My Hiking Experience With An Ostomy Bag

So I’m going to kick this off by saying, right away, that I am nowhere near what you would call a smart person. Now I don’t mean academically or logically speaking; because in this sense, I am about average intelligence wise. However, I fall apart when it comes to any sort of common sense, situational awareness, or emotional intelligence scenarios. I have struggled to make smart, conscious decisions for most of my life, and my parents have officially labeled me as their dumbest child out of the family. Maybe some people see that as really discouraging, and I think I used to see it that way too. However, it has been comforting to know in recent years that, no matter how badly I screw up, I can’t do anything to make the people around me feel any more disappointed in me.

Now that that’s out of the way, let me tell you about the time I went hiking with an ostomy bag. I ended up needing a stoma put in my lower intestines when I was 13, so I’ve long since been used to wearing an ostomy bag and taking all the necessary steps and precautions that go along with having a gaping whole in my lower abdomen. I went on a trip for spring break with some of my buddies for college a few years ago, and this would have been the first time ever going on a serious backpacking trip with an ostomy bag. I made sure to research about what fellow ostomates have to say about camping and hiking with an ostomy bag, and got a pretty good idea of the supplies and gear I would need for the trip. 

The trip started off well with me and 2 other buddies in the north east part of the Appalachian trail. Both my friends knew about my ostomy bag but did not really know much about it beyond the extent that if I don’t have it things go poorly for everyone involved. One night we stopped to camp somewhere in the mountains, and I took off my ostomy pouch to start the cleaning process with a few sanitary pads I had brought. Somewhat disguised and intrigued, my buddies wanted to see for themselves how I go about cleaning that wretched thing. I go to put on a new pouch and realize, to my dismay, that I have left my entire supply of ostomy pouches in a bag pack home that I meant to pack. 

“Get used to the smell, lads”, I say to my two buddies. For the rest of the trip, I will have to be sporting the same ostomy bag over miles of mountain ranges and river crossings. All the while I had to hope that I wouldn’t snag my pouch on a stray tree branch or sharp rock, which would lead to serious leakage of my own bodily waste that will forever taint the ground somewhere in the mountains of the Appalachian trail. Luckily, we made it through the 4 day trip without an incident, and I ended up not seriously needing an extra ostomy bag. However, I would not advise spending 4 days without changing your bag, especially when sweating, climbing, and hiking through the mountains. Oh, and the camping food was not helpful for my digestive system either.