So I posted a couple weeks ago about chronic diarrhea, still had no answers yet, but the thing is I've had close family members tell me "I'm at it" which has hurt my feelings, why would I pretend I can't leave my house for the most part and not going to work so losing out on hundreds of pounds every month which I can't afford to, why would I fake being in this state of health, just feel like I have no one who understands what I'm going through right now 
Anyone else? : So I posted a couple weeks ago... - IBS Network
Anyone else?
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Emsky
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I had chronic diarrhea for 2 years. Went to 3 GI docs and, to no avail.
The last month I've had only 2 episodes, and one was on purpose as I ate a trigger food to check tolerance.
We are all different, so this may not work for you, but here is my routine.
A dose of Metamucil every morning.
A rounded teaspone of L-glutamine every morning dissolved in water.
Time released levsin twice a day.
And finally, strict adherence to the low fodmap diet.
And if I start to have gut motility, I take a single dose of pepto. (used to be 6 to 8 doses)
Might be worth a shot.
Are all these things available over the counter? Also the fodmap diet is hard for me as I'm a really fussy eater and have really bad food anxiety when it comes to trying new things I already don't eat much so following the fodmap from what I've seen I'd pretty much be eating nothing
Hi i know how you feel being unable to leave home. I used to be same. Tried everything. Was on loo every 15 -20 minutes most of day, until GP prescribed codeine. Now i going 1-4 times a day. Over half of times i was going b4. It's suggested that you built dose up slowly so you don't get constipated. I take cocodamol 8/500 8 tablets a day (2 tablets × 4 daily) . In beginning i was having 1-4 immodium ( loperimide) 2 mg in morning. Gradually reduced that as cocodamol kicked in. Codeine changed my life along with gluten free dairy free diet. I suggest you try it. I got freedom back. Give it a go
I used to take cocodamol on a regular basis for pain relief so it doesnt have much affect on me anymore
Sorry to hear that Emsky. Not nice when you’re going through bowel issues too. What have you tried or been investigated for? There are so many bowel conditions. I’ve had diarrhoea for years and told it was IBS or it was what I was eating. Usual culprits are dairy, wheat and caffeine so I eliminated all them and never made a difference. It was only last year when I was being sick as well I finally got referred to a gastro consultant. I had a colonoscopy, luckily all clear and sehcat scan which revealed I have bile salt malabsorption. Finally after all these years I’m now on medication. The only way for diagnosis is the scan. I’ve heard others say their doctors only look at blood results so they can’t have. But it isn’t diagnosed that way. It could also be something called SIBO. Anyway my advice would be to keep a diary of everything you eat and drink and when and then every time you go to the toilet and note what it is like, the pain, how long you were on the toilet etc. That was the only way my doctor finally took me seriously. Good luck x
I'm currently waiting on blood work had 2 stool samples and this is my second bloods if these are negative I'm being referred to gi specialist also going to ask to go to gynaecology as recently found out bowel changes can be a sign of a gynaelogical cancer, currently have no appetite and feel sick when I eat so keep a food diary just now is a bit pointless as I'm only eating once a day maybe twice if I'm lucky and even then still going to the toilet
People dont understamd IBS if they don't suffer. This group us great for a sympathetic ear and sharing experiences. Stay positive and focus on getting better by managing your symptoms..Have you been away anywhere abroad in the last few months or before the diarrhoea started? I had chronic long term diarrhoea from a stomach infection picked up whilst travelling in New York, not even exotic! which was eased by antibiotics. GP should help. I now use silicolgel for my stress induced IBSD and can't recommend it highly enough for controlling diarrhoea. It's in most high street pharmacies. It helped me take control of my problem to travel a nd go to business meetings and eat out again with confidence.
