SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. - Jerre Stead is a busy man. As a runner for over 50 years, he's always on the go.
When a hiatal hernia surgery put a halt to his active lifestyle, he felt defeated.
"My large intestine, part of my small intestine had moved up and it was inside of my lungs. My lungs were depressed about 55%," he said.
The first surgery led to a second surgery after experiencing complications.
In June, doctors had to insert feeding tubes.
"All I could do was drink smoothies. You may think that sounds great when you can only do three smoothies a day and then be fed with a food tube at night. That's not such a good thing," he said.
Doctors told him he'd need to keep the feeding tubes in for months. Stead didn't know if he could handle it.
"End of July, I was thinking this is forever already and now I've got to go August, September, October, November, December, January, another six, seven months," he said.
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That's when he was encouraged to get a second opinion at Banner.
"I was able to do the surgery robotically. So through multiple small incisions, I was able to repair his hernia. I took out his feeding tube so that he could eat and drink normally," Dr. Jennifer Preston at Banner University Medical Center in Phoenix said.
Stead recently had his last check-up appointment with Dr. Jennifer Preston.
"She's given me a great deal of comfort as I've gone through the recovery," Stead said.
Stead's back to his active lifestyle and back to eating solid foods just in time to enjoy a holiday meal with his wife.
"I don't realize how good food taste until you don't have it. And now as you bring it back and it gets reintroduced, it's like, wow, this is great," he said.