Latest / Beyond the Pouch / E6: Keith Shares How He Maintains a Positive Attitude With a Stoma, Raising Awareness & His Diabetes Diagnosis

Transcript

E6: Keith Shares How He Maintains a Positive Attitude With a Stoma, Raising Awareness & His Diabetes Diagnosis · Beyond the Pouch

0:00
SPEAKER_01: Hi guys, welcome to Beyond the Pouch, a podcast series brought to you by Pelican, Eakin, and Respond with your hosts Rachel and Louise.
0:08
SPEAKER_01: Dive into the world of ostomy through open and honest conversations, including the lives of many inspirational ostomats that we're lucky enough to call our friends.
0:17
SPEAKER_01: So you can get to know them beyond the pouch.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: Welcome back for another episode of Beyond the Pouch.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: If you haven't already listened to the very first few episodes, you can head over to Spotify or YouTube and you can give them a listen or a watch.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: So we are very excited today, like majorly excited for uh the guest, Keith, who will be opening up about his stoma story and having a hidden disability alongside his keenness for raising awareness and overall having a positive mindset with a stoma.
0:53
SPEAKER_00: And let's not mention the uh drop and squat because it's what we call you, isn't it, Mr.
0:58
SPEAKER_00: Dominic?
1:00
SPEAKER_02: Good morning, ladies.
1:01
SPEAKER_02: How are we?
1:03
SPEAKER_01: I'm so pumped you're here.
1:04
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I can't.
1:05
SPEAKER_01: A bit of Welshness in the room.
1:07
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, two Welshies in the room.
1:08
SPEAKER_01: You're outnumbered.
1:09
SPEAKER_01: You are never outnumbered.
1:11
SPEAKER_02: What could go wrong?
1:12
SPEAKER_01: I'm kind of like the adopted one though.
1:14
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you are.
1:14
SPEAKER_01: You're ear enough now, isn't it?
1:15
SPEAKER_01: Adopted, Reggie.
1:16
SPEAKER_02: We do her lead paper, right?
1:20
SPEAKER_01: Oh no, we love you and we've we've known you for years now.
1:23
SPEAKER_02: We have.
1:24
SPEAKER_02: When we say we're family, we really are family.
1:27
SPEAKER_02: We are the ostomet family.
1:28
SPEAKER_00: We are running about the studio this morning there, wondering, well no sky no business.
1:33
SPEAKER_01: What is it?
1:34
SPEAKER_01: They said they need to turn the volume down because us three are in here.
1:38
SPEAKER_02: No.
1:39
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, be honoured.
1:40
SPEAKER_02: Let's be calm, shall we?
1:41
SPEAKER_00: Oh no.
1:42
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna take a sip from the mug.
1:45
SPEAKER_02: The mug.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've met you a few times, and obviously we've done I know the f one of the first times I met you face to face was uh many years ago when we did the presentation down at Swansea Rugby Stadium.
1:57
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: And listening to your wife at the time uh to obviously talk about your story before you did the presentation and how the surgery changed you and your mindset because pre-surgery.
2:12
SPEAKER_02: Oh, pre-surgery.
2:14
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
2:14
SPEAKER_02: Well, let me tell you about pre-surgery.
2:16
SPEAKER_02: Um I was so ill, I just couldn't leave the house.
2:20
SPEAKER_02: Or on top of that, I would hide away in my bedroom.
2:24
SPEAKER_02: Um say family or friends came to visit, and it's a case of you come home from work, you lay on the bed, you just don't want to see anyone.
2:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
2:33
SPEAKER_02: And then you have this amazing surgery.
2:36
SPEAKER_02: Well, I'm saying I've had this amazing surgery, and it's just whoa, it just rockets.
2:41
SPEAKER_02: Do you know what I mean?
2:42
SPEAKER_02: Everything in your life everything in my life has totally changed.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh, how was it for you though?
2:47
SPEAKER_00: Because your diagnosis was quite later on in life.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Rachel's from birth, I was, you know, my late teens.
2:55
SPEAKER_00: You were in your forties.
2:57
SPEAKER_02: I was in my forties, yeah.
2:58
SPEAKER_02: In my forties when I was diagnosed.
3:00
SPEAKER_02: At the time I was a coach driver, so I was up and down the country.
3:04
SPEAKER_02: And uh being a coach driver, when you take people places, you have a lot of time to just lay about in the bus and really snack.
3:13
SPEAKER_02: It is a snacky job, bus driving, coach driving.
3:16
SPEAKER_02: And I just thought it was down to my diet, you know.
3:19
SPEAKER_02: I was visiting the toilet a lot, and then all of a sudden there'd be blood in my poo, and then I'd start to thinking what's wrong there.
3:27
SPEAKER_02: But the main thing was because I was having so much diarrhea, I was always ended up in casualty, dehydrated.
3:34
SPEAKER_02: That was the massive thing was dehydration for me.
3:38
SPEAKER_02: And I remember um I went into a hospital and I went in for the um what they call it triage.
3:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
3:47
SPEAKER_02: And the nurse took one look at me, she said, You're just so dehydrated.
3:51
SPEAKER_02: We have to admit to.
3:53
SPEAKER_02: They admitted me, and I remember talking, the doctor was talking to me, standing outside of me, and he's like this, squeezing the bag of um saline or whatever it is they get into.
4:03
SPEAKER_02: I said, What are you doing?
4:04
SPEAKER_02: Just got to get this fluid into, said, You're so dehydrated.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: And this this is the thing, and this is what people don't necessarily realise dehydration with regards to IBD or dehydration with a stoma.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: If you get past the point of no return, you you got you start going into acute renal failure and then it's dehydration is shocking, it really is, isn't it?
4:28
SPEAKER_00: It's not pleasant.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: I mean, everything that you've got with a dehydration as well, you've got the kidney pains, the cramps, the feeling faints, dry mouth, headaches.
4:37
SPEAKER_01: How did you keep up with your fluid intake doing that kind of job?
4:40
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's not like you can pull over anytime you want to pee, is it?
4:43
SPEAKER_01: How did you how did you deal with that?
4:45
SPEAKER_02: I just carry a lot of drinks with me.
4:47
SPEAKER_02: I do it now as as a bus driver, you know.
4:49
SPEAKER_02: I carry I'd say I carry about six full bottles of uh squash and water with me in a bag with an ice pack so they they cool no matter what the weather's like.
4:59
SPEAKER_02: And I just sip on them whenever, you know, whenever I stopped at a bus stop or whenever I get out or whatever.
5:04
SPEAKER_01: Because I uh like most people who've got a bowel condition, I know the one thing is the whole phobia of going out of the house knowing you're either gonna need the toilet loads or that you've got a stomach and you're just gonna leak, or you've got a stomacher and you're worried to where you're gonna sort yourself out.
5:18
SPEAKER_01: So how did you navigate that?
5:20
SPEAKER_01: Well, with um not having Nicks or Well, with you know, if you needed the loo and you're driving a coach load of people, it's not like you can just stop and can you?
5:29
SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, I find nearest toilet.
5:31
SPEAKER_02: It's like it's like being a bus driver now.
5:33
SPEAKER_02: I'm very lucky at the moment.
5:34
SPEAKER_02: I my routes are usually between um Singleton Hospital in Swansea to Morriston Hospital.
5:41
SPEAKER_02: So in between, in the middle is a toilet in the bus station.
5:46
SPEAKER_02: Either end is a toilet.
5:47
SPEAKER_02: Ah.
5:47
SPEAKER_02: And if I need to stop, I stop.
5:49
SPEAKER_02: If you're a couple of minutes late, you can you know you make it up anyway.
5:52
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's no problem.
5:54
SPEAKER_02: Plus, there's a little tip for you.
5:56
SPEAKER_02: Every single time I pee throughout the day, I empty my bag.
6:00
SPEAKER_02: No matter what.
6:01
SPEAKER_02: I do.
6:01
SPEAKER_02: No matter what, it doesn't have to be anything in it, I'll empty my bag.
6:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
6:07
SPEAKER_02: Because that way you're constantly keeping it low.
6:11
SPEAKER_00: And that wee day that gets to the point of no return.
6:14
SPEAKER_03: Oh no, that would trigger me to hell.
6:16
SPEAKER_01: I did not do that.
6:17
SPEAKER_01: Oh, we don't or I just don't want to have to do it twice.
6:21
SPEAKER_01: That's why I do it, and I do it with Jake when I empty here.
6:24
SPEAKER_01: So I'm like, right, if you're having a wee, let's do your bag.
6:26
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if if you were in and out of hospital in in in your early 40s, why why did it take them so long to diagnose you with ulcerative colitis?
6:34
SPEAKER_02: We talk in for we talking 22 years ago.
6:38
SPEAKER_02: There wasn't a lot about um IBD around.
6:42
SPEAKER_02: There was no social media really.
6:44
SPEAKER_02: There's none of you Facebook and all that.
6:46
SPEAKER_02: When I I had my operation in 2012, uh that was really round about when social media was kicking in.
6:54
SPEAKER_02: Um I knew nothing about social media.
6:57
SPEAKER_02: As I say, there were pe there weren't people being diagnosed like there are today with IBD and having ostomy surgery.
7:05
SPEAKER_02: It wasn't much of that.
7:06
SPEAKER_02: People had stomas, they didn't hear about it.
7:09
SPEAKER_01: No.
7:09
SPEAKER_01: You know?
7:10
SPEAKER_02: You really I'll I'll give you a little um instance.
7:13
SPEAKER_02: I was on my bus once and I'd been in one of the local papers um about my ostomy, and a little old lady came on the bus, and I'm waiting for her to put a pass on, and she just looked at me and she said, I got a bag.
7:26
SPEAKER_02: And oh my god, this lady had probably never told anybody in the world.
7:29
SPEAKER_02: Instead, she is telling me on a bus full of people that she's got a bag because she'd seen me in the paper.
7:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that's the power of it, isn't it?
7:36
SPEAKER_00: That is the power of it, because you've got you've got the Welsh bag cover, haven't you?
7:42
SPEAKER_00: Because I've I've seen everyone on loose women, yeah.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
7:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it was on loose women.
7:48
SPEAKER_00: I mean, does does like having you use the two-piece, don't use it?
7:52
SPEAKER_00: I don't does that help you, like on the bus and stuff if you are isolated and there's not the toilet, because obviously we're gonna be able to do it.
7:58
SPEAKER_00: Massively, you just have the option to just take it, take the bag out.
8:02
SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, a lot of you wouldn't know what a two-piece is, but a two-piece is you have the flange on you permanently, and you just click on and off a bag, and it's so handy in so many situations because if you just feel like being fresh, go in the toilet, whip the bag off, chuck it away, put a new one on.
8:20
SPEAKER_02: So wash your hands, of course.
8:21
SPEAKER_01: How long does your flange last?
8:23
SPEAKER_01: How often do you change that?
8:24
SPEAKER_02: Well, I've just last night I came back from Cyprus and I've been keeping that flange on for about three days in the heat of Cyprus, and we're talking 28 degrees, and that flange has been no problems whatsoever.
8:36
SPEAKER_01: That would give people a lot of anxiety thinking about going on holiday somewhere hot, wondering how their stoma bag's gonna react.
8:44
SPEAKER_01: That's amazing.
8:45
SPEAKER_02: I as I say, I came back last night from Cyprus, been a week in Cyprus.
8:49
SPEAKER_02: Um, I went through the airport in Bristol, no mention of a stormer.
8:55
SPEAKER_02: They didn't ask me about stoma, they didn't ask me about my products.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: Were you were you hyped up ready for it?
9:00
SPEAKER_02: No, I no, I were just Yeah, it is what it is.
9:03
SPEAKER_02: If I've got to tell people about it, I'll tell them about it.
9:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
9:06
SPEAKER_02: And then it's just you that gets swamped.
9:09
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, just you.
9:11
SPEAKER_02: I was thinking a little bit more about it coming back through the Cyprus airport, but again, straight through.
9:16
SPEAKER_02: Not a scanner, nothing.
9:18
SPEAKER_02: Incredible.
9:19
SPEAKER_00: We're we're with traveling in different countries, obviously as ostomas and IBD and everything else.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: We travel with pain medication and stoma supplies and everything else.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: And everybody's always so worried about stoma supplies and having an allowance for stoma supplies.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, what they don't realise it's actually more difficult to get your medication through customs, especially with Greece codeine, and anything opiate-based, getting it through to Greece, it's actually illegal over there.
9:48
SPEAKER_02: Oh right.
9:48
SPEAKER_00: Um, so you have to be very careful when you go on holiday to Greece and stuff, and you have to make sure that it's all boxed.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: So don't do what I do and take it all out of the boxes and I'm being clever.
9:59
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I want to do that.
10:01
SPEAKER_00: Don't do that when you're going to Greece.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: You have to take it in the boxes, make sure that the boxes that you've got are opened and that you actually have a copy of your prescription and a covering letter with you from your GP.
10:13
SPEAKER_02: I carried all that kiss.
10:14
SPEAKER_00: I carried that.
10:16
SPEAKER_02: I carried the respond uh travel certificate, which is fantastic.
10:20
SPEAKER_02: It tells you in loads of different lounges that you've got a stoma and everything.
10:26
SPEAKER_02: Um I listed all my supplies on it.
10:29
SPEAKER_02: I took it to the doctor, I got the doctor to sign it, got it stamped.
10:32
SPEAKER_02: It's in my pocket, so any problems.
10:35
SPEAKER_01: How far in advance would you say to people?
10:38
SPEAKER_01: So I haven't been abroad since I've had my stoma, so and so I we want to take the well, it'll be kids then next time this time next year.
10:46
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, so we want to go next summer.
10:48
SPEAKER_01: So obviously, half the family, two of us, will go with a stoma.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: So I'm thinking, oh my god, two lots of stoma supplies, two lots of meds.
10:56
SPEAKER_01: Jake's got celiac, so I'm gonna have to there's an allowance for you to take um prescription food as well, which I only found about through someone's Instagram the other day, which is just madness.
11:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, how far in advance do you need to go to your doctor?
11:10
SPEAKER_01: Try and sort this out.
11:11
SPEAKER_01: How what would you guys do?
11:13
SPEAKER_02: He signed it after a few days.
11:15
SPEAKER_02: Well, actually, I took it there in the morning, the certificate.
11:18
SPEAKER_02: He signed it, then they rang me in the afternoon to come pick it back up.
11:21
SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's odd.
11:22
SPEAKER_00: And then I suppose again, it's where you live, what doctor it is, and all that.
11:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it depends.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's more so about actually doing your research and knowing what you can and can't take.
11:32
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was panicking my.
11:34
SPEAKER_00: How did you know that about Greece?
11:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh because I checked it, because I have travelled a lot, and obviously, like when I went to Egypt and like taking stuff over there back back then, because they check everything when you go through customs in Egypt.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's just about checking and knowing, and obviously, my main panic is I'm on opiates, and obviously, the opiates to control my stoma.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: And obviously, I was having a panic because I was like, well, if they take my meds off of me, I'm gonna end up in the phone.
12:01
SPEAKER_00: I know, and then always somewhere in the stuff.
12:04
SPEAKER_00: What would you do?
12:05
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I don't even want to know.
12:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's all about it's all about forward planning.
12:09
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know with like the majority of airlines that you can actually ring them up, and they will most of them will be tend to give you a five kilo to ten kilo allowance.
12:19
SPEAKER_02: I've got a wife that did all that, so No! We need Jane on your missus tea.
12:25
SPEAKER_02: She sorted everything out.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: I just had to turn up really to come over yours and sort my holiday in there.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: They will give you the allowance, and there's also you've got the lanyard as well for hidden lanyard.
12:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Um it's that's the thing though, because you do have to think about that.
12:42
SPEAKER_00: We do have to think as ostomates with regards to supplies, because do you put your supplies in your suitcase?