I don't think it's my ibs though as had it for years, then I went on antibiotics in April and it started so came off them after two weeks and still suffering I was in Spain in May and the sanitation at the part I was in was terrible, loads of poo on the floors etc, I've already explained this and keep being told because it was Spain that it was highly unlikely but highly unlikely things happen to me all the time
Hi Emsky, I had exactly the same situation. You need to make an appointment with your doctor if you haven't already and begin to try and found out what is causing it. If it is IBS, as would appear the most likely outcome, them you can start trying things that might help be it dietary, medicinal or a combination of the two. If you are "lucky" it might turn out to be something you need to eliminate from your diet and you might find the answer. In my case, there are numerous foods that almost always bring on an attack and I have to either leave them out altogether or plan for the inevitable. I also suffered immense pain and it wasn't until I was prescribed mebeverine and peppermint oil together that this became less of an issue. Please don't feel that you are alone in this, there are literally millions of us! Maybe you should point your family members in the direction of this website for a start as you are right, it seems much harder when those you depend upon do not understand what you are dealing with. All the best.
I'm already on mebeverine, and was recently put on peppermint oil and anti diarrhoea meds, I've been to the docs countless times and sick of no answers, I really don't think it's my ibs though as the last 6 years I haven't been like this, I did have episodes of diarrhea but they never lasted this long
Dear Emsky,
Please don't give up. Also try to forgive your family, they are very unlikely to understand, as from the sound of it they don't have digestive system problems.
Do keep going back to the GP, and if the important tests all come back clear then ask for a referral to a dietician, to help with experiments changing what you eat. The odd thing is if you can change your diet, after a bit what you eat will seem normal and taste right, and you may be very put off what you used to eat. One other thing, have you posted what you typically drink each day.
Note some of the diet changes aren't intended to be permanent, but just to get you well again.
Wishing you well,
Ernest
I don't think a dietician would be helpful for me, food anxiety is dreadful the thought of trying new stuff puts me into panic and when I do manage to try something new I end up not liking it anyway I mostly drink water about 2l a day then I have a can of juice with my dinner in 4he evening and at weekends I usually have a few more cans of juice, my diet has been the same most of my life, and most of my family have ibs and my auntie has had ulcerative colitis, my family keep saying I'm just at it though when they keep asking if I still the the diarrhea and I say yes they keep saying I'm faking it it's not exactly something I want to fake, before this I wouldnt go to the toilet for 7-10 days then for 1-2 days I would be going to the toilet frequently but never as frequently as this and the stools weren't as loose either, also the urgency is stronger and it's making me urinate a lot more too!
Dear Emsky,
Please try to keep an open mind about help. We all need to do that. All food will taste normal (and nice) once you have been eating it for a bit. Just try to adopt the "nothing to lose" attitude for a bit, and block out peoples negative comments (but please forgive them). Also consider that changes may not all need to be permanent, just need to get rid of your current problems.
I'm wondering (right or wrong) that the juice you mention may have lots of sugar and/or artificial sweeteners (bad), so I think I'd try just drinking plenty of water while you get back to normal, and park the juice for a bit.
Dumb question on the food, how much Veg do you eat (ignoring spuds) ? Steaming is a good way to cook to give you good flavour and preserve nutrients.
Hopefully there is nothing seriously wrong with you that is not reversible, and you have just accidentally adopted a bad load of gut bacteria. If that is true then healthy eating is probably the safest way to get them back in control, and aquire some more friendly ones.
Hope you get some test results soon, and can then go forward from there.
Wishing you well,
Ernest
Ever thing is available online except Kevin as it is an antispasmodic and must be prescribed.
No, fodmap is not eating nothing. I suppose it could be a matter of perspective.
Today I'm having spaghetti and meatballs, salad, and gluten free bread. For the most part, I eat much like I did before, but with different ingredients. I do miss onions and garlic terribly.
Now, eating out is VERY difficult.
