- Hello again, it me.
It's another video.
I said I didn't know when I was gonna make another video,
but recovering at home and like kind of wanting to get back
to work means that I'm on top of my emails,
and I'm gonna make videos.
So there's that.
I don't quite have the mental brain power
to do videos that involve research and scripting.
So we're gonna do a Q&A.
We're also doing a Q&A,
because you guys have a lot of questions.
Thank you so much for all of your love and support.
There are lots and lots of questions,
and I want to answer as many of them as possible,
so this is probably going to be another hella-long video.
So just gonna get into it.
I asked on Twitter for your questions
using hashtag ash Hannah.
Let's do this.
Emily asked,
any books or films you're highly anticipating this year?
I still need to watch most
of the like Oscar Bafta nomed films.
I do feel up for going to cinema if I Uber there and back.
I'm very excited about seeing Lady Bird.
And I'm also really excited for Black Panther.
In terms of books,
I am super excited for The Surface Breaks,
which is Louse O'Neill's feminist retelling
of The Little Mermaid.
And also, my friend Holly Bourne,
her debut adult novel is coming out this year.
It's called How Do You Like Me Now?
And I'm very excited to read that.
Naomi asked, how on Earth does a stoma work?
As a non-medical professional,
I'm going to try and answer this the best I can.
Basically, the stoma is the end of my small intestine.
People who have a colon,
your small intestine is attached to your large intestine,
which is attached to your rectum, and then poo comes out.
I don't have a large intestine,
so the end of my small intestine sticks out of my stomach.
It is bright red and kinda moist and fleshy.
Basically, all of my food waste goes
through my small intestine, and then comes out the stoma.
That's how it works.
Nicole asks, how often does your stoma need changing?
At the moment, I'm changing my stoma bag every other day.
But once I have my stitches out
and the bit where the skin attaches to the stoma,
once that's all healed,
I feel like I might be able to do it like every three days.
That's like changing the whole bag.
But in terms of emptying it,
they say you have to empty it like four to six times a day.
I haven't really been counting how often I've been doing it,
but I do have to set an alarm in the middle
of the night for like three, four in the morning,
because I have to empty it in the night as well.
Naturally, there were a lot of questions about sex.
How that works,
and also how a stoma works with potential pregnancy
and things like that.
In theory, having the stoma makes no difference.
The only thing that I'm anticipating would be weird
is the fact that the top half of the bag
is like stuck with stickiness to my tummy.
But then the bottom half of the bag is like flappy.
You can like fold it up and velcro it up to make it smaller,
which is I think is a thing
that people would do for sexy times.
Also, you can get things online.
They're kind of like binders,
but they go around your tummy,
so it basically just holds the bag down.
And I guess that just stops it flapping around.
In terms of pregnancy,
I read that there is like some small amount of evidence
that it can affect your fertility, but generally doesn't.
The only thing that they say is quite likely
is that I would have to opt in for a Caesarean.
Are there any activities or sports
that you won't be able to do now with a stoma?
Obviously right now, I can't do any of them.
But once I'm fully recovered,
there is nothing really stopping me
from just living the same life that I lived before.
Actually, in terms of exercise,
it is especially important that I do lots of core exercises.
The fact that there is some of my insides on the outside,
that is a weakness.
It means that I am at higher risk
of getting things like hernias.
In order to avoid hernias, you want a stronger core.
Jenna asks, do I miss pooing?
Weirdly, I'm kind of indifferent.
When I was in hospital,
I was having like phantom needing to poo,
needing to fart out my bum feelings.
I haven't had them since I've been home.
Jim asks, does this mean I don't have colitis now?
I'm not sure about the technicality.
But in theory, no colon, no colitis.
Colitis is only in your large intestine,
and I had my whole large intestine removed.
In a similar vain, Samantha asked,
is it possible to get another flare up?
If you did,
would that mean it was then Crohn's rather than UC?
If I did get another flare up
anywhere between my throat and my small intestine,
yes, that could mean it was Crohn's.
But the histology report and all of the tests and stuff
that they did on my colon showed
that it was ulcerative colitis and not Crohn's.
