Freaking out
I know I haven't been around here much lately, tho I have been lurking.
I haven't been feeling well for a couple of months now. Actually it started last summer and has been getting progressively worse. Stomach and lower GI tract stuff. I'm finally going in on Wednesday to get checked out. I have a pretty strong feeling that I know what they're going to say. Three people in my immediate family (siblings and cousins) have either Crohn's or ulcerated colitis, and I have all of their symptoms. I had really thought I was the exception, and I'm so bummed. It's gotten so that I can't drink anything alcoholic, eat spicy foods, eat anything with a tomato sauce, anything with roughage, or eat a bowl of ice cream anymore without suffering dire consequences. Getting fevers that come and go. And I'm really tired, all of the time.
Anyway, how manageable is this? My brother has to take meds every day, but he can eat what he wants and gets the occasional surgery. My cousins are both on bags.
I have always taken good care of my health, but I've been under mad amounts of stress for the past three years. I love to cook and preparing meals is pretty much the only outlet of creativity that I have left. I didn't drink beer or eat ice cream all that much, but these things were my little treats, and I miss them. The prospect of giving up a food group or radically changing my diet is making me totally miserable.
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i have crohns and though i have seen the worst of it, i have been great for about 6 years!
dealing with doctors has been the most difficult aspect for me. it seems like i have always had to constantly advocate for myself. lesson 1: you know your body best.
eating as baby would is the what i need to do when i am having a flare up :squash, mashed potatoes, and be sure to have lots of protein, chicken works best for me. and a supplement like spirutein is great in the morning to help get off to a good start. spirulina is the most easily absorbable green i have found.
you can totally manage your health.i love accupuncture (if i could afford it) and i have never found the doctor's drugs to be useful, with the exception of prednisone when i have been in the worst... though the side effects are so awful it is hardly worth it. marijuana has been my best tool in maintaining my good health. staying one step ahead of a flare up has been my solution.
pm me if you want to talk more, i love going on and on about crohns
you can PM me too if you want to talk more!
Find ecstasy in life; the mere sense of living is joy enough. -- Emily Dickinson
You want to do what you think is right and what matters to you, and if other people don't like it, as my father would have said, they can go fuck themselves. -- Amy Bloom
I just started,and I have to say, I'm a total convert!!!! It's the best. I've NO idea how it works for my colitis but I swear it does. We are really lucky in the Twin Cities that there's a couple of acupuncturists who have started a community practice, with sliding scale fees, where you can pay as little as $15. or even less, they are totally committed to the community. thank god!!!
i concur about the prednisone. it works like a charm but you become a monster and crazy in your head. sucks.
Don't freak out yet! It could be anything.
I have been diagnosed with crohn's and I have to agree with huck that no prescribed medications have done a damn thing for me aside from the prednisone, and you don't want to be on it.
Spirulina has helped a lot for me, also I have had a lot of luck with coconut oil. It's helped with the soreness of the stomach area enough that I can lay on my stomach for the first time in years without pain from the pressure.
You just have to know what you can and can't eat. That's the main thing. For me- wheat is bad. Rice is good. Also things made from rice; rice noodles, rice cereals, rice cakes...all are fine for me to eat. No orange or tomato or anything acidic. Lots of protein; fish and chicken are good. If you can't eat any fresh vegetables or fruit just eat canned. Canned fruits/vegetables are much easier on the stomach. I've had times when all I could eat is plain fish and rice. But at least know there's always that to fall back on, fish and rice has never hurt my stomach. Also coconut milk, coconut oil, coconut water... anything coconut is good. You might do a google search on coconut and crohns.
"I RULE THIS ENTIRE WHOREDOM!" - Velma
spark something up mama. though i have no first hand experience with the disease i've heard it helps and for now it will lift your spirits as well. I'm sorry you are going through this and vibe you good news at the doc. so spark a fatty for now and think positive.
Jessica
Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind~~Dr.Seuss
Jessica
Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind~~Dr.Seuss
i definetly use medicinally, but when i am in the middle of a flare up it is marginally useful. the thing is: it can help overcome the nausea, but shortly there after i am in extra pain from eating. marijuana is best for me as a first line of defense. if i feel the slightest symptom coming on, i take a moment, smoke, and find a meditative state that helps me move through the pain. i use it to find where i am holding my tension-stress-disease and i can send it off gracefully with stretching, movement or just the simple awareness.
Oh, I feel for you, guava!!! GI issues are really a pain in the...well, ass!
I've had ulcerative colitis for god, over 20 years now. In my case, it is really not affected by diet, and specifically, by dairy. In other words, I can eat dairy all the time and have no problems and then all of the sudden: problem! I get a flare-up. For many years I was on conventional meds (sulfasalazine and Asacol) with periodic use of enemas when things got bad. Between these two things I have been able to manage quite well- no surgery. I have gone a couple of years at a time without using drugs. More recently I decided that I did not want to be on the drugs because of possible side-effects in my breastfed baby. And so I went to a naturopath and she has prescribed white fish oil supplements. If I have a flare-up she wants me on a higher dose of the white fish oil as well as on a bioflavenoid supplement. Both of these are anti-inflammatory and she says people with ulcerative colitis and IBS respond really well. I'm also doing acupuncture to address this. Both- or one or the other- seem to really be working. I'm very happy with this. I wasn't really unhappy with the allopathic route either but I have to say, taking fish oil caplets daily is nicer (if stinkier! 
). So I just wanted to throw out there that "alternative" therapies are worth a look into, if you are so inclined.
Diet-related things: I try to eat lots of flax seeds and tumeric and ginger (all have anti-inflammatory properties). Freakinchillmom posted the following once on another discussion about this kind of stuff, which I found VERY useful: http://www.fammed.wisc.edu/files/webfm-uploads/documents/outreach/im/han...
I've NEVER had surgery. But I have a pretty mild case of UC-- just in the lowest portion of my colon. I do have to have colonoscopies every couple of years due to an increased risk of colon cancer. Joy. But not all that bad, in the grand scheme of things.
Oh, and stress never seems to matter for me either. Some of my healthiest time, colon-wise, was grad school when I was totally stressed out!!! So who knows. Different people have different triggers.
Wishing you lots of VIBES and good health!!!!
i feel for you, i had a bad flare last sept and it did me in majorly until i had it knocked out taking prednisone. and yuck for that. i've been okay since and have been trying to be better about my diet since as that flare was not pretty. i can now tell i'm way better off with more leafy greens and less carbs and dairy. and i take a few spoonfuls of flax oil a day. it's all about your diet really. and standing on your head is good too.
i don't like taking medicine but really the last flare was so scary i'm more inclined to adhere to my regimine so i take sulfasalazine daily with folic acid and a multivitamin. supposed to do the sulfasalazine 3x per day with food but i'm lucky to get it in me after breakfast.
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