Except what sorry? And for me it's basically eating nothing as everything on the not to eat list is basically everything I like, the only thing on the OK to eat list I like is the meat section everything else I don't like, gluten free stuff doesn't taste good to me, also you're saying you're having spaghetti and meatballs, I don't like spaghetti or pasta keep trying to eat pasta as I always get told for being a fussy eater it's weird that I don't like it, but can never eat it, it's more the texture rather than taste when it comes to pasta
I'm with you. The depression, the anxiety and the ENVY of normal gutted people
Sorry your family doesn't believe you...I can relate! I had chronic diarrhea for years and years, and like you, couldn't leave my house for fear of making a "mess." My doctor prescribed me Colestipol (6 tablets a day) and it cured me totally!!! No more diarrhea! There are also 2 other drugs that will know diarrhea on its arse: Welchol and Questran! Have your doctor prescribe any of these for you...you will not be sorry. I take the Colestipol in 2 doses: 3 in the morning and 3 in the afternoon...keep me posted!!
When I am leaving home I'm having to wear incontinence pants as it means if I have any accidents then at least I don't have to worry as much, they haven't prescribed me them they only gave me immodium which I already told them wasn't working and peppermint oil, it had reduced the number of times I go but still going frequent but part of me thinks its cos I'm barely eating and that's the only reason I'm not going as frequently
As said in earlier comment and someone else mentioned. I take questran which is a binder so bowel movements more normal. But you really should see gastro consultant and get tested. Drs are good but you need a hospital referral cos if you have bile salt malabsorption like me, what you eat doesn’t come into it really. Please keep on at doctors to refer you.
The doctors can't refer me until this blood work comes back, but it's been 2 weeks and still not back, so if this is negative then I can get referred
I’m another with a decade of being told my chronic diarrhoea was ibs. It turned out to also be bile salt malabsorption. Blood / stool tests etc can’t diagnose it. Only the sehcat scan as previously mentioned above. Tho some consultants will trial the meds pre scan to see if they help. If your diarrhoea is yellow/green and if higher fat meals make things worse please do try to get checked for it. The meds have changed my life. Good luck x
Emsky• in reply to
It's not yellow or green and I'm going so much its hard to tell if a fat meal is causing it, as I'm just constant even when I don't eat so hard to tell
• in reply toEmsky
It’s so awful when it’s like that I really feel for you. If u manage to get referred to a gastro please do ask about it (even without the colour thing) x
Yeah I will do, I just hope they find something I'm tired of being at home 90% of the time and only going out when completely necessary x
Hello, this is my general response to help people repair and find a baseline of GI performance after addressing all the factors that adversely interfere with it.
First, go to the doctors and get yourself checked for intestinal infections, and whatever other tests they want to do. Most people find they are all clear, and that IBS is a condition brought on by our modern diet, freely accessible food, sedentary lifestyles and is usually initially set off by a GI infection or other trauma to the GI tract, and is then maintained by several factors. Particularly for IBS-D (diarrhoea predominant), the gut becomes hypersensitive to certain triggers, and the official description is that a physical brain-gut dysfunction develops which causes the gut to over-react to mild stimuli. This leads to inflammation, and worsening gut performance that tends to spiral out of control. Be aware that in this state you can still get new GI infections, or have other underlying issues that are not connected to IBS, so you need to be vigilant for this, and if concerned then visit your doctor again.
The good news is that this situation is reversible, and you need to be positive that with the correct understanding and behaviours you can get your life back in control.
After 27 years of suffering with IBS I have found that the long-term solution that actually works for addressing IBS is about FOUR key topics: your vitamins, daily fasting periods, peristalsis control and toxic food additives.
You are effectively the manager of a “food nutrient extraction factory”, I know that sounds obvious, but I have found that IBS is not about medicines, but about changing the way you run the factory, and learning how to get the best performance out of it.
So after your doctor’s tests, if IBS is the diagnosis, then the first thing is to get familiar with the FODMAP diet, and be cutting out wheat and milk products at least, and replacing them with oats, gluten-free options and lactose free milk options, and understanding which fruit and vegetables you can eat. You can gradually work off this diet as your symptoms improve.
The next thing to sort out is your vitamins. An incident of food poisoning or GI infection can start you on a cycle that you need to make a really concerted effort to break out of. IBS causes vitamin deficiencies which are practically impossible to overcome in most people’s diets, especially if you’ve already adopted the FODMAP diet. But fundamentally, your vitamin levels affect the health of your intestines, and the health of your intestines affects your vitamin absorption and your production and effectiveness of your pancreatic digestive enzymes; it is a vicious circle that you have to break out of.
