Question: Definitely for the Ladies

Just to be clear - you are having vaginal bleeding not blood in your stool?

If so, it might be endometriosis or some other condition that would be handled by a gynecologist.

Or it could be the Crohn's causing an extreme reaction with your menstrual cycle. Lots of women say they have much more severe symptoms after they are diagnosed with CD even when they are in remission. But it sounds like this is totally new 5 years after you were diagnosed. Hm.

Could be a bleeding disorder but I would have thought that would have manifested earlier.

I wonder about your Vit. K level? Low Vit. K due to malabsorption could also be contributing.

Did the bleeding stop when you were on prednisone? Because prednisone can be a cause of abnormal uterine bleeding. You don't say what other meds you are on, if any, but there are some others that could be adding to the problem.

Are you old enough that it could partly be blamed on the onset of menopause? That might explain the irregularity of the bleeding.

Some of the young women on DP are on birth control pills to help even out their menstrual symptoms. Your gyn needs to be well informed about CD, CD meds and birth control pills and to monitor you closely when you are starting on them should you go that route.

If you are having bleeding that is soaking through a pad or tampon in an hour and has lasted for several hours, you have to change your pad during the night, or you are having large clots you should probably call the gyn after hours tonight. Or your regular doctor if you don't have a gynecologist.

If you are having symptoms of anemia - fatigue, shortness of breath, rapid or irregular heart beat - you may want to contact your GI on Monday unless the symptoms get severe. If they're severe you may need to go back to ER.

Did they do any labs at the ER? Will your gyn have access to those records if they run new labs to check for anemia?

As you can see from my wonderings - there are a number of possible explanations and you may have to see more than one specialist to get it sorted out.

Hope the bleeding has stopped and you have a good holiday with no more trips to ER!

Patricia

So have you seen your OB/Gyn about any of this?  I don't know how CD and vaginal bleeding could be related.  On the other hand, lots of women have an increase of abdominal symptoms with their menstrual cycle.  Prostaglandins in the pelvis around ovulation or menstruation definitely can give you diarrhea.

Heavy menstrual bleeding can be due to several different things.  If you are not menstruating monthly (it's not clear from your post, but did you skip 3 months of cycles?) then you are probably not ovulating.  Your CD could interrupt ovulation (I think that CD can be a cause of endocrine dysfunction), or perhaps your ovulatory cycles are awry for other reasons.  or you could have fibroids in the uterus, which could definitely lead to heavy bleeding.

Call your OB/Gyn.