12:47
SPEAKER_00: Do you do half and half?
12:48
SPEAKER_00: Half and half.
12:49
SPEAKER_01: Because what happens if your suitcase goes and then anybody thinks it's in the suitcase?
12:53
SPEAKER_01: Now I'd think, right, I'm gonna cut so I don't have ready cut bags, so I use the one piece a one piece.
12:59
SPEAKER_01: So I cut them myself because my stoma is it's not.
13:02
SPEAKER_01: Do you have them pre-cut?
13:04
SPEAKER_01: No, no.
13:04
SPEAKER_01: So uh to me it it it changes.
13:07
SPEAKER_01: It I don't know, I just like to know I can cut it myself and I know that it's gonna fit.
13:11
SPEAKER_01: And since being pregnant, my stoma is like a mutant now.
13:14
SPEAKER_01: It has nearly doubled.
13:15
SPEAKER_01: And it is not it's not even an oval, I don't know what it is.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: It will though, and and and this this is the this this is the thing.
13:22
SPEAKER_00: I mean, great for those that do have their bags pre-cut and you don't have to be able to do it.
13:25
SPEAKER_01: And if it works for easy life, wouldn't it amazing?
13:29
SPEAKER_00: I know it's just a bag getting hand cramped.
13:34
SPEAKER_02: I love it, I love doing it.
13:35
SPEAKER_02: Um but I cut all my bags be um my back plates before I went away.
13:38
SPEAKER_02: Because you can't.
13:39
SPEAKER_02: Can you do that?
13:40
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I wanted to ask.
13:41
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
13:41
SPEAKER_02: Don't take your scissors on, Flynn.
13:42
SPEAKER_02: Can't take your scissors on it.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: Yes, you can.
13:45
SPEAKER_00: Can you?
13:45
SPEAKER_00: All right, can I stand corrected?
13:47
SPEAKER_00: The curved.
13:49
SPEAKER_00: And they're under a certain length, not not the entirety of the scissor, but the blade, you are allowed to take the scissors on the aeroplane.
13:59
SPEAKER_02: I've got loads of stoma products with me and back plates, and I in a week I use three back plates or so.
14:05
SPEAKER_01: Oh, see, I I I never need to change mine.
14:09
SPEAKER_01: I re I could get two days out of mine.
14:11
SPEAKER_01: I've got an oleostomy and it's very watery consistency, so I'm never gonna be one of these people that get two, two, three, four days out of it.
14:18
SPEAKER_01: But um, yeah, I still, even like years after, I still, for me and Jake, pack way more than I would ever need.
14:26
SPEAKER_01: Just it's it's that it's that's a thing, isn't it?
14:28
SPEAKER_01: Anxiety, isn't it?
14:29
SPEAKER_02: But when you think about when you think about it, right?
14:32
SPEAKER_02: You you pack all your stoma products, right?
14:34
SPEAKER_02: But when it comes to clothes and other things, whatever you've forgotten, you can just buy it.
14:40
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
14:41
SPEAKER_02: You don't have to manage about changing.
14:43
SPEAKER_02: No.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: You pack you pack all the silly shoes and then you wear the floor.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: Then you wear the same pair of flip-flops.
14:52
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, all week to work.
14:53
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
14:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know what I still get paranoid about well, which is ridiculous.
14:57
SPEAKER_01: I still pack loads of pants.
14:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
15:00
SPEAKER_01: I don't need to do that.
15:02
SPEAKER_01: It's not really necessary.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: You need enough for two a day.
15:05
SPEAKER_02: But I but I still ingrained in me that's why.
15:09
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why why you wear a one piece.
15:11
SPEAKER_02: Have you tried the two piece?
15:12
SPEAKER_01: So I did use a two-piece, um, but I found that it wasn't adhering to my skin as much as I wanted it to.
15:22
SPEAKER_01: Oh right.
15:22
SPEAKER_01: And then I think I I rung respond, had it had a chat through with someone that answered the phone.
15:28
SPEAKER_01: Who would it have been that time?
15:29
SPEAKER_01: Maybe Drew.
15:30
SPEAKER_01: Maybe Drew.
15:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
15:31
SPEAKER_01: Um and you said, Oh, if you tried a one piece, some people find that they find it better with one piece.
15:36
SPEAKER_01: Right just some people do, there's no factual evidence to show that.
15:40
SPEAKER_00: Tried it, work like a charm.
15:42
SPEAKER_00: With with the two-piece, being able to wear the base plate for longer and just having the option to switch the bag out is so much healthier for your peristomal skin because daily changing strips the skin of the skin.
15:57
SPEAKER_02: It's like um I always find when people talk about pancaking and how's never had that bananas.
16:04
SPEAKER_02: But how the people really panic about pancaking, right?
16:09
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
16:10
SPEAKER_02: Because a lot of people think that if it's all around your stoma, it's gonna get infected.
16:16
SPEAKER_02: But it can't, that's your inside.
16:17
SPEAKER_02: It's always covered in poo anyway.
16:19
SPEAKER_02: It can't get infected.
16:20
SPEAKER_02: But some people have the attitude that, oh, if if if it's pancaking, you can explain to the viewers later on what pancaking is, right?
16:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't think it's always explained.
16:30
SPEAKER_00: So the the term pancaking uh tends to be those with thicker outputs.
16:35
SPEAKER_00: The things sit up the top, but the the terms of pancaking actually tends to be is when you've got the output coming out with that much force and it's that thick, that it actually pushes, it pulls the base plate off.
16:48
SPEAKER_02: Stays at the top of the plate.
16:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it stays at the top, and because it's not sliding down, it's all backing up, which is how obviously the the base plate then gets pulled off or pushed off.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: It's like I can't eat banana if I if I eat banana, don't come near me because my bag will be off within the hour because the the the amount of fibre and the false that comes out the the false, quite literally, the false is with you.
17:12
SPEAKER_00: The false is oh my god, I ate a banana.
17:15
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna tell the rest of my story anyway.
17:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:18
SPEAKER_02: So in um 2008, I was diagnosed with ultra stiff like this.
17:24
SPEAKER_02: It took until 2008.
17:26
SPEAKER_02: And I was How old were you then?
17:28
SPEAKER_02: I was 47 then.
17:30
SPEAKER_02: I know.
17:30
SPEAKER_02: So you taught in seven, yeah, seven years or so.
17:33
SPEAKER_01: So when how long through your childhood, then like primary school age, secondary school age, were you suffering?
17:38
SPEAKER_01: Were you poorly?
17:39
SPEAKER_02: No, fine.
17:40
SPEAKER_02: I just couldn't see much because I was I needed glasses.
17:44
SPEAKER_02: But yeah, no, no, I I never suffered um through my childhood with anything like this.
17:50
SPEAKER_02: Um I've spoken to a doctor and it related around the time that I gave up smoking that I started to have problems with colitis.
18:02
SPEAKER_01: Curious, curious.
18:04
SPEAKER_01: Don't give up smoking.
18:07
SPEAKER_02: I I've given up smoking like 16 years now.
18:10
SPEAKER_02: Um absolutely fantastic.
18:13
SPEAKER_02: But around the time I give up smoking, that's when I was getting more and more ill.
18:20
SPEAKER_03: God.
18:20
SPEAKER_02: It's probably no they probably don't relate the two things.
18:24
SPEAKER_03: Well, you don't know, do you?
18:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but if anybody's um researching that type of thing, as far as I'm concerned, they're gonna be able to do that.
18:31
SPEAKER_01: I'd love to know if anyone's watching or listening to this, if that's happened to you, let us know.
18:35
SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, it's um it's in my family a lot.
18:38
SPEAKER_02: My younger sister's got very bad Crohn's, very severe Crohn shares for many years.
18:44
SPEAKER_02: My eldest son has got Crohn's.
18:47
SPEAKER_02: My young grandson has got Crohn's.
18:49
SPEAKER_02: So there's a lot of it in my family.
18:51
SPEAKER_02: I was I put myself down as the lucky one because I only had ulcerative colitis, which between the two, ulcerative colitis is far easier, I think.
