'cured' during pregnancy

Hi all,

Im 20 weeks pregnant. I was warned that i might get better, worse or stayed the same but i can honestly say that i feel 'cured'. My system has completely changed:im eating salad and orange juice with ZERO problems, im going to the toilet once a day and my stools are completely 'normal', not just normal for me but normal for someone without crohn's. I've got no pain, no bloating, mimimal gas, no urges to go, no D. While i should be really enjoying all of this, i feel like my body is teasing me-it's given me a glimmer of how easy and comfortable my life could be and while i can't wait to be a mummy, it's making me want to stay pregnant forever!

I know this is all only temporary but i wondered if anyone experience something similar. I've literally NEVER felt this good, my skin is pink for the first time in 10 years! Did you find your symptoms can back immediately? Were they better or worse than before you got pregnant? Did breastfeeding help delay things?

Does anyone know if there is any drug out there that can recreate pregnancy hormones? Immunosuppressants have never worked for me so im wondering if it's just the hormones that are making me feel so good? Im just confussed as to what's going on. My body IS capable of succesful digestion under certain circumstances whereas before i felt it was just completely broken. Sorry for all the questions.

WOW that is wonderful!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thankyou for your replies. Zanne-i've got an appointment booked to see my consultant a few weeks after the birth and he's given me the number for his 'hotline' so i can see him sooner if need be, so im braced for the worst! I'm just wondering if i should see him sooner just so he can explain what's going on to me but i don't suppose they really know!

I've had a thought which has made me feel better today. Most people feel great in the second trimester, im sure that by the end of the pregnancy i'll be heavy, uncomfortable and desperate to give birth and have my baby-i wont go from feeling as good as i do now to suddenly flaring so hopefully it'll be a gradual process.

I just wish i could bottle whatever it is that's 'cured' me and keep taking it! I've been in remission for a good few years now but was still struggling on a daily basis.

Thanks inflamed, that's given me some hope that i might have a few healthy months with our baby, i'm going to try very hard to stick with the breastfeeding. Things never turn out how you imagine do they! I was so scared to get pregnant, i was having visions of morning sickness/crohn's sickness/upset stomachs/pain/weight loss, generally a nightmare but so far, i've been great-haven't even had a hint of sickness!

Congrats to you too! I think we should be very proud of ourselves!

I was exactly the same way!!! I felt unreal during my 1st pregnancy and am 18 weeks preggers w/ #2 and despite a stricture that my doc wanted to operate on, I feel amazing once again! I WISH they could clone the hormones and make some sort of medicine that we could take. My husband and I joke that I should be a surrogate mother!

My remission lasted about a yr or so...and then symptoms came back with a vengeance. I went off azathioprine 3 mths beofre trying to conceive and only stayed on Asacol throughout the pregnancy. I was feeling so good that I decided not to go on anything else. My body wasn't happy with me. I was a mess! Really bad tummy and horrible arthritis. I went back on the azathioprine and stayed on it until we wanted to try for another baby. Luckily my pregnancies have mirrored eachother thus far and I am feeling awesome.

FYI I have heard that breast feeding can induce a flair due to the extra hormones and the stress of it on your body. I chose not to...mostly cause I was on the asacol. It was the right choice for me and I will be doing it again with this baby.

Just keep a close eye on yourself and listen to your body. The faster you get under a docs care when you start not to feel good the better. It is easy to lose sight of yourself when you have a new baby...but without you being healthy the baby is worse off! Ask for help and try to get as much rest as you can. GOOD LUCK!!!

I had my son 8 months ago. I felt great during my pregnancy and for about 5 months afterwards. Then my hair started getting brittle and my skin started breaking out and I knew the crohns was back. I stayed on 6mp and pentasa for the whole pregnancy too. I wish we could always feel that great. Hopefully you will. Make sure you see a high risk obstetrician since you have crohns disease.

Aren't birth control pills supposed to mimic pregnancy?

Thankyou so much for sharing your experiences with me, i've taken everything you all said on bored.

stef17-i'll definately have some fat stores in reserve by march and im going to try to get the baby used to a rubber teet so that i can express. Once i've done that, i'll try a formula bottle once a week as suggested, thanks for telling me about that!

Makiesmama-i think following stef's advice above will help me to switch to bottle if breastfeeding is too difficult. I think 'normal' people find breastfeeding hard due to lack of sleep and stress on the body so i'll bare in mind that if i do flare switching may help me get better quicker. It goes completely against natural instinct to put your own needs before that of the baby but i realise that im no use to anyone if im ill.

