The Whipple procedure recovery

After the Whipple procedure and the week of recovery in the hospital, it felt great to be home. There were some differences between recovering in the hospital and at home and I added items to the list of things I will never again take for granted.

As mentioned before, everyone experiences this procedure and recovery differently. This is how things went for me.

Finally, a proper shower

I was able to take sorta showers at the hospital. But the whole time I was there, I couldn’t properly wash my hair because I had to be careful of incisions, drains, and IVs. The last day I was there the nurse gave me a shower cap that had no rinse shampoo in it. It worked about as well as you can probably imagine. My hair felt worse after than it did before. At least we tried.

Thankfully, we bought a shower chair so I could sit and wash my hair at home. There was no way I was going to be able to lean back into the water to rinse it because my abs were still recovering from the surgery. Also, I still had zero energy so standing long enough for a shower wasn’t happening. Even with sitting, a shower took every ounce of energy I had at first. But I was finally able to wash my hair and feel semi-human again.

Getting around

I came home with a walker and quickly realized my house was not set up for it like the hospital was. We had to move some things around so I could get around, but it wasn’t too bad.

Fortunately, I felt like I wouldn’t need the walker for long. Based on how I was already getting around, I thought it was a reasonable goal to be able to go to my follow up appointment without using the walker. The appointment was only two weeks after the surgery, which meant less than a week at home to be able to not use it.

One thing that helped toward this goal was not being hooked up to an IV. Another was feeling less “sick” just by being at home — no longer in a building filled with sick people, having washed hair, and wearing my own clothes rather than the sexy peek-a-boo hospital gown.

It was a little tough, but I was able to start taking short walks throughout the house without the walker. The short walks added up and by the day before my appointment I was barely using it. When I showed up to the appointment without the walker, the doc and staff were very happy. So was I. I did need to go home and take a nap, but I achieved my goal! It was a first step in whipping the Whipple recovery and I felt like I whipped it real good.

I had my own food when I wanted it

Props to the hospital where I stayed for having pretty good food and reasonable delivery time. But there is something to be said for being able to go to your own fridge and grab a Gogurt when you want one, especially when your appetite is not great.

With not wanting to eat much, we kept small snacks on hand for whenever I felt like eating. The main things I tended to eat were Honey Nut Cheerios, pudding, and Gogurts. Yes, I was basically eating like a toddler. But at least I was eating. In the hospital, a dietitian told me calories were the main focus for me. So if ice cream was the only thing that sounded good for breakfast, then I was to eat ice cream for breakfast. I just needed to eat.

I tried to work in as much protein as possible, too, to help with recovery. At first, this mostly came from drinking Ensure. I had one a day, until they started giving me the shits as soon as I’d finish one. Later I heard from a nurse that the chocolate flavored ones have a higher tendency to do this to people. That sucked because it was the only one I liked. I have since found having one every few days does not send me running to the bathroom. Carnation Instant Breakfast has been a good alternative, but I have to remember to take Lactaid so my gut does not rebel.

Saw doctors and nurses less frequently

The home care nurses stopped by once a week instead of every few hours like the hospital staff. It was nice having them check up on me without interrupting my sleep to check my blood pressure. Even though I still had several doctor visits, they at least weren’t every day.

In addition to doctors and nurses, a couple of physical therapists stopped by in the hospital, but we didn’t do too much exercising there. The first time one stopped by the house, she had me do a lot of simple stuff. That simple stuff made very obvious to me just how much strength I had lost over the past few months. That was mentally tough to handle. I kept myself together until she left, then I sat and cried. Fortunately, I did better at later appointments and have gained back a good amount of strength. I still have a long way to go, though.

Saw my family and friends more

The week of my surgery, the hospital’s rules for visitors just changed from one at a time to two. This meant my husband and mom could both be there at the same time. However, my son still could not visit because they did not allow guests under 18 and for whatever reason they don’t let people bring their dogs for a visit. So I did not get to see my son or my dog in person for a week. And the one time a friend was going to visit I felt so horrible I had to cancel.

Being home with my entire family was awesome. And having friends stop by was great. I am one who needs my alone time, but at that point having human contact and staying connected helped me mentally not drop into total despair over the situation. Even just getting cards or texts were a huge help in this respect.

No longer taking several abilities for granted

After going through the surgery and recovery, I will no longer take for granted the ability to:

• get out of bed on my own
• go to the bathroom by myself
• wipe my own ass (seriously, the next time you wipe your own ass, say a prayer of thanks, put gratitude into the universe, or whatever your thing is, because not having this ability sucks more than you might think)
• wash my hair
• spend time with my family and friends
• take a walk outside, even a short one

The biggest is probably the ability to be alive. It’s amazing how perspective on things can shift when you’re told you have a disease with a 5-year survival rate of 10%. That is hard news to take and it sticks in the back of my mind even though I have every reason to believe I can beat it (I’m only 50, in pretty good health otherwise, and we caught it at stage 2B). So I’m thankful for every day I wake up. And even when I feel annoyed, sad, angry, or frustrated, I’m grateful that I am here to feel those things.

Next step

My next big step in this strange journey is chemo. I already have my port and treatments started a month ago. Chemo has been a whole other thing and I’ll write about that soon.

More pancreatic cancer posts:

• Getting a lung biopsy
• Cancer Possibly Has Returned
• Scanxiety
• My first Whippleversary
• One-year survivor
• Ring the bell!
• Coping with cancer
• Side quest: Pass a kidney stone
• Chemotherapy is weird
• The Whipple procedure recovery