So, get some really good, expensive, multi-vitamins (ideally constituted for your age) and take them without fail every day with your breakfast. Get a blood test for Vitamin D and get you doctor to judge your supplement level required in IU’s to get you well healthy for Vitamin D. Do not get vitamins with high calcium and magnesium content initially as certainly in large doses these minerals can mess you up as they consume your stomach acid, and doses of magnesium will give you diarrhoea. You should get enough of these minerals from your diet. If you are on the low FODMAP diet, go for all lactose free dairy products can maintain your calcium, as unfortunately the diet tends to cut out almost all good sources of calcium.
Secondly, you should understand that your “food nutrition extraction factory” works on a batch-wise basis, and definitely not on a continuous process. So, you need to sort out your fasting periods immediately to give a clear break between batches, and the complete processing of each batch. This is normally overlooked by GP’s, but is an absolutely essential element for resolving IBS. Your small intestine should be practically sterile, and your stomach acid along with bowel cleaning contractions during fasting (called MMC) will usually do the cleaning. But, you need to fast for this to be effective, and by that I mean, ABSOLUTELY NO eating in between meals, ideally drinking only water. Imagine if you never washed your dinner plates and just kept putting food on them all the time!, they would be filthy and full of bacteria and this is what happens in your small intestine. This results in SIBO (Small Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth), which is apparently responsible for 85% of IBS cases, but is really only one of factors that you need to address. You need to give your small intestine plenty of time free of food for cleaning and maintaining the factory. The modern scenario of have cupboards full of rich foods permanently available day and night is a modern luxury outside of human evolution, and this is bad for you. Your stomach will sort itself out when you have got control of your small intestine (although if you've got gastritis you'll need to finish a course of omeprazole first), and then your large intestine will improve later as nutrients are more efficiently absorbed from your small intestine. Furthermore, you should be able to avoid future bouts of gastritis as during the fasting periods, your stomach becomes more neutral at nearly pH 4.
As a basic program, eat a good breakfast at say 7am (porridge with 50% almond milk or lactose free milk) or what suits you and then a good lunch at 12 o'clock – and absolutely no food in between. After lunch, no food at all for at least 5 hours, and eat well again for your evening meal because it has got to get you through the night. Ideally, no food after 7 pm, no supper or snacks, no food or milk at all until breakfast the next day. You will feel hunger in the fasting periods, but you will not starve, and this is doing you good!, You must NOT respond to the hunger - only with water or fruit tea. This is CRITICAL. Unless you are in a very healthy GI state, a mid-morning or afternoon snack interrupts your set meal digestion, causing acidity, SIBO, and driving premature advancement of food into your colon resulting in putrid fart gases mentioned later. Importantly, when you are feeling better, do not resort to your old ways, you are still recovering as you intestinal villi repair and become more efficient, and you need to make a life-style change to have this level of discipline in your eating and continue with it. It takes a few weeks at least, and you need to persevere with this. Failing on this will undermine all of your other good works. In a couple of weeks, you should be able to be getting off the low FODMAP diet, and begin working back the higher FODMAPs slowly into your diet. Some people recommend longer fasting periods, but for me the regular program above is sufficient without going extreme.
If your farts really stink like something died in your guts, then this is because partially undigested proteins are making it through to your large intestine and the amino acids lysine and arginine are being metabolized by bacteria into cadaverine and putrescine which are the compounds that give the smell to rotting flesh! – do not worry that you yourself are rotting, this is just temporary, but it shows that you really need to sort your digestion out. One reason for this can simply be that you have eaten more proteins than you can handle, if your gut peristalsis is too fast.
