WATER WORKS - LIFE WITH A LONG TERM CATHETER

About the Blog.

Some of you reading this may know me but for those who don’t, I’m Jen. I’m 28 and I have quite a complicated list of medical conditions. One of those is chronic urinary retention (specifically Fowler’s Syndrome) which means the nerves and muscles in my bladder are irreversibly damaged and without the aid of a catheter I cannot empty my bladder naturally.

When I first found out that I would have to live with some sort of bladder management for the rest of my life, I turned to the internet. Although there are tonnes of advice leaflets on the net produced by health care institutes, there was little in the way of personal experience blogs/videos, nothing to tell me what life with a catheter was really like. The little out there is often geared towards the older generation and, in particular, older men. Being a bit of writer anyway, I wanted to share my experience and some tips/tricks that I have learned over the last couple of years, in hopes that it might help someone on their first few steps in life with a long-term catheter. Another reason for writing is to raise awareness in general.  Bladder conditions are a bit like bowel conditions in that they are often taboo subjects. People generally don’t want to talk about things regarding ‘toilet habits’, but for people with bladder and/or bowel problems that have an impact on day to day life, these issues often can’t be kept behind closed toilet doors. Sometimes we need to be frank with people, which can be embarrassing, especially when people react with wrinkled noses of disgust. I am generally quite open about my bladder condition and ignore if someone is ignorant enough to be rude or digusted; the way I see it, if I was telling people that I had multiple sclerosis or a heart problem the likelihood is that disgust wouldn’t be their first reaction. Thankfully a lot of work has been done in terms of raising the profile of bowel conditions such as crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis (both forms of irritable bowel disease), I would like to see the same kind of attention and understanding for bladder conditions.