mine did) so I had to have another surgery a year later to fix it again.

Hey, good to hear from you. Yeah, I did ask the doc how likely it was to come back, he said it can come back. My bottom line is to never ignore abdominal pain ever again. 

Part of the reason I'd ignored it was the multiple times it ended up being constipation, and the one time I'm sure I did have a Petersen's Hernia acting up, but I was treated like garbage, the nnurse coming up to where I was screaming in agony and scratching my arm to get my attention to tell me to shut up as I was scaring people, followed by some aide deciding I was there to get drugs, so administering an IV with as much cruelty as you can imagine, and ultimately having them send me home with "take two tylenol and call if it doesn't get better" .... that made me want to never go back to the doctor. 

But now I will. I have been scared straight! 

So sorry you had to deal with that.. I know you had your own issues postop RNY. 

I don't go to ER unless my bariatric doc calls first and tells me where to go. 

So sorry you experienced this.  Was the discomfort/pain in one area - right upper abdomen, left lower abdomen, etc. ??

Were you just disinterested in food, did it nauseate you, could you drink liquid protein??

I'm having some issues at 7 1/2 years out and they are diagnosing pancreatitis.  I'm not losing weight, but I do drink liquid protein if I'm not feeling well - it makes me nauseated but stays down.

Glad to hear from you -

Penny

Hey, the general discomfort was just that eating made me feel "icky" but the specific pain leading to the ER was really all over. When I lay on my back to probe my abdomen, each breath felt like it was lighting up in brilliant pain flares a runway down the center of my abdomen. So the pain was everywhere. Since eating just didn't interest me, I did return to protein shakes about three days before the whole thing went acute. 

The only nausea I had was when the pain became super-acute.

LL, I'm sorry you had this. It sounds just horrid.

It's good to see you back.

I'm glad you are on the other side. That sounds like quite a trauma.

Good to see you though.

Were you too sick to enjoy the airlift? I always thought that looked like fun but if you are the patient you have to be half dead..so maybe not so much fun.

Come tell us stories when you have time.