So, the third aspect of IBS is peristalsis control, also called gut motility. This is the speed at which your intestinal contractions drive food through your intestines. IBS-D can be characterized as having excessively fast gut motility or excessive peristalsis, while IBS-C is where the motility and peristalsis is too slow. If it’s too fast, then your digestive enzymes don’t have enough time to work on the food and for you to absorb the nutrients, and the food is driven prematurely into your colon which gives IBS-D. “Digestive enzyme” supplements are usually plant-based enzymes which work in a wider pH range than your own enzymes, and so can get to work on the food while it’s still in your stomach and also during transit through your small intestine, and so boosting the work of your own pancreatic enzymes, that are released by your pancreas into your small intestine. In this case, not only are you ensuring you have sufficient enzymes working on your food, but you are also gaining extra time for effective enzyme and food mixing and action. I would suggest trying some multi-component digestive enzyme supplements, and take these with at least two meals a day, particularly your heaviest meals. You want them to contain at least amylases, proteases, and lipases (for starches, proteins and fats respectively), but they can also contain other enzymes such as cellulase (for tough vegetables) and betaine HCl which helps with stomach acid production. Pancreatic enzyme production can decrease as you get older, and is also affected by stress/anxiety, vitamins, and the general health of your guts. You want to be sure that undigested food does not get to your large intestine where the bad bacteria will go to town on it, causing bloating, inflammation and pain. Using enzymes for IBS-D can improve your nutrition and help you to break out of the IBS cycle, but for IBS-D you still need to slow down that gut peristalsis.
This is affected by several things:
Caffeine massively stimulates peristalsis of the intestines and so this is negative for IBS-D, but positive for IBS-C. Between meal snacking, spicy foods, black pepper, chilli peppers, sucralose, sorbitol, black tea, coffee (and de-caffeinated coffee!), peanuts, cashew nuts, almonds, black beans also stimulate peristalsis. The general advice given for IBS is to cut down on tea/coffee stimulants, no more than 3 cups a day is the NICE guidance, but this entirely depends on whether you have IBS-D, IBS-C or a mixture of both. If you have IBS-D, you must cut out tea and coffee altogether, and for IBS-C you could try drinking more! You can “tune” your gut peristalsis by how much tea or coffee you can tolerate in a day. A mug of coffee contains about 120 mg of caffeine, there is about 50 mg in black tea, and 30 mg in the same volume of coke. A Pro-Plus caffeine tablet only contains 50 mg of caffeine (equivalent to one cup of tea!), and if you were having 10 of these a day you would rightly be concerned! Caffeine is a drug with no nutritional value. The half-life for excretion of caffeine from your body is between 5 and 15 hours depending on your health. So, it can take about three days to remove it all from your body to know how you would really perform without it. For IBS-D, you must do this, and then try re-introducing it by one cup per day (starting with tea), and then do not exceed what you determine is the optimum for you. You may only tolerate one cup of tea per day, or none at all, as in my case. Acknowledging this powerful effect is very important, because even if your natural enzyme levels are good, and you also take enzyme supplements, if your gut peristalsis (motility) is too fast you will still drive undigested food to your colon causing all of the usual symptoms simply because these enzyme reactions take TIME. Be aware that, caffeine also “drives” anxiety, agitation and nervousness. If you are also suffering from stress, then tea and coffee is definitely not helping you. Caffeine is a drug substance, it’s just that as a society we’ve mistakenly chosen to ignore that important fact, and have adopted living with a certain caffeine fuelled life as being normal. Even de-caff coffee, contains other substances that trigger gut peristalsis, so with coffee you just cannot win.
Gut peristalsis is very sensitive to adrenalin. A friend of mine says that “adrenalin not used by your muscles goes to your guts” and there may be some truth to this. If you have a busy life, you are probably not coasting along on a bed of feathers, and you probably not aware of your almost constantly high adrenalin levels – that is until you start actively lowering them. Crucially, what does work, is hard exercise to burn up your adrenalin and stop it interfering with the nervous system of your guts. My advice is to do something every day, whatever you can manage in your busy life, it will all help. It will improve your gut motility, general health, bone strength, relieve tiredness, help you sleep better, improve your mental agility and help get your anxiety under control. To many people, exercise may seem like a waste of time, but it is equivalent to spending a bit of time sharpening an axe – of course it is not wasted time, but time very well spent in servicing your whole body and mind.
