Life on the Left Side

Life on the Left Side: Living Fully With an Ostomy Bag

A free, honest guide for anyone facing life with a stoma — from someone who's actually lived it.

In 2017, a jump over a garden wall led to a twisted ankle. The twisted ankle led to a doctor's exam. The exam found a lump nobody expected. What followed was aggressive cancer, chemo, radiation, and a surgery where the surgeon told me flat out: right side, the bag comes off in a couple of months. Left side, it's permanent, for life.

I woke up on the left.

This book is everything I wish someone had handed me that day — no textbook language, no sugar-coating, just what actually happened and what actually works. The mall disaster. The five years I hid the bag from my own wife. The eleven words she said that finally ended it. What the research says about why the adjustment takes 1-2 years, and why that's completely normal.

What's inside:

• The real story, start to finish — diagnosis to nine years later
• Why the grief is real, how long it actually takes, and why you're not behind
• Fixing leaks, rashes, and the fear of "what if it happens in public"
• Getting back to work, sport, travel, and intimacy without hiding
• Why you don't have to do this alone — even if, like me, you mostly did

Who this is for: anyone facing this surgery, anyone newly out of it and struggling, and anyone years in who still hasn't made peace with the bag. If that's you, or someone you love, this book was written for exactly that moment.

This is completely free. No trial, no upsell, no catch. I wrote it because nobody wrote it for me in 2017 — I'd rather one

more person feel less alone than sell a single copy.

Download it, read it, and if it helps — please pass it on to someone who needs it.