19:03
SPEAKER_02: Because it's in the bowel.
19:04
SPEAKER_02: With as you all know, with Crohn's it's through the whole tract.
19:08
SPEAKER_00: But um with you see, it's the lo just the large bowel.
19:11
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you you had the stoma surgery and the protectomy in one all in one go.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: How did you deal with that?
19:19
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, when I was told I was rushed into hospital um for ten days because my bowel decided after four years of medication it wanted to try and perforate.
19:30
SPEAKER_02: So they kept me in hospital for ten days, pumping me with steroids, um, taking x-rays every single day just to check that I was okay.
19:40
SPEAKER_02: And um that was the ten days, and in that ten days I met the guy who was to be my surgeon, and he said, Your bowel's no good, it it's got to go.
19:52
SPEAKER_02: But he did give me a choice.
19:54
SPEAKER_02: He gave me a choice of um a J Powt or total colectomy.
20:00
SPEAKER_02: And I was very lucky I got to speak to two gentlemen, one had a J-Pout, and I spoke to him over the phone, and I have to say, his life was shakes, and he didn't do a lot, he didn't go and he had trouble with it, and then I spoke to the second guy who'd had a colostomy for 40 years, and he went to the pub and he worked on building sites.
20:23
SPEAKER_02: It was a no-brainer for me.
20:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
20:25
SPEAKER_02: So my thinking was um I think I could have had both operations, I could have had stoma surgery first, then the Barbie butt or the Ken butt afterwards.
20:36
SPEAKER_02: But I said, right, let's do it all in one go, one operation, one recovery, and I was back in work in six weeks.
20:42
SPEAKER_02: It was light duties, I was working in a factory, I was back in work six weeks later, and I've now been an ostomate 11 years, and I've said I've seen a stomach maybe twice, three times in the years.
20:56
SPEAKER_00: That's crazy.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: It took me it took me a year to feel completely human when I had my protect.
21:03
SPEAKER_02: Right, I put it down to my positivity, and nothing in the world is gonna beat me.
21:08
SPEAKER_00: I mean, do you feel that maybe because that was your was that your one one and only surgery?
21:17
SPEAKER_00: Because it this is the this is the thing as well, for for those that have only had the one surgery, if you were so poorly beforehand, having the surgery and feeling better, I think has a better positive impact with regards to your mental health.
21:34
SPEAKER_00: Oh massive.
21:35
SPEAKER_00: And because you're feeling so much better in yourself, things are easier.
21:39
SPEAKER_00: Whereas I think those that have had surgery, surgery, surgery, surgery, surgery, then protect me, it kind of gets to the oh my god.
21:46
SPEAKER_02: I can't imagine I really can't imagine the people like yourself who just go through surgery after surgery.
21:52
SPEAKER_02: It must be so disheartening.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: You know, it really must be so disheartening.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I it depends on the people's mindset though, doesn't it?
21:59
SPEAKER_00: I mean You're incredibly positive.
22:01
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we all love you, and every time we see you, we're like, oh hi, best friend.
22:08
SPEAKER_02: We are best friends, aren't you?
22:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but it is it is so nice to be in a room with you.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know we laugh and joke about like Mr.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: Selfie and the drop and squat and things like that because obviously we know each other that well.
22:19
SPEAKER_02: Tag him in the drop and squat.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: Um it's um being in a room with you is just makes everybody else, even if they are feeling a bit low, just smile because you're just so positive and so happy.
22:35
SPEAKER_02: And well, I've been asked many, many times on my social media why I'm so incredibly happy and why I'm so incredibly positive.
22:44
SPEAKER_02: And it always comes back to the same thing.
22:48
SPEAKER_02: I literally have lost so many people in my life through so many illnesses, not just IBD, but all ranges of illnesses, right?
22:56
SPEAKER_02: And when people turn around and they say you only get one chance in life, I'm given a second chance.
23:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
23:05
SPEAKER_02: And I just I am determined not to waste a single day.
23:11
SPEAKER_02: There's no negativity in my life, honestly.
23:13
SPEAKER_02: If negative people want to try and come into my life, they're gone.
23:17
SPEAKER_02: Right?
23:18
SPEAKER_02: There's no time for negativity or negative people.
23:21
SPEAKER_02: And you surround yourself with positive people, and it just gets bigger and better.
23:27
SPEAKER_02: It every day, every minute of every day is special.
23:30
SPEAKER_02: Don't waste it.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the other thing, because I remember talking to you about this when we were at the meetup, because I've been following you, and the cakes that he puts up on his social media that obviously pre- You need to tell the people you were a baker.
23:44
SPEAKER_02: I was a baker when I was 16.
23:46
SPEAKER_02: Actually, that is a story behind that because when I when I left school at 16, I worked in several bakeries, but after many years I developed an allergy to flour on a big scale, you know, um industrial scale.
23:58
SPEAKER_02: So it was like hay fever, and I had to leave the industry because of that.
24:02
SPEAKER_02: Um, it didn't matter.
24:03
SPEAKER_02: I went coach driving.
24:05
SPEAKER_02: I'd done many things in my life.
24:06
SPEAKER_02: I'm a qualified plumber, went back to college.
24:09
SPEAKER_00: You're a qualified plumber.
24:10
SPEAKER_02: I went back to college at 45.
24:12
SPEAKER_01: We know.
24:14
SPEAKER_01: Well, you're stuck.
24:15
SPEAKER_01: You live too far away, but uh on five.
24:17
SPEAKER_01: It's only four when I was at the road.
24:20
SPEAKER_02: I turned my hand to most things.
24:22
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
24:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh so I'm a qualified plumber.
24:25
SPEAKER_02: I'm uh a bus driver.
24:26
SPEAKER_02: May I just say an award-winning bus driver?
24:29
SPEAKER_02: Oh I did I have won two awards for bus driving.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: And you do that there is a bus where you are literally on the side of it driving round.
24:36
SPEAKER_00: And not it's not just a sticker, is it?
24:38
SPEAKER_00: Can you explain to the people?
24:40
SPEAKER_02: It's it is the whole side of the bus.
24:43
SPEAKER_02: The whole side of the bus.
24:44
SPEAKER_01: The top of your head is the top of the bus.
24:46
SPEAKER_02: I was on three buses, but they've scrapped one now, so I'm in the scrapyard somewhere.
24:51
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's just it's only two buses.
24:55
SPEAKER_02: I've got a picture of it somewhere.
24:56
SPEAKER_02: When I find it, I'll uh I'll tag you in it.
24:58
SPEAKER_02: But yeah, I was on side three buses, um, which is an incredible, um, fantastic achievement for me.
25:05
SPEAKER_02: I'm an ambassador for bus driving.
25:07
SPEAKER_02: I do my bus driving exactly the same as I I live my life.
25:11
SPEAKER_02: I'm nice to people, I don't judge people.
25:15
SPEAKER_02: You know, it makes such a difference.
25:17
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't cost anything to be nice, though.
25:18
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't.
25:19
SPEAKER_01: But that's why, you know, Pelican and Respond will have chosen you as part of being an ambassador because that's you know.
25:26
SPEAKER_02: It was uh I I have to say, when they asked me to be an ambassador a few years ago, first of all, I was really, really hyped up about it.
25:34
SPEAKER_02: And then when I saw you two and all the rest, and I thought, oh my god, I'm older than all of them.
25:40
SPEAKER_02: Can I really do this?
25:42
SPEAKER_02: Is my social media?
25:43
SPEAKER_02: It wouldn't work without you, it wouldn't be a good idea.
25:45
SPEAKER_02: And I just said to myself, yeah, of course you are, of course you're good enough to do it.
25:49
SPEAKER_02: And I've loved every second of it.
25:51
SPEAKER_02: I've been in photo shoots, I've been in get-togethers, I'm doing a podcast.
25:58
SPEAKER_02: It's just you know, I can hear my wife in my ear and I'll say, calm down, Keith, calm down.
26:03
SPEAKER_01: No, but that's why people love you because you are what you are.
