A woman who can only poo once every two months because of a bowel condition is trying to raise £30,000 for an operation.
Anna Cowling, from Dunmow, Essex, feels bloated after a single sip of water and can only eat soft foods. She also has constant nausea.
The 34-year-old police officer was diagnosed with gastroparesis – which is a chronic condition – in 2017, meaning her stomach takes longer than normal to digest food.
As well as the chronic bloating, Anna also has intense pain in her joints and has to spend most of her time sitting down or in the hospital.
The condition has got so bad that Anna has even had to leave her dream job in the control room for the Met Police. She has worked there since 2011, but recently the pain has just got too bad for her to continue.
‘It’s just impossible to do anything,’ says Anna. ‘When I’m at home I’m just constantly on the sofa, my parents have to do everything for me and I’m always at hospital.
‘I can only eat soft foods so I’ll have a yoghurt for breakfast, soup for lunch and then mashed potato for dinner but it has to be really mashed, sometimes I have to put it through a blender.
‘I have a sip of water and I’m bloated, I just feel really heavy in my stomach and I have pain on my spine. I just want to feel better.’
Anna has had bowel and digestion issues ever since she was born.
‘When was younger I would only go (to the toilet) once a week,’ she explains.
‘It was 2015 when I noticed quite a big change. I was going to the toilet once a month and I would try taking laxatives but nothing would work.
‘Then it got worse in 2017. I was getting constant pains in my abdomen and my joints and I started going to the toilet every two months. I couldn’t keep anything down.’
In 2017, Anna was diagnosed with multiple chronic illnesses including gastroparesis and Ehlers Danlos syndrome (EDS) – a rare condition affecting the connective tissue in the body.
People with EDS are also at higher risk of complications if they are put to sleep with anaesthetics during surgery, because they bleed for much longer, which makes it hard for wounds to heal.
While there is currently no cure for gastroparesis, there a few things that can be done to improve the quality of life – but the NHS don’t fund them.
One option is a gastric pacemaker, which is performed in an NHS hospital in Essex, but costs around £30,000.
The pacemaker would be fitted in the stomach and would speed up Anna’s gastric emptying, but it needs to be replaced every ten years.
The second option is a Per-oral Pyloromyotomy procedure at a specialist bowel hospital in America.
This would snip part of the end of Anna’s stomach off, allowing it to empty better, but this treatment is not available in the UK and costs around $40,000 (£30,730).
Anna has set up a GoFundMe page to try to raise the money for one of these procedures so she can start feeling better and get her life back on track.
‘I just feel like it’s never-ending, I’m always in hospital,’ says Anna. ‘Before, I could never really sit and do nothing I was always out doing something but now I just feel so ill.’
‘I loved my job it was something I always wanted to do. I would wake up and feel excited about going into work.
‘If I can get this surgery I’d love to return even if it’s just part-time.’
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source https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/24/police-officer-can-poo-every-two-months-bowel-condition-12116269/
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