Need Some Suggestions.

Hi everyone, I just found this site and I would like to ask a couple of questions. Unfortunately I am usually on the CPPS forum because I have had something they call chronic pelvic pain for the past ten years. I do not have pelvic pain, but I have urinary pain issues. I'm a 31 year old male and I have a contruction business. Anyway my fear is that I now have IBS because of the horror stories I have read while trying to see what could be wrong. My symptoms may not sound that bad, but they make my other problem worse. My story is about 3 months ago I woke up from a dead sleep with horrible stomach cramps that turned into diareha for a few hours. I never get this and my stools have always been very solid and I have a bowel movement about every 2 days. The diareha stopped but every since I have had abdominal discomfort, a lot of gas, I have been having 1-2 bowel movements a day and they are not as solid as before. I also kind of feel like its going to be diareha each time I go and I also feel like I have to go almost all the time. Eating seems to have not effect, but after a BM I feel like my colon is pushing more to get ready to come out, and my stomach starts to hurt a little worse. I seen my GP and she said her first thought was IBS but since my symptoms started out the way they did she thought maybe it was an infection and gave me a few antibiotics and a perscription for Levsin, which doesnt do anything. I would go in for some tests w/ a GI but I dont have insurance and cant afford the tests. I was just wondering if anyone had any thoughts on what else this could be, or what could help. Sorry for the long post!!

You could try taking calcium supplements to help make your stools more solid. The recommended brand is Caltrate 600 w/vitamin D. That's formulated to be a bit constipating. Calcium can also help soothe the intestinal lining inflamed by an infection, bad bacteria, too much bile or other things.

You may also want to take probiotics, especially since you are on antibiotics. Good, multi-strain products include Digestive Advantage and Culturelle. You can find them in most chain drug stores in the bowel products section. They can be a bit pricey, though. If you need something cheaper, you can try just plain acidophillus pills, but don't take more than one a day to start with, because they can give you gas cramps. All probiotics can give you gas, actually, but several of us have noticed that acidophillus on its own is worse. You will adjust to it after a week or two, then you may want to take more than one a day, especially if you feel some improvements. If you are a milk drinker, you can also switch to acidophillus milk, and/or eat yogurt. Actavia is the new yogurt that's out that's supposed to be full of extra bacteria strains, but someone here at work had some and I looked at it and it didn't look like it had any more strains than the Stoneyfield organic yogurt that I get. Whatever brand is cheaper and/or has the flavors you like. Whatever method you chose, if you have bad bacteria that's upseting your guts, the probiotics will eventually oust it. Notice I say eventually. You should give them a month to work; if you aren't improved by them any after a month, then you probably don't have a bacteria problem. If you are cured in a week or two, then that may have well been your problem.

You may want to continue to drink the acidophillus milk or eat yogurt on occasion just to give your guts a little boost, especially if you are traveling or camping. I have observed that if you have something wrong with your guts once, you seem to catch/get other gut problems easily, so you need to be ever wary of what you eat and as soon as you develop a problem, hit it with some probiotics and calcium (if you're having loose stools) and head it off.

Hi Garys, welcome to HealingWell!
I see the girls have covered just about everything.
I hope you find the support you are looking for here.
Take care.

Hey Garys,
Junk food it definitely not good for IBS. Fat and preservatives can trigger IBS symptoms. Once a week I usually make a large batch of soup and take some with me to work all week. It's boring but really good and safe. You can also try lean meats with plain things, like rice or potatoes.
Unfortunately, today there is still no cure for IBS. It can get better (or worse) depending on what is causing your IBS. Sometimes it's a bacterial overgrowth that you can make better with the right antibiotics. Other times it's a bad gallbladder that can be helped by removing and taking meds. More often than not, we don't know so we have to play it by ear. Keep seeing the doc and asking for new ideas and ways to treat your IBS. If you can figure out what foods are bothering you most, and avoiding them, you can manage pretty well and not be house bound.
Calcium really seems to help - have you considered that?

I eat in at work everyday and always have. You say you have a construction business; do you have an office you can eat at, or are you always on the road or at a job site? It's not too hard to pack a lunch either way, but access to a microwave can be helpful. If you are on the road all the time, get a thermos and fill it up with any kind of soup or stew that you want and then microwave it at home until it's boiling. Cap it and take it with you; it will still be hot enough to be tasty by lunchtime. You can also pack sandwiches in a lunch box with a cool pack and they will keep well enough, even in a hot vehicle, until lunch. You can put your meat on the bread beforehand, but don't add lettuce, tomatoes or condiments until you are ready to eat it or it will get soggy. I usually eat soup, salad and crackers with dip for lunch. Salads are easy enough to pack for lunch and putting them in a big lunch box with a cool pack will keep the lettuce from wilting. Add dressing and croutons when you get ready to eat it. You can also pack cheese spreads, seafood dips and the like and eat that on crackers. You can find recipes online and in magazines for them or just buy some from the deli section of most grocery stores. And given that summer's almost here, you can even use your car to do a decent job of heating up leftovers. about an hour before you want to eat lunch, take your leftovers and sit them up on the dashboard in the full sunlight. That should warm them up about as well as a toaster oven on low. And then there are things that taste okay cold. Quiche is one thing that I can think of. Oh, I just remembered reading about a woman whose husband works construction and she said they went to a Flying J station (big truck stop) and they got a little truck oven for like $30 and you plug it into your cigarette lighter and it works like a toaster over. With one of those, you'd never want for a hot meal, even in the wintertime.

If you want to try the probiotic route, you definitely have to take them for more than three days; it takes them a while to oust the bad bacteria in suffcient numbers (and establish themselves) to make a difference. It's not like taking a chemical medicine where you see relief quickly; it's something that has to have time to make a cumulative effect.

IBS can get worse, but most of us reach a certain level and stay there. Things can aggrevate it and make it flare, but just because you may have IBS now doesn't mean that you will necessarily wind up housebound. Some people do, but I think most of us aren't that bad. And if you just have a bad bacteria problem, and you get that cleared up, you should be good to go for life.

Fast-foods, processed foods, sugar and sugar substitutes can be killers for both IBS and IBD....you should really get scoped (colonoscopy) to try and rule out IBD as well as stool samples tested and blood work.