26:08
SPEAKER_02: I just love everything I do, honestly.
26:10
SPEAKER_01: We need to mention Jane, don't we?
26:11
SPEAKER_02: Because my gorgeous wife, Jane.
26:13
SPEAKER_02: Mrs.
26:14
SPEAKER_02: Tears, she's affected.
26:15
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because I mean the one thing that I think is essential to recovery and going through all this type of thing is the person that stood by you.
26:24
SPEAKER_02: And you know, family, family are so important.
26:28
SPEAKER_02: Uh, when you're on your IBD journey and when you're on your stallman journey, family are so important because they get you through everything.
26:37
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, and I say my wife is just oh, I can't praise her enough.
26:42
SPEAKER_02: I really can't.
26:43
SPEAKER_02: She is one in a million, and I'd be lost older.
26:47
SPEAKER_02: And she knows it.
26:49
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
26:50
SPEAKER_02: So uh I I keep asking her, come on, goggle box me if she wants to.
26:54
SPEAKER_02: Oh, come on, Jane.
26:54
SPEAKER_02: Come on, Jane.
26:55
SPEAKER_02: Come on, goggle box me.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: If Jane doesn't, we'll do it.
26:57
SPEAKER_00: We'll all get it together.
26:58
SPEAKER_02: Oh my god, how can we?
27:00
SPEAKER_01: Brilliant would that be?
27:01
SPEAKER_01: So instead of like a celebrity one, disability episode, and we can be on a couch and dressing out.
27:11
SPEAKER_01: Oh my god, can can can the ladies in the room next door make that happen?
27:18
SPEAKER_01: How brilliant would that be?
27:20
SPEAKER_00: You got through, I think, volclitis.
27:22
SPEAKER_00: You had your surgery, bus driving.
27:26
SPEAKER_00: You was dried nose diabetic, wasn't you?
27:28
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I was.
27:29
SPEAKER_02: Uh funny enough, four months ago I was um I was shocked, you know, because I'm 62 year old.
27:35
SPEAKER_02: I did not expect after everything to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, but it was my eating habits, you know.
27:44
SPEAKER_02: Um carbs are the worst thing.
27:47
SPEAKER_02: And if we talk in potatoes, if I have a Sunday dinner, normal people would have say two potatoes, maybe one roasty.
27:55
SPEAKER_02: Oh no, no, me, four or five potatoes, half a dozen roasties, do famous potatoes.
28:01
SPEAKER_02: Oh she's a fantastic cook, my wife.
28:06
SPEAKER_02: But it's not until you start thinking about what you eat, then.
28:09
SPEAKER_02: Do you know what I mean?
28:10
SPEAKER_02: Um I go into a shop and buy a full pack of chocolate bars, I might finish them by the end of the day.
28:16
SPEAKER_02: You don't think about it.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: No.
28:18
SPEAKER_02: But that was four months ago.
28:21
SPEAKER_02: I changed my diet.
28:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh, I do a lot of walking anyway, because I raise a lot of money, and a lot of the money for charity has been through walks and things like that.
28:30
SPEAKER_02: So I try and do a lot of walking because it keeps you super fit.
28:34
SPEAKER_01: What's your total at the moment?
28:36
SPEAKER_01: Do you know how much you've raised over the years?
28:37
SPEAKER_02: I think I've raised um I started fundraising in 2016.
28:40
SPEAKER_02: I've raised about 16,000 pounds.
28:43
SPEAKER_02: I change I've raised money for about 16, 17 different charities.
28:48
SPEAKER_02: I think that's incredible.
28:49
SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
28:50
SPEAKER_02: Not just me, lots of people have helped me along the way, you know.
28:53
SPEAKER_02: People have helped me set up uh coffee mornings.
28:56
SPEAKER_02: People have come on walks with me, I've done skipping, you name it, I've tried there.
29:00
SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I still got all my other accounts which are fantastic, you know, um, helps me raise awareness, which is the main thing.
29:06
SPEAKER_02: I do my charity on it, I raise awareness, I raise awareness for hidden disabilities, as you both know.
29:12
SPEAKER_02: Uh, which is is very easy for me because a lot of it is showing myself with my shirt off.
29:19
SPEAKER_02: Woo-hoo, with my bag out, and I usually put a caption, now you see it.
29:24
SPEAKER_02: See my bag.
29:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
29:25
SPEAKER_02: And then I'm dressed up or I'm in a suit or whatever, and you see the caption, now you don't.
29:30
SPEAKER_02: Hidden disabilities are real.
29:33
SPEAKER_02: Um, people are getting judged for their hidden disabilities, you know, especially using disabled toilets.
29:39
SPEAKER_02: Oh people, as you know yourself, people are getting verbally and sometimes physically attacked for using disabled toilets.
29:47
SPEAKER_02: Whereas we all know as ostemates good old wedding services.
29:51
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we all we all know as ostomates, right, that we need the room that's in uh especially if someone has a leak.
29:59
SPEAKER_02: Oh, god, yeah, you cannot manage that.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: You can't do it in a toilet, there's no bin in there, especially just a cube, but I have to say, so obviously, with my issues now, I need to have a toilet that's higher up.
30:12
SPEAKER_00: For some unknown reason, toilets and normal cubicles are tiny and point down on the floor.
30:18
SPEAKER_00: Whereas the disabled toilets always seem to be a lot higher up and a lot easier to get on and off of.
30:24
SPEAKER_02: Well, I've just had a week's experience now because um I don't know if you know, but in Cypress you don't flush any toilet paper.
30:30
SPEAKER_00: No, it all has to go in a bag.
30:32
SPEAKER_02: All has to go in a bag and in a bin.
30:33
SPEAKER_02: It's interesting.
30:34
SPEAKER_02: Which has been um a strange week for me.
30:37
SPEAKER_02: It was nice to it was nice to get home last night and actually flush paper down the toilet.
30:41
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
30:41
SPEAKER_01: So I've got to ask everyone be asking this who haven't been like me, what must that smell like in there?
30:47
SPEAKER_02: No, you just take the bag out every day.
30:49
SPEAKER_02: It's perfume bags, you just take them out every day.
30:52
SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
30:52
SPEAKER_01: It's like perfume bags, and you just you just put it out.
30:54
SPEAKER_01: Imagine it like a nappy bin, like it's fine, but as soon as you push that lid growing, like it's it's fine until you poke the beer.
31:02
SPEAKER_01: Like don't poke the beer.
31:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that was the most interesting part of that journey.
31:08
SPEAKER_02: Um, it wasn't difficult, do you know what I mean?
31:10
SPEAKER_02: It's just retraining yourself to do something the way other people do it.
31:14
SPEAKER_02: But um, yeah, I like I like to chuck toilet paper down the toilet, which we're so lucky to be able to do.
31:22
SPEAKER_00: Um I was gonna say, so the cat amongst the pigeons.
31:26
SPEAKER_00: So everything that we do uh do as ambassadors is to raise awareness, to lift taboos.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: What are your feelings behind the thing?
31:37
SPEAKER_00: Because you were saying bag, yeah, what bag, but I always feel that that's like a double entendre caveat with regards to style of life because we're meant to be positive and raising awareness with regards to the bag.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: So why are we saying bag?
31:54
SPEAKER_00: What bag?
31:56
SPEAKER_02: Um, I think we're saying that because uh when you do bag what bag, you're usually showing your bag and then you're showing yourself where you've got a maybe a wrap on or something again and you can't see the bag.
32:09
SPEAKER_02: It's just I think it's more showing people that you can still wear normal clothes.
32:13
SPEAKER_02: I think that's more what it what it's about.
32:16
SPEAKER_01: People can take different things in different ways.
32:18
SPEAKER_01: I mean, for me, if I like for Jake, I'm thinking of my seven-year-old, he wears a waistband.
32:25
SPEAKER_01: So when he's got his clothes on, you wouldn't know and you'd be like, what bag?
32:30
SPEAKER_01: But then actually underneath he's got a lot going on and you wouldn't even know.
