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2-3 BM's/day seems normal.

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Ulcerative Colitis
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Posted 6/28/2011 3:04 AM (GMT 0)
I feel pretty normal going this many times per day. Usually it is one or two in the morning, and one just after work. I know the goal seems to be one per day, but I am definitely not wasting my time when heading to the pot. The trips for the most part aren't due to urgency now, but due to necessity it seems. I'm still improving, and open to whatever happens... but I'm just kind of wondering if this is about as good as it might get for me, frequency wise.

Does anyone know, or know of articles that mention if healthy people go 2-3 times per day?
Posted 6/28/2011 3:41 AM (GMT 0)
Before I got UC I had three a day. I read years ago that it's normal for people to have that many movements, but we're not considered 'healthy/normal'.

Congrats on feeling almost normal :)
Posted 6/28/2011 11:42 AM (GMT 0)
I to go 2-3 times per day. I have read that normal is anywhere in the range of three times per week up to three times per day. I have also heard that you should go the same number of times as the number of meals you consume the previous day. That was anecdotal so I usually hold the first in a higher regard; I have read it in many places. It is a pain going three times, but I don't consider it a sign of flaring.

When I was bleeding last November and had a perfect sigmoidoscopy up to my distal transverse colon (he found internal hemmies as the likely culprit of the blood), I was still going 3X/day then.

Posted 6/28/2011 11:48 AM (GMT 0)
I don't need an article to tell me that 2-3 times a day for healthy individual is...well healthy! :) I live with it daily - my husband and two kids. They also have urgency. I think the urgency we feel is a bit different though. While flaring, when our urgency hits it can be painful not like the "normals".

I am in remission but I go about 5 times a day - sometimes less or sometimes more. I have other bowel issues though. I don't try to get to my pre-Uc days - for me it's an impossibility. I take it as it comes. I used to think if only I can get down to once or twice a day, things will be golden but then I would only set myself up for disappointment and discouragment.

I'm glad to hear you are doing better!
Posted 6/28/2011 3:04 PM (GMT 0)
How much output you have also depends on how much input you have! :) I am in remission, and the number of bowel movements totally depends on how much I am eating. When it's Christmas pig-out time, I have big bowel movements at least once a day... when I am in restricted calorie mode, like now, I have a decent-sized bowel movement maybe every 3 days.
Posted 6/28/2011 5:10 PM (GMT 0)
Pre-UC, I went one a day about 20 minutes after I got up in the morning.

Now, I go 2-3 times a day within the first 1 1/2 hours after waking.
Posted 6/28/2011 5:18 PM (GMT 0)
i go once or twice a day.
always in the morning, 30 -60 mins after i wake up and sometimes later in the afternoon.
just before diagnose and SCD i was going 5-7 times. No D, but a lot of gas and the feeling of incomplete defecation.


i told my self what's happening now is normal. going only once would be perfect. but what the heck, i am no Mr. Perfect. As long as i feel ok, do my job, have energy, my joint pain levels are dropping - is good for me. I do not expect it to be as in my 20's :)
so i say: if you go once, twice, trice or more and you feel ok, why bother? why add another stressful issue to our life?
Posted 6/28/2011 6:38 PM (GMT 0)
I read once that it was more the amount and not times. This doctor believed that you should be going at least 12 inches a day to be properly removing toxins. According to him some people go once 12 inches in one trip, some go twice 6 inches each or 3 times 4 inches each time.

Makes good sense to me that it should be more about output not times.
Posted 6/28/2011 6:45 PM (GMT 0)
Pre-UC I went 2 - 3 times daily (more so 2 times). This was absolutely normal for me. Now I go on average 4 times daily. I am not flaring (at least I hope not) but I also have IBS so I think if or until that settles down, my normal is now 4 times a day. Obviously 2 times is better but 4 times is still manageable.

cupcakespinkgal said...
I read once that it was more the amount and not times. This doctor believed that you should be going at least 12 inches a day to be properly removing toxins. According to him some people go once 12 inches in one trip, some go twice 6 inches each or 3 times 4 inches each time.

Makes good sense to me that it should be more about output not times.

I like this idea. Sometimes when I go to the toilet, only a tiny bit comes out, hardly emptying my bowels at all but I still include that "trip" as one of my daily BMs. Sometimes I still can feel there is stuff up there but it just doesn't come out until a later BM.
Posted 6/28/2011 7:29 PM (GMT 0)

MaxMilian said...

I like this idea. Sometimes when I go to the toilet, only a tiny bit comes out, hardly emptying my bowels at all but I still include that "trip" as one of my daily BMs. Sometimes I still can feel there is stuff up there but it just doesn't come out until a later BM.

this is a common IBD symptom when flaring. at least it's what my GI told me...
Posted 6/28/2011 10:11 PM (GMT 0)
Pre-UC I was 4-5x a day - and that didn't require much input (1500 cal/day). That was my "normal"
Posted 6/29/2011 4:03 AM (GMT 0)

Alinus said...


this is a common IBD symptom when flaring. at least it's what my GI told me...

My GI said it was IBS because I am not displaying other classic IBD symptoms. IBS and IBD symptoms are so confusing :-(. Oh well.
Posted 6/29/2011 6:42 AM (GMT 0)
indeed :)
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