Just wanted to share my experience with e-cigarettes and UC in case anyone is interested

Hello, I haven't been on here in a while but I thought I would share my experience with smoking/UC in case it is helpful for anyone else.

I smoked for about 7 years and then quit and got UC about a year or two after that. I have no idea if it is related or not. My doctor said that after my first scope that it was the mildest case of UC he had ever seen and put me on Asacol and my next scope he said it was one of the worst cases of UC he had ever seen. He said I had pan colits with no involvement in the rectum. Anyway, I had a tough year and a half or so dealing with UC involving many tapers of pred and several different medications...asacol and about every 5 asa out there. I started remicade and stopped the 5 asa's and it didn't make a big difference for the first few months and I started smoking again. I got better mostly. I have no idea if it was the remicade finally kicking in, stopping the 5 asa's or smoking...or perhaps a combination of factors.

I was still going to the bathroom 5-8 times a day but I had no pain except sometimes right before I used the restroom and no blood. I was nervous about quitting smoking but my doctor basically said that smoking is worse for you than UC so I decided that I needed to quit after I had a clean scope with no active UC but he said I have non active UC. I don't really know what that means...possibly scaring?

Anyway, so I bought an ecig and stopped smoking that day with no problem. I am assuming I didn't have problems because you are still getting nicotine. So I have been using the e cig for about three weeks now and I have gotten better than I have ever been. I go to the bathroom once or twice a day. I am still on the remicade and that is the only medication I have been on for the last two years with one flare in which I tried two antibiotics (which worked) based on a study I read. I didn't want to do a pred taper.

So anyway, this could mean several things. It could be that the cigarettes were causing me to have more problems with UC or possibly I have IBS also and the cigarettes were affecting that. It could be that something in the e cig is making my UC better. I have heard that it causes constipation in some people so maybe it is slowing me down a bit.

So my goal is to try and wean myself off the ecig slowly and see if my UC is affected. Sorry for the long post......hopefully there is someone out there that this will help. When I was extremely sick I found this site very helpful and encouraging.

Also, in my humble opinion, my experience has been that what I ingest affects my digestive system. I have done quite a bit of trial and error and I don't know if this means I have IBS on top of my UC or not. I know there are a lot of studies out there which say that what you eat etc. doesn't affect UC but I am not 100% convinced. I have learned to pay attention to my body over the last few years, and I can tell when I need to what what I eat, not stress and make sure I am sleeping 8-9 hours to revamp my body. If I don't listen, I start having problems.

There is a definite correlation between cigarettes and UC. I smoked for 14 years. Quit in 1988 or 89. By 1991 I was diagnosed with proctitis and then a year later full blown UC. After my first scope my doctor asked if I wasn't sure I hadn't been having symptoms a lot longer than the past 2 years. He said my colon's lining looked like a spider web. At this point in time he didn't know I was a previous smoker. Several years later during a conversation during one of my visits I mentioned I was an ex-smoker. He said that explained why my colon looked so scarred during the first scope. Nicotine reduces the symptoms of ulcerative colitis. I stayed a nonsmoker until my divorce in 2005. I started again, symptoms all but disappeared, started gaining weight, etc. Twice since then I've tried to quit and stayed on the 21mg patch for nicotine replacement. Neither time did the patches helped. Severe painful flares, most recently a month ago the second time I quit. I sawa my doctor earlier this week and he said there is no real evidence that nicotine replacement will help. I started smoking again and within 2 days feeling much better. While I hate the fact that I started smoking again, I do feel much better. Since 2005 I've kept my cigarette intake under 10 a day.