32:33
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
32:33
SPEAKER_01: So I mean, yeah, I mean, it can all be taken in different ways, can't it?
32:38
SPEAKER_02: It really is how we I would take it, I suppose.
32:41
SPEAKER_01: I wanted to ask you actually.
32:42
SPEAKER_01: So your confidence, yeah, especially being a man, yeah, is you know, amazing to see.
32:49
SPEAKER_01: So a lot, I think as women, we chat to each other about stuff, we moan about our bodies a lot, which we shouldn't, but we do it too much.
32:56
SPEAKER_01: Um as a man with a hidden disability, yeah.
33:01
SPEAKER_01: What advice would you give to men that are struggling with a new stoma, or even if they've had one for 10, 20 years?
33:08
SPEAKER_02: Talk to other people, talk to people, talk to people like me, talk to people like Ant, talk to people like Ostomy Jack.
33:14
SPEAKER_02: We're all men who got the same thing, and we are there to talk to.
33:19
SPEAKER_01: Did you have your confidence pre-stoma?
33:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I was pretty confident.
33:24
SPEAKER_02: I I had a fantastic um upbringing.
33:27
SPEAKER_02: My late dad was a milkman, and for 30 years he would not only have like 500 people on his round, he'd go back in the afternoon and he'd be the gardener, the roofer, uh you know, they'd he'd wallpaper, they live in rooms.
33:45
SPEAKER_02: But the fantastic thing was he would take us as children, me and my twin brother, back to do it all.
33:53
SPEAKER_02: So we didn't just l learn the practical skills, we learned how to treat people, how to be with people, how to be confident.
34:00
SPEAKER_02: You can't buy confidence, you've either got it or you haven't.
34:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you can't it it's I'm so grateful for everything that I've been taught in life, and I'm grateful for having the confidence I have and how I can treat people.
34:17
SPEAKER_02: I love to treat people as they should be treated.
34:20
SPEAKER_02: That is the most one of the most important things in the world to me.
34:23
SPEAKER_02: Treating others how they should be treated.
34:25
SPEAKER_00: Can I ask you, have you ever had a negative moment or oh god, yes, yes, people get negative, yeah.
34:32
SPEAKER_02: This is what do I do?
34:34
SPEAKER_02: Shut myself away with music.
34:36
SPEAKER_02: So music.
34:39
SPEAKER_02: I love music, and if I'm having a bad time, which I've had bad times in my life.
34:44
SPEAKER_02: I still have bad days, I still have bad times.
34:47
SPEAKER_02: I just don't post it on social media.
34:49
SPEAKER_02: I don't post a single negative thing on personal media.
34:52
SPEAKER_02: It may some people may think, oh, it's a little bit false.
34:54
SPEAKER_02: All he shows is negativity.
34:56
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but you it's up to you what you post.
34:58
SPEAKER_01: You know, you don't have to post whatever.
35:00
SPEAKER_01: You know, that's the thing, isn't it?
35:01
SPEAKER_01: We it's been so it's been World Mental Health Day this week, and there's been a lot of I think I posted about this been so much content about being positive and this and that and whatever, but also it's been nice, it has been nice to see that it's just not all I don't know.
35:19
SPEAKER_00: I seem to be posting negative well wouldn't say negative, I wouldn't say worries me, but it'll kind of be a bit more of a realist reason.
35:27
SPEAKER_01: But also like with social media, that's a thing, isn't it?
35:30
SPEAKER_01: You can choose to follow what you want to consume.
35:32
SPEAKER_02: So if you're not to watch anything on social media.
35:35
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I know like it some people might really struggle with seeing stoma bags out, they might struggle with seeing it, they might not be ready to see that, but then when they are, it's there for them and they can take it as they want it.
35:47
SPEAKER_00: It's it's the added caveat though of making people aware of what you're posting.
35:52
SPEAKER_02: I had to um do a blog for Respond.
35:56
SPEAKER_02: I think it might have been a month ago, two months ago, and it was on um mental health and a stoma, and I said to my wife straight away, I'm gonna struggle right in this one because I don't consider myself to have ever had mental health.
36:11
SPEAKER_02: But then I thought back to the days when I had ultra colitis before I had a stoma and how I used to lock myself away in my bedroom if people came to visit me, and all of a sudden I had something to talk about, I had something to relate because that is a form of mental health.
36:27
SPEAKER_02: You're hiding away, you don't want to see people.
36:30
SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I I have as many bad days as some other people do, but I just choose to keep it to me, wait until I'm over it, and then start posting.
36:42
SPEAKER_01: And and and y if you if you don't want to share it, you don't have to.
36:46
SPEAKER_01: Is no one saying you have to?
36:47
SPEAKER_02: It's something I really don't ever want to share is negativity.
36:51
SPEAKER_02: I'll share all the positivity in the world, and I know it helps so many people.
36:56
SPEAKER_02: I I post a video, I make a video every single day.
37:01
SPEAKER_02: And usually it's me having my breakfast.
37:03
SPEAKER_02: I might have got to work, I'm in my car before I go into work, I might have just jumped on my bus and I make one.
37:08
SPEAKER_02: It's just good morning, how is everybody?
37:10
SPEAKER_02: That's all it takes, right?
37:12
SPEAKER_02: That's the message I want to pull across.
37:14
SPEAKER_02: I just I just like to be nice to people.
37:18
SPEAKER_00: I I've I find with with with social media, I mean, we all have our moments where we're a bit like, oh, gonna take a break off of it.
37:26
SPEAKER_00: Not gonna follow as much.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: You change your mind as to what you do and don't tolerate.
37:31
SPEAKER_00: But I I I do find, especially with with Instagram, I've made because I help people, it's now kind of gone the other way.
37:41
SPEAKER_00: People are checking in on me and making sure that I'm okay and asking me how I'm doing.
37:46
SPEAKER_00: That's because you've made genuine connections, you know.
37:49
SPEAKER_00: That's they would be asking.
37:50
SPEAKER_00: I find that helps so much.
37:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, like the amount of women that have come forward with the same issue that I've got that are also fighting to have the surgery to to to get it get it removed, it's qu it's quite eye-opening, but it's always oh I'm always so humbled by everything that we do and like the help that we get back because I always done it on the caveat that if it helped one person, you'd have to do it.
38:18
SPEAKER_00: Well that's why we all do it, isn't it?
38:20
SPEAKER_02: Yes, true.
38:20
SPEAKER_00: I I have I've done it, I've done that right, but I've I still always try and keep that in my mind whenever I am doing what I'm doing to make sure that it is helping somebody else and it's not just helping myself.
38:33
unknown: Yeah.
38:34
SPEAKER_02: I was talking to a lady in Australia um a couple of weeks ago.
38:37
SPEAKER_02: You know, she just messaged me out of the blue, said, I've seen you on Instagram.
38:41
SPEAKER_02: Um I live in Australia, I'm just about to go in for surgery, and um I'm not asking your advice, but I just want to know, you know.
38:49
SPEAKER_01: What an honour that is that she messaged you in there.
38:52
SPEAKER_01: She just you know that's it.
38:53
SPEAKER_02: I've sat in I've sat in um cafees with people.
38:56
SPEAKER_02: I nearly said Costa then.
38:58
SPEAKER_02: Costa.
38:59
SPEAKER_02: That's gotta be worth a free coffee, isn't it?
39:02
SPEAKER_02: But I've sat in cafes with people um half my age, people older than me, just they just wanted to know what my life was like.
39:10
SPEAKER_02: I don't give people um any advice, medical advice, because I'm not trained to that.
39:15
SPEAKER_02: But I can just tell people how the last 11 years have been for me.
39:20
SPEAKER_02: And believe me, since my storm surgery, the last 11 years for me have been up there.
39:25
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
39:26
SPEAKER_02: It's like it's like winning the lottery without a few years.
39:28
SPEAKER_01: Well, listen, I suppose it's when you have that surgery after most people who have it have been suffering for a considerable amount of time.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: And when you have that surgery and fingers crossed, it's fixed some part of your struggles.
39:43
SPEAKER_01: It's just it's game-changing, isn't it?