Closely related to this (and possibly more importantly is serotonin), which is a controlling hormone for your bowel, and is the target of low-dose anti-depressants used for IBS treatment that are used to raise your levels of it by inhibiting its destruction. TCA’s (tricyclic antidepressants) are used for IBS-D, and SSRI’s are used for IBS-C. It is important for your doctor to get this the right way round if you choose to try the medicine route. Exercise increases your serotonin levels, but there are also two other surprising ways to do this: 1.) increase your agreeableness (and avoid hostility), 2.) bright light, i.e. get outside in the daylight as much as possible and avoid dim lighting indoors.
The fourth aspect of IBS is that some food additives are quite simply toxic for you and cause direct irritation and inflammation of the colon, allergic reaction of the colon, or they are laxatives that give you diarrhoea that you didn’t realise you were eating.
1.) Try to seek out and eliminate “trans-fats”. These cause direct inflammation of the colon, and you will be more sensitive than most people and this confuses what is causing you trouble. Chips, hash browns, butter, doughnuts, popcorn and things cooked in cheap or old frying oil as you find in many restaurants and commercial products can give you colon pain directly through inflammation. It can take up to three or four days to recover from this inflammation, but trans-fats are bad for you in a miriad of ways (cardio-vascular and diabetes etc), not only by inflammation of the colon. A big problem here, is eating out at commercial outlets that do not change their cooking oil often enough. There is evidence that as cooking oil is re-used that the trans-fats (and other compounds) increase. So, if you want fried food as a treat, do it at home with new oil at a low temperature, and only use it once. Ideally, starches should only be boiled, rather than fried.
2.) E407, or “Carrageenan” – is a food additive derived from a red seaweed, which is only present in small quantities as a thickener, but even at low levels it has been shown to be “highly inflammatory to the digestive tract” and associated with IBS, colitis and other GI diseases. There is loads of literature and objections to this substance on the internet. It is present in commercial Crème Caramels, soft cheeses, and many other dairy and meat products. After weeks of good health, just one of these products can knock you out for 24 hours with colon bloating and pain. I have found this by trial and error several times. Food tests show that even the food grade carrageenan contains between 2 and 25% of the non-approved “degraded” carrageenan, which is colon damaging and carcinogenic. Some food agencies now prohibit this additive altogether, and it may be responsible for a lot of IBS cases. It might be found in chocolate milk, cottage cheese, cream, crème caramel, ice cream, almond milk, diary alternatives, such as vegan cheeses or non-dairy desserts, coconut milk, creamers, hemp milk, rice milk, soy milk, and particularly processed meat. It is used extensively in cheap meats and is even injected into beef joints – so always get organic or local butcher fresh good quality meat!). It may be labelled as E407 or Carrageenan, but if you’ve got IBS, you must consider it as highly toxic for you.
Carboxy methyl cellulose (CMC) which is more widely used in the food industry, and has similar toxicology in animal studies, giving inflammation of the colon. However, the jury is still out on CMC to its impact on humans, and personally I can tolerate this.
I’ll also mention here mono-sodium glutamate (MSG). Clinical trials and several scientific articles connect MSG with IBS, so given the option to avoid it you should avoid it.
Also, NICE advises against the use of Aloe Vera for IBS - although I would say for the hydration of skin burns the pure plant gel itself is miraculous, so I would recommend you get a tube of this for your medicine cabinet for minor burns.
3.) E338, E339, E340, E341, E450, E451 and E452, are phosphates, diphosphates or polyphosphates as different salts. Natural phosphates are essential for life, and your body is full of organically bound phosphates, however, free ionic phosphates have several problems. Firstly, they are laxatives and will give you diarrhoea (sodium phosphate was once used to prepare patients for colonoscopies!). Secondly, they are associated with cardiovascular disease and accelerated aging. Since the 1990’s we are now exposed to twice the amount of added phosphate in foods; this is bad. There are calls to have added phosphate labelled on products as a health warning. Particular culprits are mass produced sausages and processed ham and chicken slices (and other meats), some cheeses, and cola (both diet and normal). So, always buy ham “on the bone”, which usually has no phosphate added. Personally, all phosphate additives in commercially processed meats make me ill.
