Blood in your stool.

Hello,

I found reading some of the posts on here really useful and it seemed to help the author a lot too. So I thought I would give it a go.

I am 38 years old and I was diagnosed a long time ago with IBS and I have suffered with eating hot and spicy foods ever since. I really love my food and therefore it was a real kick in the teeth for me. It's has also meant for probably 10 years + now I have had loose ’ish stools (sorry for being graphic). but it’s something I have learnt to deal with now and I avoid eating hot or spicy foods unless I want to pay for it later.

But what this post is really about - 5 days ago at about 4 am (Monday morning) I woke needing the loo really badly to find out I had really bad diarrhoea, I felt a bit crappy but dealt with it for the next probably 4 hours before I managed to get a little more sleep. By deal with it I mean I was on and off the loo quite a lot and when I say diarrhoea it was like yellow water and a lot of it. As well as diarrhoea I started to ache from the bottom of my rib cage down to my toes, like having the flu but it was very painful. I was also very hot one minute and very cold the next.

After 24 hours of this I was worried so I went to see my doctor. He asked me the normal question, what had I eaten, been doing, what are the stools like and do I have blood in them etc. I explained that I had eaten the same food as everyone else all weekend - except one single hamburger at 7 pm the night before.

First of all he stuck a thermometer in my ear and said I have a fever and that he things I might have food poisoning. No drugs can help me just paracetamol and lots of fluid.

This lasted for 3 maybe into 4 days before the fever broke and the aches and pains started to get better. Originally the doctor has said if its not getting better by Friday (5 days after it started) then to give him a stool sample. Well this Friday happened to be a bank holiday and therefore they are not open! Which because I was ill at the time I didn't think of that but my darling wife did and therefore went into the doctors herself on the Thursday afternoon and spoke to another doctor, it was to late to get a stool sample to them by then as they want them in by 10am and I now have to wait until Tuesday before I can drop one off.

The reason I am posting this is that once the diarrhoea started to get better, I started to notice blood in my stools; red mucus coated lumps in and around the stool.

This has really scared me. My wife mentioned this to the doctor and she said, she isn't surprised after what I have been through but the first doctor I saw seemed a little "lets wait and see" kind of guy and I struggle with trust sometimes in out doctors because they only have a 5 minute window to see each individual and that isn't enough time for introductions in my eyes and quite often each doctor has a different approach to the same problem...

Everything I thought I knew was that is there was blood in your stool something was seriously wrong and I am just quiet nervous and scared at the moment because I now have 4 days before I can even drop off a stool sample then I have to wait for the results.

For the first 3 days that I was ill, I didn't really eat at all I just drunk and therefore there wasn't much to come out but because it was yellow water, there was no trace of blood, since I have been eating (scramble eggs, toast, plain chicken, rice, yogurt and banana). Not all at once :) they are the things I was advised to eat as they are plain kind foods. I have had a little bit of tummy cramps, nothing to painful but its there and I now only go to the loo maybe once every 8 hours, it might take 3 trips to the toilet before I am finished but the diarrhoea has got a lot better. I am just so worried I now have found blood and I guess I am looking for people who might have seen or had something similar to me and to share their thoughts.

Many thanks

Hi Sherry,

Thanks for your reply, as I said before I have been suffering all week with flu like aches and they have almost gone but not completely. So I still have them to deal with but other than those I can't say there is just one spot. I have only been going to the loo normally (for me that is) for 24 hours now so only been like 3 times and I have noticed it in only two of them. The middle one wasn't very big mind you but it is the colour you said, on the paper it’s bright red spot, maybe two spots and in the stool its not quite so bright but it is red and normally coated in mucus. I don't know how to quantify the amount when you say and not very much of it... I had to look for it if that's any indication it wasn't easy to notice.

The second doctor my wife spoke to on Thursday (yesterday afternoon) said, she didn't agree with the first doctor I saw on Monday now and that she didn't think it was food poisoning but more a virus or bug as there does seem to be a lot of diarrhoea / sickness bugs going around at the moment. I know of 4 people who have had it at work.

None of them have lasted as long as mind did and of course I don't know any more than them being off with a tummy bug.

My main worry was the blood. IBS / loose stools I have lived with for many years and a tummy bug I can deal with even as nasty as the one I just had but I am worried about the blood and not having very much medical advice to go on now until the middle of next week. The only thing I have is the one thing the doctor said to my wife yesterday that “she isn't surprised about the blood with what I have been through” but was that just a flippant comment. I wasn't there was that actually meant about the blood. Can having an illness or diarrhoea cause blood to occur? These are all things I just don't know. Also will it cure itself or do I need medication to help it get better? I know only a doctor after examination can really tell me the answers to these questions but I have to wait a while for that to happen and I am worried. My wife says try not to but of course its not that easy to just switch off worrying, which worry in itself can make your tummy do strange things.

Again thanks for your comments before.

Ramakin, Red has given great advice.

The reason you are advised to see your DR when you pass blood in your stool is because sometimes it's bad news. Mostly it's either something transitory (like irritation from a bad infection/diarrhea, or hemorrhoids) or something chronic and treatable, like proctitis. It seems likely to me that with your history and current situation you are going to be on the good side of this issue. It's great that you have gone to the DR and they are right to take a wait and see attitude.

The diagnostic procedures that come next are pretty invasive. It doesn't make sense to do those yet. It is completely reasonable to wait for the diarrhea to pass and see how you are doing in another week or so. Since you have a history of IBS it isn't surprising that your diarrhea has lasted longer than your office-mates'.

I had rectal bleeding like yours for months before I went to a DR, and it was another year before I got a proctitis diagnosis. On the other hand, my dad had a bout of enteritis (gut virus) and he had diarrhea for 2 years with no diagnosis (multiple scopes). The gut is complicated. Your DR will figure it out, and you can always come to this forum for good support.

The next diagnostic steps are blood tests to look for inflammatory markers and stool samples to look for bad bugs like C.Diff. Hang in there. Breathe deeply. Keep eating the easy foods. Drink lots of water.

i would definitely give them a stool sample and i hope you do this. at every minutes of this mess, you are in charge and you do not have to let them do anything invasive.

get a stool sample there and see what the results are.