G-Mans Bag for Life

Everyone thinks because I have a stoma they presume i can look after it myself.   For me this is not the case,,  over the years i have been called lazy or not accepting what i have and ignoring what i have. If i could change my bag i would, there's nothing worse than asking my mum that i need my bag changing.    The same goes whenever i am in hospital.   Its one of the hardest to things to ask, as i feel so embarrassed and ashamed. You may ask why i can't change it myself,,,  well when i was a young child i had surgery on my spine which they fused and this has restricted my neck movement from looking down at the area. When i reached my mid teens, i asked if i could try and learn how to manage it,  at this point I still had a colostomy so the bag was being changed twice a day. Using 2 mirrors i tried my hardest and i was getting frustrated each time and after weeks of trying I gave up. Once i reached my 20s i finally had my first stoma nurse...

On 30 January 1972 I arrived into the world as a full term baby, but no-one could have expected what happened next. I weighed in at only 1 lb and on full examination the doctors noticed I was born with no opening of the back passage. I had a imperforate anus. Over 30 years later I had access to my hospital notes from the day I was born and the doctor wrote in them said “I have been presented with this freak looking baby.”  As you can imagine reading this I found it very upsetting, thankfully those words would not be said these days. I was rushed off to another hospital without my mum even getting the chance to see me.  My parents were told the chances of me surviving the night was extremely low as I needed urgent surgery to form a colostomy. So at just over an hour old I had the colostomy and was in ICU for many months. As the months passed I slowly gained weight and eventually was allowed home. Back in those days there was no stoma bags for babies and I was told ...