My Dad's Surgery/Recovery

So I mentioned earlier that my dad is in the process of fatting himself to death.  I don't think that a lot of people, because of the obesity epidemic in the US, tend to realize how dangerous weight-related medical complications can be.  Most fat is actually stored between your organs, not in an external place where it's super noticeable.  This means that the organs are under more pressure than they would be in a non-obese body.


Everyone seems to realize that having that kind of pressure on your veins is awful; pretty much everyone in the US can tell you what their blood pressure is and where it falls on a health scale.  But it's been a real shock to me, since dad came out of surgery, how few people can apply that principle to their organs at large.

Basically with him, the pressure on his organs, combined with a virtually fiber free diet (like most Americans) to cause a series of ruptures through his digestive tract.  Because the tissue lining his tract was so overworked, it had been worn too thin to immediately correct.  If they had stitched the ruptures back together, there was an extremely high chance that the new intestines wouldn't be able to handle the hostile environment, and would just break open again.  Therefore the doctors elected to give him a colostomy bag, allowing his digestive process to completely avoid the ruptured areas.  He HATES that bag.

Also, because of all the infection, the doctors had to make a series of incisions to let that all drain out of him.  And he'll be in IV and oral antibiotics for at least six months, in an attempt to get that under control.  When he came out of surgery, my mom sent me a pic of him with NO CONTEXT WHATSOEVER with just the caption "show this to your brother".

So that was great of her.  Looks like some fucking horror movie shit, right?  Those incisions go all the way past that subcuanious layer down to the infection, which has to drain out of him before he'll be a candidate for surgery.  Now that he's home he pretty much just has to change the dressings, take his meds, and go back to Lexington once a week to check in with his surgeons.

Fun times.