Question:
How does your digestion take place post op?

I know this is a "DUH" question, but I was recently asked a question that I really couldn't answer! I remember discussing this with my surgeon, but I couldn't remember what he said. After surgery, does your pouch still have digestive juices? Do you still have a duodenem? In simple terms that people NOT having had this surgery, how does the RNY patient "digest" foods?    — Susan B. (posted on January 19, 2002)

January 20, 2002
No, RNY do not "digest", as in having the food fall into a vat of acid/enzymes. Our digestive function, duodenum and at least part of the jejunum are sealed away from the route of the food. Sooooo, the food goes this way, to the right (in theory), and the gastric juices go to the left. They begin mingling in the common channel. In this way, disgestion and absorption must try to occur simultaneously, which is why the malabsorption works for us, as long as we get the nutrition into us in a non-food way, too. Make sense?
   — vitalady