Definitely invest in a mattress protector from somewhere like Dunelm Mills for around a tenner, to avoid sleeping on a map of Tasmania like I do now, as there will be the inevitable ‘accident’ or three.
They inflate the abdomen with gas so Dr Da Vinci can get to work, and all of your intestines are rearranged out of the way, thus interrupting the peristaltic action of the bowel.
It can take a day or two or four for the intestines to sort themselves out after that disruption, so the first fart is a pleasure, and the first jobby even better. If I were having the operation again, I would definitely take a stool softener such as Fibrogel just before ‘nil by mouth’. They gave me a box of Laxido when I was discharged which I didn’t need, but I think that has a similar function.
Don’t go down the pub with the leg bag discharge tap open, so you don’t have to lie to the barmaid, ‘Sorry, I’ve spilled some beer, have you got a mop?’😂
There is a phone app for kegel pelvic floor excercises which someone here recommended, which I downloaded, so worth looking up? I deleted that off my phone because as you know I had a brilliant surgeon and didn’t need to do any exercises as my continence was good, more or less from the start, barring the accident(s) mentioned above.
I can honestly say I have had more pain from a sore throat and from a broken/bruised rib than from my prostatectomy. I asked the surgeon the next day, ‘Why am I not in any pain, where’s my morphine pump?’ (Her Loveliness had one after her hysterectomy, and never having done drugs, I was quite looking forward to trying a medical grade opiate). He said: ‘That’s the benefit of minimally-invasive surgery, you can have some paracetamol if you want’.
So best of luck to your old man next week, and hopefully you can look forward to a cancer-free 2019.
Cheers, John.