Ulcerative Colitus (UC) is a very serious inflammation of the colon and digestive system. Its massively suppresses ones appetite. And last, when it is very bad, it is very difficult to control ones bowel movements.... you literally need to go to pass stool (have a shit!) within a matter of seconds, only to get to the bathroom and nothing comes out.
If you have it for an extended period of time (as mentioned, it comes and goes), then because your appetite is so suppressed, you rapidly lose lots of weight but conversely get a very bloated stomach due to the inflammation of the colon and intestines. And last, over a period of time, if it gets REALLY BAD, it can lead to the most heinous of abdominal pain.
Medical science has no idea yet where this condition/illness comes from. And BTW, its not a 'disease' as some have mentioned nor is it any form of ‘cancer’.
I was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitus aged 30. It came from nowhere ... I'd never been ill before or since, neither was there any hereditary patterns ... my doctors could not diagnose why I got it. I went through all the symptoms I mentioned above, including abdominal pain at the end that was so bad, I fainted.
Luckily I was with my parents in London, they knew about the condition (I was having a very bad 2 weeks of the condition, been off work for that period and moved into my parents house to be tended after). My parents immediately called 999 and an ambulance quickly took me to hospital.
The doctors diagnosed very serious bout of UC but concluded that they could get me better through medicinal chemistry. So I was fed 25 pills of various sorts a day .... for 6 weeks! The abdominal pain was so bad, I was also given 3 shots of 'pethidin' a day for that duration too. For an indication as to how strong a painkiller this is, or give an indication of the abdominal pain levels felt during very bad periods of UC, pregnant women are given one shot of pethidin during birth to ease their pain.
6 weeks into my ‘chemistry’ treatment (I was in hospital all this time), I had lost about 30% of my body weight. Then one day, the doctor came in with very bad news. the abdominal pains were even stronger than what pethidine could mask and I had an ‘Ethiopian’ bloated stomach. My doctor told me this was because part of my lower colon basically looked ‘like a tea bag’ …. And there was a 70% chance it would burst within the next 48 hours. If it burst, there was a 70% chance that the toxins would be so strong that I would die (nearly fecal matter scattered all inside ones abdomen). The math was easy, 49% chance of dying within next 48 hours.
I asked what solutions there were and they said there was an operation available and that it would ‘cure’ the condition but it was a lengthy 2 stage process and had some risks and was major surgery…. But really I had no choice so I agreed, I assumed the operation would be the next day but they said my condition was so bad they had to operate in the next 5 hours!
Those were some of the most intense, crazy, scary, loving and intimate hours of my life as I genuinely stared ‘death in the face’ …. I was so ill and lost so much ‘health’ due to so much medicine, drugs and very bad UC that the doctors secretly told my mother that they were unsure if my body could ‘take the major surgery’. They told her I had a 40% chance of coming through. But as I said, its not as though I had a choice!
When I woke up post surgery, I genuinely understood what it means to have been ‘hit by a bus’ …. I felt ‘smashed by a club’ all over my body and had 9 pipes coming out of various orifices, holes and parts of my body!!! The operation involved a vertical incision, some 15 inches long from just above the pubic bone all the way up to the middle of my chest (about 3 inches below upper chest). Once they had cut me open, they had cut out the infected part of the colon and also some of my lower intestines. About 8 inches in total.
They had then ‘stitched’ the two loose ends of my colon together again. However, because that stitching needed time to heal and the join become strong, they also pulled a healthy upper part of my working colon through a smaller incision on my lower right tummy and put a small incision in that …. which effectively became my anal passage whilst the stiching of my inner colon healed …. and so I also had to wear a colostomy bag.
The colostomy bag was as psychologically challenging as it was a physical adjustment. There was about a 20% chance that the ‘stitched up’ colon would not heal properly and that would mean wearing a colostomy bag for life.
However, given what I had been through, that was the least of my concerns. Now I had to get myself physically and mentally fit again …. for exactly the same operation 4 months later: stage 2 of the process involved them opening you up again in exactly the same manner to check if the necessary healing had taken place, and if so, for them to turn your normal digestive system ‘back on’.
I managed to do this, it’s my life’s greatest achievement, and I was happy to go in for round 2. The 2nd op was much easier, though exactly the same process, because a) I was not a sick, chemically overdosed cabbage b) Psychologically, I knew what was going to happen c) I knew what it would feel like when I woke up.
Of course when I woke up after surgery the 2nd time around, it was 5 times easier than the first time, for all the reasons I just mentioned and they also took away the colostomy bag. SO I was ‘back in order … though had lost 40% of my previous body weight.
In total, I was off work for about 7 months. But in reality, it took me about 5 extra months to get my ‘fitness’ back (ie have the stamina to complete a mentally demanding office job which involved lots of travel) as well as recover a lot of lost self confidence.
But the good news was that my life was completely back to the way it used to be within a year of when I fainted with abdominal pain: I had no dietary constraints, I could play sport like I used to and after abit of time, could carry on perfectly fine with my career and previous social life. The only changes that I needed to make was I would need the bathroom 3 times a day instead of just the once a day before (But I had full control over my bowel movements, unlike before) …. and I have to drink 3 glasses of water a day …. A very small price to pay.
That was 8 years ago. Now I’m completely fine, I have no mental of physiological issues and have forgotten about the ordeal except when I see my abdominal scar.
So in answer to some posters questions, yes there is a cure …. But it’s a long process. Given what we know about Fletcher, I think he went through all my early issues last season but his UC could not be managed …. So it sounds like he has probably just had surgery no 1 and will now have the 4 month wait for surgery no 2.
If all ends successfully, there is absolutely no reason why he cant carry on with his career as a top athlete, the surgery process I went through has not physiological side effects that would impact him as a footballer. It will just take him time after surgery 2 to put on all the weight he lost, to turn a lot of that back into muscle matter and then for him to get ‘match fit.
Being optimistic, if all goes well, he should be back for the beginning of next season.
дури и САФ еднаш на пресконференција го ребраше кога новинарите го прашаа дали знае дека Еванс планира да ја побара девојка му за жена 