4.) Aspartame and other sweeteners definitely have a negative role to play in IBS for many people. As with the other toxins above, your ability to cope with them varies on a spectrum. If you look at some of the work of K.J. Mielke, many of these additives can be allergens or “pseudoallergens” and with time you can develop a colonic reaction to them. The best sweetener for IBS is normal table sugar (sucrose), otherwise, it’s “Stevia” which is quite a new plant based sweetener and seems to be safe for IBS.
Other points...
There is a lot of support for L-glutamine to help with repair of your small-intestinal lining; this means buying 500g of the bodybuilder powder type and having a couple of tea-spoons of this a day - one before breakfast and one just before you go to bed, and you can have this in a light cordial drink. I don’t think this is a permanent requirement, but I think it may help you recover more quickly from long term issues.
Excessive burping which starts a couple of hours after eating can be due to excessive acid being neutralized by the sodium bicarbonate that is released by your pancreas, releasing more CO2 than you can cope with re-adsorbing. The simple remedy for this is to take a couple of ant-acid tablets, or Ranitidine.
I am not a fan of pro-biotics, I have never found that they actually do anything for me compared to getting control of fasting and peristalsis. However, I have had more success with pre-biotics, which are basically food for your large intestine good bacteria. This helps to strengthen the lining of your colon, and further improve your resilience to potential trigger foods and inflammation. Again, I would only use these periodically for a few weeks to help you back to a good state which you can then manage with the other good behaviours. It’s not that they do you any harm, but they are expensive and are just another thing to shop for. They can give a noticeable improvement in your GI comfort and performance, but don’t depend on them alone - it won’t last. You cannot get away with having poorly digested food getting to your large intestine.
I should add that although I eat bread and milk now in moderation, I am still cautious about high FODMAP fruits and tend to avoid them. The FODMAP fruit list is complicated, but an easy way to remember it is like this: the "fleshy", juicy fruits are bad, i.e. (nectarines, peaches, apricots, pears, apples, plums, dates etc), but segmented fruits (oranges, mandarins etc.) and all berries are generally OK as you are not likely to eat lots of them. Best of all is bananas which you can eat loads of. Microwave three of them until they are mushy and put a couple of fried eggs and cheese on them is my favourite weekend breakfast! For efficient fructose adsorption, you need glucose to be present with it in a ratio of 1:1. No enzyme will help you with fructose adsorption from fruits with excess fructose compared its glucose, but what can help is trying to balance the fructose with an excessive glucose fruit like banana. Bananas, figs, kiwis and pineapples have an excess of glucose over fructose, and so you can balance fruits with excess fructose. If you try using pure glucose powder, this will not travel slowly in your guts and you’ll still be left with excess fructose later on, so it is better to use bananas for the slow release of glucose to accompany the fructose. So you can experiment with this by making yourself a fruit salad mainly composed of bananas, and small amounts of other fruits. However, beware, that the problem with “fleshy” fruits (e.g. nectarines) is not only in fructose ratio, but also the polyols that they contain, which can still make you ill!
I should also mention hormone changes in women can be connected with IBS, affecting serotonin and the brain-gut nervous system, but being male I have no personal experience in this! Similarly, hypnosis is actually recommended by NICE as the best alternative therapy, again trying to get a grip on the nervous dysfunction. I have tried this, but for me I was just being very relaxed with your eyes shut for half an hour, and not spoiling the fun for everybody by pretending you actually are “hypnotized”! Unfortunately, I was £75 worse off for the privilege. However, like other psychotherapies it concentrates on repeatedly putting lots of positive thoughts in your mind, boosting your self-confidence and giving strategies for dealing with negativity, so I’d say it is a good complement for your psychology and anxiety, although it will not address fundamental organic issues like SIBO. But, as an example of your sub-conscious on your guts, try taking yourself off camping for a few days in a “proper” tent. The change of living environment will slow down your gut motility into emergency mode as your mind tells your body to get everything it can from the food you eat in case you don’t have any in the future. Camping also removes you from your usual daily anxieties, gives you more serotonin, and gets you more active.
