I'm not sure if this is IBS

I think I have IBS... mainly bloating and bad gas problems (painful gas, that is). I don't really have indigestion and before this month it hadn't really been bad. Just the rare pain occasionally. Then I got alarmingly sick. It was very bad... I had severe pain in my abdomen and I couldn't eat. I went to the ER and was given a shot and was told not to eat within 24 hours and to take pain meds. I took the pain meds, but not the advice about eating. I hadn't eaten for a long time by then and I was hungry, causing a stabbing sensation in my stomach. So I ate out of sheer desperate hunger and threw up so hard the blood vessels on my face burst.

I waited a few days for my scheduled visit to the hospital where I would have an ultrasound and finally I got the answer to some of the problem - I had a ruptured ovarian cyst. This should have been the end of it, I thought. My gynocologist assured me that within 2 weeks at most the cyst would be reabsorbed and I was put on birth control to prevent this from occurring again. However, it's been over two weeks and I continued to have problems and pains in my stomach. I had some constipation and freaked out and pretty much made things worse by taking laxatives and vitamins and fruits more than I should have. I was taking Mylanta Gas maximum strength after every meal until I finally came to my senses and stopped myself (I have depression and sometimes I think the worst and overreact. To illustrate this point, I'm a painter and when I first got sick this month I thought it was because of the turpentine I worked with. I had this very irrational fear that I had poisoned myself even though I certainly should have known better!).

I had gone to my family doctor and explained things to him. He prescribed two medicines for me, one of which is aciphex. The other medication made me ill and I had to take anti-nausea pills I had to keep from vomiting. I was told to stop taking that one. An EGD was also scheduled for me and I will be going next Tuesday because I told him that when I'm hungry I get the stabbing pains along with the usual feeling of hunger and for much of the time I had nausea as well.

Lately the pain has almost totally disappeared along with the nausea. They only seem to crop up in the afternoon for some reason when they do... and if I lie down it seems to be more likely to happen. I've been taking Acidophilus with Bifidus chewables 3 times a day just recently and I hope that will help me out over time. I've just been in pain consistently for so long that I'm pretty desperate at times. I'm not a person who is usually sick and this pain has totally blindsided and terrified me.

I hope I keep feeling better and better... I'm not in the same terrible pain I was in last week. I can actually do something other than curl up in bed and cry now. I'm not a person who eats unhealthily and this sudden severe pain after the ruptured cyst has me more confused than anything. Why would I suddenly have this problem... I'm a healthy eater, I drink water, I'm not easily stressed at all, although I suppose the pain does make me somewhat stressed.

If this is IBS, I hope I'm on the path to fixing it and getting on with my life. My father's side of the family has a history of intestinal problems. I forget the name of it, but almost all of them have this disease where if they eat nuts the nuts much be very finely chewed up or it messes up their colons. Also, I've been told that my uncle on my father's side has pretty bad IBS.

Thanks, Jess. I'm very glad I've found these forums. It's good to be able to talk to other people about problems like this. I'm sorry to hear about your own IBS and I hope you are feeling better soon as well. :)

Thanks for this insight, Keriamon. No, no one mentioned it and I didn't see anything about it in the large fold-out pamphlet I was provided with the medicine. I'm set to go back to the gynocologist after another month and have been debating calling the nurse there as I have been feeling pains in my calf and legs that are quite unusual for me (and the pamphlet said they may be clots), but the pains don't last long and I'm not truly sure they are clots. I'll ask them about the hormone levels and testing as well.

I'm not sure if I should try to wait until my next appointment or call them. I do worry about the possible clots as well as the gas issues, but I guess the depression has me thinking bad things (It makes me feel irrational)... or maybe that's hormones too. I had originally made the same mistake with the pain from the ruptured cyst. It wasn't until it got so unbearable that I hadn't eaten and was having severe cramping pains that I went to the local doctor and then got sent to the ER. My depression caused a sort of war inside my brain. One part of me wondered if it was the turpentine, the other thought it was nothing and would end soon. Neither side was right. I suppose I shouldn't let my depression cause these irrational feelings and fears, but it's really difficult and sometimes it just runs away with me before I realize how ridiculous I'm being.

I saw a doctor about it many years ago and had been prescribed a pill for it. This was back when I was starting college and it ended up being a huge part of what affected the first part of my college years. Taking the medicine caused my heart to speed up and caused me to feel breathless and nauseous. I had tried to tell my doctor about this and how horrible it was being, but the doctor insisted I take it for another few months and said it should stop. Needless to say it didn't and I stopped taking it on my own and never went back to that doctor again. My next doctor prescribed Zoloft, but I had trouble taking it with the memory of that last medication still in my mind (I had trouble even taking headache medicine for a while there).

The depression actually isn't very bad, but it does seem to take a severe turn at times when I'm feeling really sick and unsure of when I might feel better. I'm not used to being sick. I've had the occasional day where I feel sick before, and stomach flu for a week, but aside from that I've been pretty healthy.

I'm sure my depression probably isn't helping at times like this, and it's quite interesting what you've said about the stomach being a second brain. I've been able to do well for the most part without depression medication. I do have occasional moments where I do despair of my future, but that's more a reasonable worry that results in feeling depressed. I've done very well in many of my college classes, but I've never been able to pass a math course. I'm fairly sure I have dyscalculia, but testing for it is outrageously expensive. I'm trying to work on my math skills at home with books and some tutorial help, but now at 27 even an associate's degree seems out of reach. Right now I'm hoping to rely on my strengths and talents which would not require a degree - art and writing. However, both are notoriously difficult fields and I sometimes wonder if I can make it work. It's the only thing I can really do. The downside is of course this uncertainty, but there's an upside that suits my personality much more than a normal job... it's for the most part very relaxed and really inspires me to work more and I love it. :)

Yeah... I had been put in developmental math classes and failed the second to last developmental course twice. Unfortunately, these don't even count. However, more recently I've found a math course for liberal arts students that seems to involve euler circuits and things like that and don't require much actual algebraic calculations. I'm hoping to take that course and pass it. For my other math requirement, I'm looking at Philosophy's logic course, which also counts in the place of a math. If I can get these two I'll have a degree at least.

I haven't truly thought of taking anti-depressants, but if some of the other stuff I'm going to try fails then I'll give it a go and see how it works. Right now I'm doing just what you described and going from idea to idea in order to try and make myself feel better. First I took activia, now I'm trying frequent smaller meals, I'm regulating my exercise and getting more sunshine. I was taking calcium supplements, but stopped that.

The worst part seems to be not knowing what foods might be causing the worst of the gas. It's been a bit of a trial to figure out what's wrong. I have read on here that ice cream and chocolate milk seem to make some people's IBS worse. I've virtually given up soda, drinking only ice water and hot tea lately myself. Orange juice seems to make me really sick.