39:45
SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's just a different way of life, isn't it?
39:47
SPEAKER_02: You know, I I see it as a different way of going to the toilet, that's all.
39:50
SPEAKER_02: We all go to the toilet and and we go differently.
39:53
SPEAKER_01: As a man, what position?
39:57
SPEAKER_02: In front of the uh toilet, normally kneeling down.
40:00
SPEAKER_01: No! In public toilets! No! Why?
40:04
SPEAKER_01: No!
40:04
SPEAKER_02: No, I didn't say in a public toilet, I just said in the toilet.
40:08
SPEAKER_02: In a public toilet, I will stoop down.
40:10
SPEAKER_02: But you know, remembering stoop down, yeah.
40:14
SPEAKER_00: So you're doing the dropping squat again?
40:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, the dropping squat again, in front of the toilet, but but, you know, my knees are not what they should be at 62.
40:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, no seriousness.
40:28
SPEAKER_02: So how, yeah, so you know, if toilet paper down toilet first so it doesn't splash back, obviously.
40:34
SPEAKER_01: See, I don't do that.
40:35
SPEAKER_01: I just aim for the side of the pan.
40:37
SPEAKER_00: Have you seen the um there's a lot of pictograms going around on Instagram at the moment about how people use the toilet and there's some pretty sick things like what on earth was she doing?
40:47
SPEAKER_00: And there was part of me thinking, there might have been somebody.
40:52
SPEAKER_00: You know what?
40:52
SPEAKER_01: I've gone to make a reel right about this so many times, but I look back, I think, I can't share that.
41:00
SPEAKER_01: I'm happy to help and do whatever for anyone.
41:02
SPEAKER_02: If anyone wants to ask me, I will privately always always in front of the toilet.
41:07
SPEAKER_02: Um, I've never been able to sit on the toilet and do.
41:09
SPEAKER_02: I've never tried, actually.
41:11
SPEAKER_01: Did you find it comfortable?
41:12
SPEAKER_00: There's it's not enough space.
41:14
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh god.
41:14
SPEAKER_02: No.
41:15
SPEAKER_00: Especially not when you've gained weight and you don't quite have the same thigh gap that you used to have.
41:20
SPEAKER_02: I know.
41:21
SPEAKER_00: What's a thigh gap?
41:22
SPEAKER_02: Hey, so I I totally lost that thread on diabetes, didn't I?
41:27
SPEAKER_02: I was like about an hour ago.
41:28
SPEAKER_02: So anyway, I've just had my second um checkup in the diabetes clinic, and I'm actually now pre-diabetic.
41:37
SPEAKER_01: So you did that all in four months?
41:39
SPEAKER_02: In four months.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: Is that normal?
41:41
SPEAKER_02: Probably not.
41:42
SPEAKER_02: But they said, they said that beating I said to them, first question, is type 2 diabetes?
41:48
SPEAKER_02: Is it beatable?
41:49
SPEAKER_02: She said yes.
41:50
SPEAKER_02: I said, okay, I'm gonna beat it.
41:51
SPEAKER_02: So I changed my diet, I've gone down the trouser size.
41:55
SPEAKER_01: I did say you were looking pretty Oh, thanks.
41:58
SPEAKER_02: You know.
41:58
SPEAKER_02: I was put on tablets called metformin, right?
42:02
SPEAKER_02: Now I was put on one to start with, and I had to work my way up to four days.
42:06
SPEAKER_02: And they like horse tablets.
42:08
SPEAKER_01: So what are they for then?
42:10
SPEAKER_02: For the diabetes, I really don't know.
42:11
SPEAKER_02: They um Dr.
42:12
SPEAKER_01: Lou, you must think about it.
42:14
SPEAKER_02: I think they I think they control the sugar.
42:17
SPEAKER_02: Anyway, I think they control the sugar.
42:18
SPEAKER_02: Uh don't quote me, but I think they control sugar.
42:21
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
42:22
SPEAKER_02: But the downside of those metformin tablets is diarrhea.
42:26
SPEAKER_02: Oh.
42:26
SPEAKER_02: So as you can imagine.
42:27
SPEAKER_02: Oh my god.
42:28
SPEAKER_02: An ileostomy, diarrhea.
42:30
SPEAKER_02: I've suffered for four months now with really bad diarrhea.
42:35
SPEAKER_02: So I've been taking um Imodium tablets.
42:38
SPEAKER_02: And is that balancing it out?
42:40
SPEAKER_02: It's balanced it out.
42:41
SPEAKER_02: Right.
42:41
SPEAKER_02: But now I'm off the metformin tablet.
42:43
SPEAKER_02: So it's fantastic.
42:44
SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
42:45
SPEAKER_02: In four months I've beaten.
42:48
SPEAKER_00: Did you find that whilst you was taking the metaphorin, because this is another another thing as well, that sometimes medication can have an adverse effect with regards to your stoma.
42:59
SPEAKER_00: So did you find that you were changing your bag more or changing your base plate more?
43:03
SPEAKER_02: No, I was just emptying more.
43:05
SPEAKER_02: I really was emptying more.
43:07
SPEAKER_02: And I have to say, and um the diabetes nurse has endured this one, but they were giving me mood swings as well.
43:15
SPEAKER_01: Were they?
43:16
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
43:17
SPEAKER_01: In what way?
43:17
SPEAKER_01: What's Keefe like on a mood swing?
43:19
SPEAKER_01: I was just angry in my head.
43:21
SPEAKER_01: Oh, really?
43:25
SPEAKER_01: Um I bet you just seem like the average person who's just a bit moody.
43:29
SPEAKER_02: I actually I didn't come across moody, but um, I'll give you an example.
43:32
SPEAKER_02: When I was driving, if somebody did something wrong, I don't suffer road rage, but in my head I was suffering road rage.
43:39
SPEAKER_02: And I didn't like it.
43:40
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, what are you doing, kids?
43:42
SPEAKER_02: That's not you.
43:43
SPEAKER_02: I'm talking to myself Yeah, I'm talking to myself.
43:45
SPEAKER_01: But medication, it does change you.
43:47
SPEAKER_01: It really does.
43:48
SPEAKER_01: It's scary.
43:49
SPEAKER_01: Like I was on pregabalin for five years.
43:52
SPEAKER_01: I was on 450 mil of pregabolin and 550 mil of Tramadol together every day because.
44:00
SPEAKER_01: Nothing would I could not absorb NAFOL.
44:03
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't touching me.
44:03
SPEAKER_01: I was having stabbing pains in the rectum for years after having Jake.
44:08
SPEAKER_01: I love you, but it was after having Jake.
44:10
SPEAKER_02: We love you, Jake.
44:11
SPEAKER_01: Um, but yes, and that's what led me to having stoma surgery because I just couldn't go on anymore.
44:15
SPEAKER_01: And I was on so many meds, they were like, this should be knocking you out, you should be drowsy.
44:19
SPEAKER_01: I was not drowsy at all.
44:20
SPEAKER_01: But I tell you what, I had mood swings.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: I was on one, I was ratty, I was like, it's like I had time of the month, every day of the month.
44:30
SPEAKER_01: It and and I'd go into a room and be like, Why am I near?
44:34
SPEAKER_01: I'd put the pot can of polish in the fridge.
44:36
SPEAKER_01: It was mental.
44:37
SPEAKER_01: It was really.
44:38
SPEAKER_02: Oh, the thoughts I was out of it.
44:39
SPEAKER_02: Thought I was having it, especially when I was driving.
44:41
SPEAKER_02: I didn't like myself.
44:42
SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's scary.
44:43
SPEAKER_02: What's going on?
44:44
SPEAKER_02: But now I've been off the tablets for a week and I can feel the difference already.
44:47
SPEAKER_00: I was gonna say, so you you've done a lot of things, so bake off.
44:52
SPEAKER_00: You've had filming in your house, haven't you, for the bacon?
44:54
SPEAKER_00: But was that Jane?