Dealing with Flare-ups
First thing is, fix your SIBO as described above. If you still have SIBO symptoms, oregano oil capsules are very good, it is bactericidal, anti-inflammatory and can help with acute SIBO problems. It is not “gassy” as you may find with peppermint oil. Take some digestive enzymes, to ensure your digestion is complete. Fixing your SIBO has got to be your priority.
If you are on top of your SIBO, then a bowel toxin might hit you 5 to 8 hours after a meal as the food gets to your large intestine. The first line of attack in this case is ibuprofen which is far more effective than paracetamol for bowel pain, and I find that 200 mg alone is enough. Second, a couple of 10 mg Buscopan will stop the cramps. If you have IBS, always have available advance some linseed (the seeds) and natural aniseed (Star Anise), and when you are bad make the following tea: in a saucepan, add 1/2 teaspoon of linseed, ½ to 1 anise star, 1 teaspoon of sugar, a squirt of lemon juice (bottled is fine), and one full mug of water. Boil to simmer, with stirring, for 3 to 5 minutes, then sieve off the hot liquid back into the mug. This is a very effective remedy that I have used countless times, and it really does help. The reason that it helps (anecdotally) is that the “gooey” linseed extract coats the intestinal lining. There may be some truth to this, as some propose that the mechanism of intestinal inflammation is a chemical attack on the mucus lining of the intestine which then allows food particles be exposed to the more delicate tissues underneath, causing inflammation. The linseed goo would provide a temporary replacement to the mucus lining, preventing further inflammation. In fact, NICE recommends oats and linseeds for daily consumption for IBS patients.
A few of my most appreciated references…
“Treatment and Management of SIBO — Taking a Dietary Approach Can Control Intestinal Fermentation and Inflammation, by Aglaée Jacob, MS, RD; Today’s Dietitian; December 2012, Vol. 14 No. 12 P. 16”.
badgut.org/information-cent...
guidelines.co.uk/gastrointe...
I'm sorry I have dyslexia and struggle to read long sentences so I couldn't read all that, so far I've said that I'm waiting in results coming back, also said I can't do the fodmap diet as I don't eat a lot of food as it is and everything on the not to eat list is basically everything I eat so unfortunately wouldn't be able to follow it, and I've already been diagnosed with ibs so I know it's not my ibs that's making me like that, I think the fact I have ibs makes my guy more sensitive to catching something but sadly won't know until bloods come back and been waiting nearly 3 weeks now
Did I read somewhere that you said this flare up started after antibiotics?
Yes it did but I started the antibiotics in the middle of April and only took them for 2 weeks and it's still ongoing I was told 2/3 weeks I after I stopped taking them that it would settle
I was told the same thing, but still going 5 weeks later. My doc is now sending me to the hospital for tests - including colitis and cancer. I'm still hoping its the antibiotics. The good thing about coming here is the reassurance that other people are having exactly the same issue, and even for a longer time than I have. That's not very nice for those other people (including yourself), of course(!) but there is some reassurance in knowing we're not alone. Like yourself, my IBS has never been this bad in the 8 or 10 years I have had it. But it can't be a coincidence that I have been here but a few days and already seen four of us basically typing similar things after antibiotic usage. It has to be related to them somehow. I started taking something called Probio 7 Advanced probiotics a couple of weeks ago, and they certainly slowed my stomach down, but they also go too far and make me constipated! That's at least easier to manage. But sadly I can't stay on them as they can't be taken with the biologic drugs I take for my arthritis.
I've been going through this for months now and I asked to get referred to the hospital and I don't think she did because she keeps saying to me she thinks it'll get better and it doesn't my doctors have seriously misdiagnosed people I know in the past and I feel they're doing the same to me and feel stuck like I can't change doctors surgery because I'm in the middle of treatment and have appointments booked
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