But one thing that they said can happen,
is that I can still get inflammation in my rectum.
If I do, then there's treatment.
Lots of you guys were asking about food and drink.
Katy and Zoey asked about any foods that I'm craving
or that I'm going to miss that I can't eat
for awhile with the stoma.
And also, can I eat chocolate yet?
Yes, I can eat chocolate,
but I can't have chocolate that's got fruit and nuts in it.
But I never liked that anyway.
If this was to happen to anyone,
it's good that it happened to me,
because this is kinda my ideal diet,
and I don't miss vegetables.
What I do miss is like the kinds of foods that I can't eat,
because they have those vegetables in them.
I would love to be able to have like fajitas,
but I would have to like take the peppers out,
and I wouldn't be able to have lettuce.
It's just not as exciting.
Megan asked, was there any particular food
you craved super bad but couldn't have
whilst I was in hospital?
Whilst I was in hospital, and I wasn't allowed to eat,
but mentally I had this huge appetite,
I made a list of all of the foods I wanted to eat.
Burgers, and in brackets it says
Five Guys, Shake Shack, and Byron.
I still haven't had any of them.
I wrote down cheese and onion crisps,
jammie dodgers, Wahaca.
I want chips and salsa.
Wagamama, loaded fries,
so basically chips with cheese and bacon.
And then Penguin chocolate bar.
We've got Penguin chocolate bars in the house.
I've eaten many of them.
I love 'em.
Maria asks, can you still drink?
I can still drink,
but I haven't 'cause I'm too scared.
And also, I don't really feel like it.
The thing about alcohol,
your large intestine is where you absorb water from.
So I have to be really careful about not getting dehydrated,
and alcohol dehydrates you a lot.
I just have to be super careful when I'm drinking
to make sure that I'm getting enough water as well.
Also, I should probably avoid beer and fizzy fizzy drinks,
because of the gas, and the wind,
and it blowing up the bag.
Maybe I'm gonna become a wine drinker.
And then the other reason why I'm a bit too scared
to drink right now is because I am extremely underweight,
and I haven't drunk anything in about two months.
So if I have just like one glass of wine,
I'll probably be pissed.
Daisy asks, can I have baths or go swimming?
I can't right now,
because I can't submerge myself in water
whilst the wound is healing.
But once I'm fully recovered, then yes,
I can have baths and I can go swimming.
The stoma bags are water proof,
but also you can get covers for them.
Before you were fully set on getting your colon removed,
what was your biggest worry about life with the stoma?
It's hard to say.
I think the main thing that I was worried about,
or not looking forward to, and now having experienced it,
I'm like yeah that's frustrating,
is the having to get up in the middle
of the night every night to empty the bag.
A few nights now,
I've naturally woken up before my alarm's gone off.
But it's still just frustrating,
because you have to get out of bed.
Of all of the things,
that to be the one thing that I'm frustrated at,
is kind of like low stakes.
Abby asks, any more book recommendations?
I haven't been reading,
but I will recommend February's Banging Book Club book,
She of the Mountains by Vivek Shraya.
I think it's kind of like a poetry book.
In the beginning, there is no he, there is no she.
Two cells make up one cell.
This is the mathematics behind creation.
One plus one makes one.
Life begets life.
We are the period to a sentence, the effect to a cause.
Always belonging to someone.
We are never our own.
This is why we are so lonely.
Wow.
Poetry doesn't agree with me,
so we'll see how I fare with this.
I'm actually gonna read along this month.
Sorry I missed last month.
So also had a bunch of questions about farts,
and wind, and how that works.
So yes, I fart out my stoma.
She does make a noise.
This is one of the reasons why I called her Mona.
Because at the beginning, she was loud.
But now it's more like I might be the only person
that can hear it.
I don't know.
But it's like a pu pu.
I can kind of feel it sometimes.
But if I do get gassy, the stoma bag fills with air
and kinda blows up a bit like a balloon,
and you have to like burp the bag.
But usually I just do that when I empty it.