44:56
SPEAKER_02: Um, right, that was for um it was something to do with they were doing a program to celebrate the nurses in lockdown and they just wanted us to be part of the celebration.
45:08
SPEAKER_02: They did a load of filming, showed us Jane Bacon and myself decorating cakes, and they never used it.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: They never put us on.
45:15
SPEAKER_02: That was quite disappointing.
45:16
SPEAKER_02: That's still out there somewhere.
45:18
SPEAKER_02: But um I have done some filming back in April.
45:24
SPEAKER_02: I was I entered um for Michael McIntyre's The Wheel.
45:29
SPEAKER_02: The Wheel.
45:31
SPEAKER_02: And what are we now on Thursday?
45:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
45:34
SPEAKER_02: Two days' time, Friday, the 14th of October, 2023.
45:39
SPEAKER_02: I am a contestant on the wheel.
45:43
SPEAKER_02: So I can't say anything about it, obviously, for legal reasons, but uh by the time this goes out, you to see me on the wheel.
45:51
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
45:52
SPEAKER_02: I'm so excited about it.
45:54
SPEAKER_02: Oh, we can't wait to see it.
45:56
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's just the little group chat we keeps popping up.
45:59
SPEAKER_00: It's keeping up.
45:59
SPEAKER_00: I know, I know, I know.
46:01
SPEAKER_02: I know.
46:01
SPEAKER_02: Well, I've I've been able to put it on my social media now and tell everybody, and and people are genuinely excited um that they're gonna see me on telly and it's Saturday night, it's prime time, Saturday night, BBC One, 8.35.
46:14
SPEAKER_02: You can't get any better than that, can you?
46:16
SPEAKER_02: No, no, I can't, I can't wait.
46:17
SPEAKER_01: It the ever half's out at a gig.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: Me and Jake are in.
46:20
SPEAKER_02: We're gonna sit down and we're gonna watch Keith.
46:22
SPEAKER_02: There's there's lots more to come as well, on top of it.
46:26
SPEAKER_02: So I can't say any more about that.
46:27
SPEAKER_02: But uh watch this space.
46:29
SPEAKER_02: And if you're not already, follow me on TikTok at Keith John 2014.
46:34
SPEAKER_00: So, why did you apply to go on the well?
46:37
SPEAKER_02: Why?
46:38
SPEAKER_02: Um, I was I did apply two years ago to uh to go on um Bradley Walsh blankety blank and I got on the reserve list two years ago.
46:50
SPEAKER_02: Uh stayed home for a week and never got called in.
46:53
SPEAKER_01: So I was quite gutted about that.
46:55
SPEAKER_01: How does it work when you apply then?
46:57
SPEAKER_01: Are you allowed to say what happens from sending off the application to getting a call?
47:02
SPEAKER_01: What happens?
47:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
47:04
SPEAKER_02: So I applied back in March, I think it was.
47:08
SPEAKER_02: I'm laying in bed, I'm watching The Wheel Saturday night.
47:11
SPEAKER_02: It's just finished, they say we need contestants for the next series.
47:15
SPEAKER_02: My wife is there playing a game on her iPad as she does.
47:20
SPEAKER_02: I said, I'm gonna apply for that.
47:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, all right then.
47:23
SPEAKER_02: That was it, right?
47:25
SPEAKER_02: So um I quickly downloaded the application on my phone and I filled it all in.
47:32
SPEAKER_02: At the end of it, it said we need a photo of you.
47:34
SPEAKER_02: Oh, how do I send this photo on?
47:36
SPEAKER_02: Oh no, I bet you don't have hardly any of yourself.
47:40
SPEAKER_02: I find a lovely photo, I send it off, and then the very last question is we need a 30-second video of you saying why you should come on the game show.
47:50
SPEAKER_01: What did you say?
47:51
SPEAKER_02: I chucked a pair of shorts on, I chucked um a flowery shirt on, and I went on.
47:56
SPEAKER_02: I said, Hi, I'm Keith Thomas, the award-winning bus driver from Thely.
48:01
SPEAKER_02: You need me on your show.
48:02
SPEAKER_02: And that was it.
48:04
SPEAKER_02: Sent it off.
48:05
SPEAKER_02: They were literally phoning me two days later.
48:07
SPEAKER_02: Oh wow, and I have to say, I think there was 29,000 people applied, and they only picked 29 people, and I was one of the 29, so I'm blown away with that anyway.
48:19
SPEAKER_00: That video really made an impression.
48:21
SPEAKER_02: And then I had to go through um a lot of rounds.
48:23
SPEAKER_02: Like um, I played a two-hour Zoom call with other contestants, and you know, you've got the music on, you're dancing in a chair and everything.
48:31
SPEAKER_02: Oh, it's fantastic.
48:32
SPEAKER_02: Me in my living room dancing to the wheel.
48:35
SPEAKER_01: So did it go from how many did it whittle down from 29 then?
48:39
SPEAKER_02: It went, I'm not sure.
48:40
SPEAKER_02: It was like 29,000.
48:42
SPEAKER_02: I don't know what the process is.
48:44
SPEAKER_02: They just keep kept bringing me back, saying you threw it the next round, you threw it the next round, shoot the next round.
48:50
SPEAKER_02: There was the one round doing that, but they obviously they have to for tell you, they have to check all your background, they have to check all your social media.
48:56
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
48:56
SPEAKER_02: Check you're not a criminal.
48:57
SPEAKER_02: Had to do a police check, got through that.
49:00
SPEAKER_03: Oh, wow.
49:02
SPEAKER_02: I even had to have um um an interview with um psychiatric then just to check that you don't break down under pressure, and you know, they their duty of care is absolutely phenomenal.
49:14
SPEAKER_02: Right, they're not just making a game show, they have to look after you as well.
49:18
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, so yeah, it's been it, it was it seemed like a long process, but it wasn't.
49:23
SPEAKER_02: Before I knew it, I was filming, and it is, I just say, one of the best days of my life, apart from meeting with my wife.
49:31
SPEAKER_00: Oh, what a smooth talker.
49:34
SPEAKER_00: Incredible.
49:34
SPEAKER_00: Is Michael McIntyre really as tiny?
49:37
SPEAKER_02: No, well, I'm tiny, so I can't really say anybody's tiny, can I?
49:40
SPEAKER_02: But he is such a genuine guy, such a lovely man.
49:43
SPEAKER_01: Did he ever drop his smile?
49:45
SPEAKER_02: Because uh in my head he's always no, he's he's on form 24 cent.
49:49
SPEAKER_02: He's uh he must be exhausted when he goes to bed.
49:52
SPEAKER_01: Do you think his face aches?
49:53
SPEAKER_02: Incredible gentleman.
49:55
SPEAKER_02: Let me tell you, incredible he is.
49:57
SPEAKER_02: As lovely as you see him on TV, that's how he is.
49:59
SPEAKER_02: He just two days' time, and I'm gonna be on BBC One, uh, it's gonna be phenomenal.
50:07
SPEAKER_02: And um, yeah.
50:09
SPEAKER_01: How are you celebrating it?
50:10
SPEAKER_01: Are you doing anything with the family?
50:12
SPEAKER_02: Um, we were thinking of having like um a wheel, a wheel night, so all my child my four children and a couple of grandchildren could watch it.
50:21
SPEAKER_02: But uh Jane and myself are going to a party in the day, so like, and we just come back from sweat things up in the air at the moment.
50:29
SPEAKER_02: But yeah, just gonna enjoy it.
50:32
SPEAKER_02: I'd be lush.
50:33
SPEAKER_02: I can't wait.
50:34
SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you everyone for listening to Beyond the Pouch.
50:37
SPEAKER_01: We hope you've enjoyed listening and you've gained something valuable from this conversation.
50:41
SPEAKER_01: And thank you, Keith, so much for coming.
50:44
SPEAKER_01: It's been fun.
50:45
SPEAKER_02: I do this every day, honestly.
50:46
SPEAKER_02: Just saying.
50:48
SPEAKER_02: I would do this every day.
50:50
SPEAKER_02: I love it.
50:50
SPEAKER_02: Thank you.