Good food... Bad food!?

When I'm flaring I try to use the rule of "if it LOOKS like it could hurt going out, it probably will" or if it burns your mouth (spicy) it will probably burn your butt! But not everything will have the same effect on everyone or even every time you eat it.. Like sometimes I can't eat popcorn, chips, chili, chicken, anything greasy, pizza, red sauce, fruit with skins, salads, nuts, dairy... I mean the list really goes on and on. But there are occasions when I certainly can handle these things. Basically, moderation is key.

The reason I am not on ant meds, is because for the last 2 years I have been traveling the glob a lot (mainly due to work) and had doctors that um and ah about my case. for first year I was told it was IBS, I believe that the doctor who told me was very bad, as he didn't carry out a single test, and only spoke to me for 5 minutes.

so for first year, was also throwing up regularly for first 6 months and lost 25lbs in weight! (I normally weigh 180ish and was extremely fit and healthy) I spent 6 months of this time living in whistler, canada, and the healthy relaxed lifestyle helped a lot, so I felt was getting better, so I just figured that i was on a road to recovery.

I left Canada, and went home, and work was stressful and life was tough, and I suffered from depression etc etc... and it flasred up again. I saw another few docs and specialists did another bunch of tests including colonoscopy and endoscopy... lovely! they took biopsies and found inflamation cells, but for whatever reason they didn't seem certain of what my condition was. they gave me asacol which I took 6 a day for a month, and they made me flare up really badly, so I stopped taking them.

about 6 months ago I felt I was getting a bit better again slowly, gut wasn't as sore, I wasn't running to toilet as frequently and my energy wasn't quite as low, so I thought I would just stay med free and hope I got better on my own. (if you hadn't guessed, i really don't like the idea of pumping myself full of drugs, I don't even like taking asprin).

It got bad about 4 months ago when I had to go to taiwan for a month with work. there were a number of factors that caused this I think.

firstly the food was all very greasy and slimey. I was working 12 hours a day 6 days a week under stressful conditions. It was on average about 38C with 98% humidity, and I wasn't exactly enjoying the whole experience.

I have been suffering since then, and it got really bad. One doc prescribes me a steroid enema, which maybe helped a little, but certainly didn't solve anything. I was home for about 2 months, but I couldn't get an appointment with any specialists, and the GP's didn't want to prescribe me with anything incase the diagnosis was wrong. and I have now been in Canada for 4 weeks and struggling. back to going to toilet roughly 10 times a day, and 3-4 times a night, with lots of blood. I am meant to be riding bikes every day (I am a mountain bike designer btw). but my energy is very low, and its hard, because everyone wants to ride with me all day every day, and I just can't do it.

thats the basis of my story. I am really fed up, mainly fed up of having such low energy. I LOVE being active and doing my 'extreme sports', so this illness has really been a massive bow to my life. I just want to learn how to control it better so I can do what I love doing again.

thanks for your help everyone, it means a lot to me!

I wonder why you are not on any meds.

The lifestyle you have currently (travelling all around the world with lots of stress) won't get you into remission. I think you should give your health the highest priority and take your time and figure out what's going on and get better before you resume your normal business activity. You don't want to get to a point when your whole body collapse and then seek help. Go see a specialist and get treatment and then you can plan everything after that!

Hi,

I personally think it is unlikely that you can control your symptoms by avoiding bad foods and eating good foods though there is a thread a month or two back detailing some positive results from spinach and sunflower seeds. Search "spinach" and you should find it.

I was like you, very physically active with an aversion to pills who had a habit of enduring and ignoring every ailment I suffered until it went away.  When I got UC, I didn't change my ways and just like you went  off colitis medication for a long time and endured and ignored the symptoms hoping they would go away for good.  Six months ago when I was in the hospital a young GI doc stood by my bed, patted my leg and said to me, "You do realize that you will have IBD for the rest of your life, don't you?"  The truth was that I did not believe I would, but I do believe now.  I hope you know this too.  It may also be the case that you will have medication every day for this disease for years, or for the rest of your life.

I agree with everyone who wrote you that you should seek medical advice.  I bet a good doc, when you explained your travelling, would be willing to treat you long distance through phone and email.  You can have a blood test in any old place and fax results to doc.  Don't delay.  You shouldn't have to suffer needlessly.  When you get your energy back it will feel better than anything else and you will never take it for granted again.

Thanks guys,

madabs, you are right, that is exactly how I am thinking, I know that it is a life long condition, but I have not really accepted this yet, sometimes I do, othertimes I don't. basically I want to fight it rather than just accept it.

Peety, testing for food sensitivities is a good idea, I was wondering if this was posible. I have tried cutting out various things like dairy etc, but nothing helped. interesting to hear that fiber might be bad... haha, to think that the first doctor I saw put me on high fiber drinks for the first 6 months... oh dear.

I am taking into account your suggestions and advice and I am really apprciative of it, so thankyou very much. I don't think I am quite at the stage of accepting I have it for life yet, maybe it will come with time, but til then I am going to try everything I can to get well. I will definately post if I find something that really helps me.

Thanks

Yeah, I have been wanting to kind of settle down a bit more for a while now. I am moving to a new place in Edinburgh (Scotland) within a month, and although I will still have to travel with work, I think that since I will now have a real home that I can call my own that this will help settle me a lot. I plan to find a good doctor there and go through with everything they suggest.

thanks for the link, I'll check that out!

A good rule of thumb is while flaring to avoid anything that hurts or you can see in the stool (corn, nuts, insoluble fibers like tomato skins etc.) Eat less refined sugar and smaller more frequent meals. Take a digestive enzyme before meals and chug some metamucil after meals. Try eating more garlic if you can take it, its a miracle worker. And finally take some probiotics, anything that you can find that has human microflora in it with at least 1 billion viable organisms. Enteric coated is good but you can take with meals to increase colonization due to the "nooks and crannies" they can hide from the acid in your food.