But I don't fart out my bum.
The other thing about farting is that
when you fart out your bum, you can feel it coming along,
and you can try and like stop yourself from farting,
like if you're in public.
Out the stoma, I have zero control.
She'll just do her thing.
I have no say in the matter.
Alex asks, how have you managed
to keep your self-confidence up
and stay so positive during these times.
I don't know.
But also, I haven't been super positive the whole time.
I've been mostly positive post-surgery.
Pre-surgery was a horrific time,
and I was too ill to either be positive or negative.
Like I see that period as like a period of depression,
where like all of the emotions are just squash.
Post-surgery for me,
it has been relatively easy to be positive.
And everything since surgery
has just been little improvements.
Naturally, I'm just like, this is better than being ill,
so I'm positive about this experience.
And then also, I'm very lucky
that I'm naturally quite a confident person anyway.
I think I'm just so happy because I'm just not ill anymore.
Sammy asked,
are you still considering going into higher education?
Yes.
So before all of this happened,
I was thinking about doing a masters
in gender and sexuality, something around that area.
And actually I was planning over Christmas
to start my applications.
In theory,
I would still like to start one this year, September 2018.
But there is big work projects
that I would have to finish first.
And obviously now because of being ill and surgery,
I'm kind of two months behind.
So we'll see.
I think I can do it.
But I also wanna manage my expectations.
Speaking of big work projects,
a lot of you asked if I'm writing another book.
Not right now, but I'm planning on it.
And I do have an idea of what it's going to be,
but I'm not gonna tell ya.
Karolina asked, have you ever though about writing a novel?
Yes, I attempted NaNoWriMo last year.
I failed at that.
But it was good fun.
Writing a novel is hard.
But that was good practise.
Did you and Dan move into your flat yet?
No, not yet.
And thank God, because I would not be able to lift things.
We are going to be moving around the end of March.
So I should be well enough to build Ikea furniture by then,
which I'm very excited about.
So because in the last video I mentioned
that I didn't get to celebrate Christmas and New Years,
a few of you asked when I'm gonna celebrate them.
And I have a plan.
So because we're moving into the flat end of March,
it'll probably take us awhile
to fully furnish the whole place.
But once it's done, we'll have a big house-warming party,
and I'm thinking about
making the house-warming party
Christmas and New Years themed.
'Cause why not?
How do you know when you need to go for a number two?
Is it still the same?
It is not the same at all.
I never feel like I need to go for a poo.
Mona just empties herself, and I can't really feel it.
And then I will be like, oh the bag's kind of full.
Or I'll be like I need a wee.
And then whilst I'm weeing, I'll be like,
might as well empty it whilst I'm here.
But no, I never feel like I need to poo.
Amy asks, how do you deal with the unpredictability,
impending doom, yeah, of UC?
Struggling with this aspect even after three years.
That's a weird one, because before this flare up,
I had been symptomless for 10 years.
My last flare up was when I was 15.
And so for 10 years,
I've just been a healthy person who takes medication,
and every six months goes to the hospital
for an outpatient's appointment,
and goes yep, I'm feeling great.
So because it'd been so long, I never worried about it.
It just was so in the back of my head.
Like I never even thought about the fact
that I could potentially get ill again.
It was just so not even on my radar.
But whilst I was ill,
and we started having the first conversations about surgery,
one of the things that we were weighing up was,
why not just bite the bullet and have surgery?
Because even if the medication works and I get better,
I then might just be living with all of this anxiety
and dread about when the next flare up is going to be.
Will it be another 10 years,
or will it be 10 months, or one year?
Or will it be 20 years?
I guess it depends like how your UC affects you,
like how often you have flare ups and things like that.
I feel like a weight off my shoulders,
and I feel so good that I'm like,
oh, I don't have to worry about having a flare up.
And once I've finished all of the meds
that I'm currently on for post-surgery,
I'm like not gonna be on any medication anymore.
That's insane to me.
I thought I was gonna be on medication
for the rest of my life.
Okay.
There's been a bunch of questions
about the coil and periods.