I'd be fascinated to know what research they're doing into this-it seems like a magic cure and you'd think they'd be able to mimic the pregnancy hormones. The mechanisms of immunosuppression that our bodies go through are probably very complex but i wonder if they've even tried synthesising the hormones? Fitzy-i was also wondering about the birth control pills, i'm going to ask my consultant but i've got a feeling that if it were that simple we'd all be given them straight away , nevermind-we can dream! Surrogacy suddenly sounds like a great idea!!xx

I was diagnosed before I ever had my 3 kids. I did take BC pills beforehand/afterwards too. The only time I flared was about 9 mos after baby #2, and what was amazing to me, was I then went into a 20 year remission after that. I wonder though if the BC pills helped me.

This would be great if they could clone this stuff to help folks reach remission. But what about the guys? Eeek! LOL

I am glad to hear you are feeling so good. And congrats on your upcoming little one!

I have to say, I too had this. Pregnancy was awesome for my CD. If only we could stay preggers forever....at least trick the body to thinking we are preggers. I remember talking to my Mid-Wife saying 'I'm only having one bowel movement a day, is there something wrong?' she laughed at me and said that this is what it's like having a normal system. :)
The only real troubles i had during pregnancy that could be related to cd was the swelling and the protein in my urine. i started swelling at 25 weeks and it was terrible! I was induced because of the protein with the first child and the second one i went on bedrest at 38 wks so that i could avoid it. i drank lots and lots of water (more than recomended) and kept my feet up.

Breastfeeding- I b/f my first child till he was 9 months and enjoyed the same 'cured' feeling. however, my second child i'm still b/f and he's 15 months now. my cd is back with avengence, started to come back in january but i didn't want to see the doc for fear i would have to wean to go on meds. Now that i'm getting really bad i went to the doc. So, now i have to wean....which sux, cuz he's not emotionally ready.
So, there's my story, hope u have a great birth and wonderful b/f experience!
-Jeny

My OB always says I should be a surrogate because I feel so awesome while pregnant. But boy have I flared HORRIBLY about 3-7 days after giving birth every time. I have only taken asacol while pregnant and 6mp is what seems to work for me so I don't know if that would have made a difference. For how quick and fierce my flares have come on I really doubt it. I nursed my first son for 5 weeks before I knew I had crohns and then went in the hospital for 2 weeks and almost died from what I didn't know was IBD at the time. He took a bottle right in the hospital room like a champ. I nursed my 2nd son for a year and well gave him a bottle at 4 weeks and well he was a stinker and never would drink a bottle. I think part of the problem was that I never gave him the bottle because it was easier to just to nurse. And the twins will drink a bottle if they are truly hungry otherwise one of them literally throws it across the room. I haven't found breastfeeding to be any better or worse for my crohns. But I did flare really bad again after weaning my second son, hopefully that doesn't happen with the twins. I wish you the best with breastfeeding and always remember that even a few weeks is better than nothing. I don't know about the hormones helping the crohns but nursing really helped me to not have any post partum depression or baby blues.
I have just had the Mirena inserted and I think that was the cause of this last flare but none of my doctors will admit it. I am doing well now with entocort, canasa and cortifoam. It is different from the pill as there is no estrogen in it and I am hoping that over time it will help.

Enjoy your pregnancy and being able to eat and drink what you want. I have to laugh because I always say how much I loved being pregnant because I could drink orange juice and eat lettuce. Which are two things that even when I am not flaring just don't seem to agree with me. Hee hee!

Congratulations and I wish you a healthy time after your little one is born.

That's right, rootsmith.

This is a big oversimplification, but think of it this way:

When you're pregnant, there's basically a semi-foreign body growing inside you.  Under normal circumstances, your immune system would not tolerate the fetus and would attack it.  One of the many functions of the hormonal changes during pregnancy is to suppress the immune response so that it doesn't go after the growing fetus.

It has been shown that during pregnancy, cortisol levels, along with lots of other hormones, increase.  Cortisol, as you may know, is the naturally occurring hormone produced by the adrenal glands that regulates metabolism and immune function (inflammation).  Now if that sounds a lot like prednisone, you're on the right track:  Prednisone is a synthetic mimic of cortisol.  When you take prednisone, it's the same as increasing your levels of cortisol.  So if you have increased levels of cortisol while pregnant, it's like being on prednisone.

Like I said, that's a huge oversimplification, and there are lots of other things happening simultaneously, but it gives you an idea what's going on.