My 1st negative experience post surgery

Hi everybody,

I'm new here and apologize if this has been asked before, but last night I had a bit of a rough night and wanted to get some ideas on what it is that was happening to me.

I had RNY surgery on November 5th, 2018. No complications during or after surgery. Since I have been home things have been going pretty well, I haven't had any issues with eating or drinking. I'm losing weight and am actually feeling pretty good. Currently I am allowed 2oz of soft/chopped food and that will increase to 3oz at the end of this month.

Yesterday at about 2pm I ate a scrambled egg and I mixed in an oz of chopped up grilled chicken nugget from chic-fil-a and a few pieces of chopped mushrooms. I didn't have anything else to eat until 6pm. I drank an 11oz can of the Pure Protein Brand Vanilla Cream protein shake. About 30 minutes or so after I drank the shake I started feeling nauseous. At one point I was sure I was going to get sick and went to the bathroom to wait it out, but never did get sick. I go back out to the living room and a little time passes, my chest starts hurting and it felt like I had something stuck in my throat. I kept wanting to burp, but couldn't. The pain in my chest got pretty intense and I wondered if it could have been gas bubbles. So my wife and I go and take a walk around the block hoping that would help and it didnt. It wasn't long after we got back that I started spitting up this white foam. Not sure what that could of been...was thinking that it was the protein shake coming back up? It didn't relieve the pain in my chest or that lump I was feeling in my throat. I usually don't panic, but I started to worry that whatever that lump was in my throat was going to cut off my air supply. Luckily it didn't get that bad, but I was getting to the point to where I wanted to go to the hospital. Finally after sitting in the bathroom for probably a good 30 minutes I threw up a couple of times and felt better almost immediately afterwards. It looked like scrambled egg and bits of mushroom that came up which I thought was odd because by the time this whole experience was over, it was well after 8pm.

So does anybody have any ideas on what happened and what I can do to avoid it. This was the furthest thing from fun. Chicken is on my approved food list and I have been eating that and drinking the brand of protein shake since I've been back home and haven't had any issues with that or eggs. Could I have just eaten too much, too fast...or could there be another problem I'm not aware of?

Sorry for the long post and gross info, but hoping somebody could give me some insight. Thanks everybody :-)

It sounds like you just ate more than you could handle. Part of what you described is what we refer to as "the foamies". I had this exact thing happen not too long after I transitioned to solids--I had some soup and then tried a scrambled egg because I still felt hungry. That was the worst. Chest pain, foamies for hours until I finally threw up. Immediately felt better.

This early out, it's very hard to judge your fullness on feeling, so make sure to measure. Even now at 5 years out, I still need to be careful of that one more bite. So, nothing to get too worried about, but be careful! As you have found out, it's not fun!

Jen

Yes definitely sounds like the foamies. I did not know about it either until it happened to me. Usually it comes from eating something too dry, too fast, not small enough bites and it gets stuck. Your body is trying to unstick it.

Yours is a little odd since you had eaten hours before... because foamies do not usually happen with liquids but somehow the food from earlier must have been stuck and the protein drink aggravated it somehow. And yes if you vomit it will relieve it.

In the beginning you have to be really careful- small bites, chew well and make sure it is moist.

Yep, what the other posters said! The foamies. It's awful, and for me, the only way to get rid of it is to throw up. I will make myself to throw up because I know otherwise it's severe discomfort. And once I expel the offending food, I am immediately better.

I think chicken breast is sort of tough on the pouch this early out. Many people ensure to only have very moist meat - either add a sauce to your chicken breast, or go with chicken thighs. At that point after RNY, I really struggled with chicken breast and sometimes it's still a challenge. Maybe stick to things like ground turkey, ground beef, flaky fish, egg salad etc for a while and try chicken again in a few weeks.

Some people struggle with eggs for the first six months or so.

The problem is, something that is fine one day is foamie-inducing the next week! So just make sure to take it easy and chew chew chew. Also, if you're out at a work event or something, don't try something new or something dry that might cause the foamies and a resulting vomit :)

It gets better - very few things bother my pouch at 5 years out. Rice and falafel are pretty much a no-go, and sometimes dry white meat chicken or turkey, but other than that, the uncertainty of that first year is all gone and my mature pouch can handle spicy peppers, most meats, and really anything!

Good luck!

eggs can be strange- they are very slidey and easy to swallow without chewing the right number of times. I had that happen on vacation with the insides of an egg white delight.

Thanks everybody for the advice and words of encouragement!! I'm glad its not something that I need to go to the ER for if and when it were to happen again. I have caught myself a couple of times getting a little too complacent because nothing too bad has happened to me yet...sneaking in a little extra food, not chewing as thoroughly as I should, or not taking a whole 30 minutes to eat like I should. It sounds weird, but in a way I'm glad that happened...a good way ti keep me in check and put me in my place. Definitely an attention getter to let me know I messed up. The only thing I didn't think of, is what happens if I have an incident at work? That's something new to think and worry about...thanks for that, lol. :p

As I was reading your post, I was nodding my head, just KNOWING where your story was going, thinking "poor guy!!!"....

MY first experience, like yours, was in a Dairy Queen bathroom. I just KNEW the bi-weekly newspaper, of our little town was going to have a headline reading "Teenaged Night Manager finds dead fat lady, in toilet, at local burger joint"...It was horrible...NOTHING prepared me for THAT...it was the CHICKEN...damn that chicken!!! And I was already 3-4 months out, at that point...

One thing I DID find, early on, was COMBINATIONS, of foods, tripped me up - like your combo of eggs/chicken/mushrooms...maybe YOUR guts don't like it yet, either

My BEST advice: NEVER EVER EVER EVER be without some PAPAYA ENZYMES. You buy them anywhere you buy vitamins. They are cheap/chewable/tasty. They will help break up whatever is "stuck", in your gut. I absolutely, positively swear by them. I am over 16 years post op, and I still get food stuck/the foamies, and my for-whatever-reason my anatomy is such that I CANNOT throw up, so I have to suffer until things can just "go down". Someone here, on OH, told me about Papaya Enzymes, probably 14 years ago, and it has literally saved my life (ok-maybe I'm being a little dramatic-but I really do swear by them!!)

Thanks for tip, I will definitely look into that. Do you take the papaya extract everyday like a vitamin/preventative? Or just when you get that feeling of nausea?

No - just when I feel something isn't "going well"

Looks like the chicken from lunch got stuck, and after you drink that drink, it could not pass the stoma. And it was sitting there... Chicken is often very difficult to digest after RNY.