So, gonna talk about this for a bit.
First of all, people have been asking
how I've dealt with having periods in hospital,
or if my flare up affected my menstrual cycle.
When I was a teenager, every time I had a flare up,
my periods would stop.
It was like my body just couldn't deal.
And the same thing has happened again.
But for the first month after having the coil,
I was spotting every day.
And then basically the spotting stopped.
And one of the side effects of the Mirena coil
is lighter periods or just no periods at all.
So probably a mixture of the two.
I'm very happy that I've not been having periods,
because oh my God, having to deal with that
and hospital at the same time, horrendous, no thank you.
I'm not really expecting my periods to come back,
because I'm assuming that part of that
is also to do with having the coil in.
And then the other questions
that have come up about the coil was,
do I think that the coil may have caused my flare up?
Yes, I do think that.
But I can't say for sure, because I asked all the doctors.
Apparently there is no evidence to say that the Mirena coil,
hormones, contraception, having something put
into your uterus would cause a flare up
of ulcerative colitis.
Getting the coil and that causing a flare up
is the best answer I have to why I flared up
for the first time after 10 years.
But there is no medical scientific evidence
that that is true.
So whatcha gonna do?
I've also had a bunch of questions about body image
and body positivity in relation
to having the stoma and the stoma bag,
but also having lost weight.
In terms of the stoma, it's hard, because it looks weird.
Like, it's just strange.
But I know being proud of it and very actively kind of like
showing it off is gonna help me
and hopefully help other people as well.
I definitely see it as that like fake it
until you make it thing.
If I post pictures of me and the stoma bag
and shout about how I still love my body,
then I know that I will be.
And I do feel that way.
Like I do feel good about it.
But I still recognise that it's like different
and gonna take some getting used to.
In terms of the weight loss,
I really don't like how my body looks right now,
but it's unhealthy.
It's not a healthy body.
For me, I wanna get in a place with my body
where my body is healthy, and strong, and fit,
and mobile, and works again.
I don't particularly care what it looks like.
Whether I'm the same size as I was before,
a bit heavier, a bit lighter.
I'm trying to be as body positive as I can in here
and then also publicly.
But as you can imagine, there's gonna be ups and downs.
Craig asks, is your stoma a permanent thing?
Mine is technically not permanent,
which means that I can get it reversed if I want to.
That would involve another surgery called pouch surgery,
where they reconnect your small intestine to your rectum
and create a pouch inside.
And then it means that I would poo out my bum again.
I am in absolutely no rush to have surgery again.
There is no rush for me to decide
whether or not I want that surgery.
I could decide by the end of this year
that I want it reversed.
I could decide that I want the stoma
for the rest of my life.
For now, I'm just gonna live life
with the stoma and see how that suits me.
And finally, I had a bunch of questions
about what I'm most looking forward to in 2018 and my goals.
Main thing I'm looking forward to,
moving into the flat that I bought.
I'm so excited about that.
There's gonna be a room that is an office,
and we're gonna play lots of video games,
and start streaming on Twitch,
and it's gonna be great.
In terms of goals, new goal, fully recover.
At least write the first draught manuscript.
And then the masters thing, am I gonna do that this year?
'Cause I'm also gonna do it part-time,
which means it will take me two years.
So ideally, I would like to start this year.
Ooh.
I'm also looking forward to my birthday,
which is very soon, 19th of February by the way.
On that happy note, I'm going to end this very long Q&A.
Thank you for watching.
Please give the video a thumbs up if you enjoyed it.
I would love to hear in the comments if me talking
about this stuff is the first time
you've ever encountered stomas before,
and you're learning this all new.
Or if there are people in your life
or someone in your life that has one,
and you already know about it.
Also, are you someone with one?
Don't forget to subscribe,
because again, who knows when my next video will be.
Maybe it will be next week,
because I've just got lots of time at home to film.
If you do want more stoma related videos,
let me know in the comments what kind of stuff
you'd be interested in seeing.
Maybe I'll do a what's in my stoma bag.
It's just poo.
Great.
Okay, goodbye.
(slow music)