What causes narrowing, of the small intestines?

I was told that i have narrowing of the intestines in multiple places through out the small intestines but not bad enough to require surgery.So does this mean i will have surgery in the future?Is it the food you eat?

The narrowing is initially caused by inflammation from active Crohn's disease. Often this inflammation can be treated by a course of steroids or enteral nutrition. The inflammation decreases or disappears, so that area of the intestines is no longer abnormally narrowed. However, if inflammation is longstanding you can develop thick, fibrous areas that no longer respond to antiinflammatory treatments. This is permanent narrowing. In this situation, sometimes the area of intestine can be stretched open endoscopically (often by inserting a little balloon and inflating it). In other cases, that won't work, and you need a resection (surgical removal of the section of intestine) to remove the narrowed area.

Yup, yup, what Nanners said. She's right on! I experienced the same as Nanners, including the 20 year remission and then ..... I now have a high grade partial obstruction w/surgery almost guaranteed to be inevitable.

To the folks who had a 20-year remission, do you mind if I ask you if you had any symptoms during that time, particularly towards the end? Or did the obstruction come totally out of the blue?

I find the thought of an obstruction coming out of nowhere after being well for 20 years a bit frightening :-/

no, mine was  slow regression, I would have small what I call gas blockages, that would last 2-4 hr's then I would get rid of gas, then that area would be sore for aday or so, then those flares became more frequent, more pain med's to get me thru, finally anything i would eat it was painful, so I had elective surgery to prevent total obstrucion, and surgion removed 1 ft, the first tho was obstuction, emergency type, you will be able to tell by the pain, I hope that explains

Nicecupoftea, for about the first 15 years I did pretty well. I had joint issues during that time, but I also had herniated discs in my neck. But about the last 5 years about once a year or so I would wind up in the ER with what they diagnosed as "gastritis attacks". The first one I ended up getting my appendix out as they thought it was that (was actually healthy). What I later figured out were those "gastritis" attacks were actually obstructions. I would mention that I had Crohns, but I think I was actually shooting myself in the foot, because I would say things like it hasn't given me problems for years. Hence, the gastritis diagnosis. During these attacks I would be given IV fluids, nausea meds and pain meds, and usually sent home a few hours later. On the visit to the ER that lead to my emergency surgery, I was treated the same, given meds and sent home. This time though the pain returned the next day just as fierce. Thats when they went into more testing and found that I was completed obstructed and two days later I had my surgery. Hope that helps.