DOes Stress CAuse UC

I should say that i think heavy antibiotic use over many years is the major culprit in my opinion. Then comes hormonal changes.

I voted "emotional stress, worrying, anxiety, etc...

     My GI told me that although stress does not cause IBD, it can make flares much worse.  I found that to be true.  My UP was not too bad until the year 2003 when my daughter was going through a messy divorce.  We practically had to raise our grandkids for two or three years while she had to try to get her life back in order...ex son in law hid tons of money and left her almost destitute...anyway, that did it for me.  I just had a horrible time trying to get into a remission.  I finally had surgery in 2010.

I've been wondering about this since I don't have UC but my brother and daughter do, so clearly I have the genes. Since my daughter's dx I've been under unimaginable amounts of stress (though I have had abnormal stressful incidents from my teens on really). So, I figure I'll come down with something sometime soon. I wouldn't be surprised. So far nothing though and it's been 2.5 years since her dx.

Who knows exactly what my trigger was. I know it's an inherited tendency for me...but during the time when I experienced the first blow-out of extreme diarrhea and over a short period of time a weightloss of 17 pounds, I was already in a physical distressed state of sensitivities and reactions.

I think it was the overuse of lawn "poisons" that was big in the 80s that broke down my body after being diagnosed with asthma 5 years previous.

Medications that I took during that time were not antibiotics, but were NSAIDS for my extreme back/neck/body pains caused by Spray and stretch treatments that backfired.

I might also have eaten something that caused a gastro bug considering my body was already distressed.

Whatever it was...I was relieved to have finally been referred to and diagnosed by my GI, 3 years after the initial crappola started....My "then" doctor didn't think I had anything to be concerned about...riiiiiiiiight!

Regarding stress...I can definitely see a correlation to flares, but more distress in situations I have no control. I use my medications faithfully...so at least I have a maintenance regimen.

I couldn't vote since there was nothing that fits my situation of genetics....

q

Marianne,
Wow, yeah that is a lot. When my daughter was dx the first thing they wanted to know what who else had an AI disease in the family - it's only my brother btw. I have some environmental allergies but who doesn't these days? Fingers crossed your kids like your brothers won't ever meet their "trigger".

Thank you so much everyone for your responses...i have tried to modify the poll to include quitting smoking but couldn't, sorry to those who were unable to vote due to this option not being available. I didn't include genetics since i figured we all must have them but exactly what caused them to turn on so to speak.

I gotta say though that no one in my family from either side has IBD or IBS for that matter! Lucky me :D
My mum though has subtle issues that come and go so she never thought of having things tested but now she is going to a GI soon i think she got freaked out by my experience and diagnosis which came when i was nearly on my deathbed.

Stereofidelic89 i can associate with your first experience; my first experience of what i now think was UP was 3 years before getting the real symptoms after childbirth. I remember how i kept going frequently to the bathroom for nearly a month and how tests kept coming back negative..i remember it first started when everyone in my family got a minor gastro after eating out and i got it too however they all improved after a couple of days but mine continued for nearly a month!!!
I, too, was going through a relationship at the time however it only became stressful after i got sick because i had to keep going to doctors appointments and found difficult to get him to understand what i was going through then everything started to unravel and we broke up soon after. And it didn't help when everybody (GPs included) kept telling me i had irritiable bowel syndrome (IBS) because stool tests and bloods kept coming clear despite them not testing everything like ESR or CRP which are the inflammation markers Nor did i get a colonscopy done. It was so ridiculous now that i remember it and i think that played a huge part in why i broke up the relationship because i thought that maybe the stress of keeping up a long distance relationship was contributing to the so-called IBS.

Now i realise it wasn't IBS!!!

In 2011 when i really flared properly this time i think i also got scared that everyone was going to tell me to 'stay calm' because it's 'just IBS' and sure enough alot of GPs told me that it was just postnatal stress. How condescending!!! but as things kept getting worse i went to the hospital (although the GPs kept telling me it's nothing) and got diagnosed. In a way i was glad that i wasn't just this crazy person who couldn't relax....

How stupid!! i mean obviously if you are going to the toilet 7 times a day, unable to eat, and passing purely liquid stool and on top of that you have a screaming crying 1 month old baby demanding to be breastfed then OBVIOUSLY you will feel nervous and worried.

stresss brings on my flares stronger and causes a lot more symptoms, but i don't believe it causes uc.

Stress is certainly unwelcome when flaring. If on prednisone it skyrockets because your so edgy. I used to think stress brought on flares. I have never thought it was the root cause of UC. I no longer think it brings on flares either. I have off the charts stress now with taking on a 2nd home, working up to 100 hours per week usually not sleeping at all one night or the next day, several nights at 2 hours sleep. Move-out coming move-in coming, lining up sole decision making motion for my daughter yet the ONLY thing not adding the stress is I am NOT in a flare ( thank god ).

In fact I wondered today if stress cranks up my cortisol it will provide protection since that is what prednisone is mimicking.

That said, I am somewhat in the driver seat of the stress these days, other stress where other people control my fate has a DEEP worrying effect on me and that is worse. When I was taking my daughter to a child family investigator ( CFI ) years ago I pulled one all nighter preparing final documents and I was freaked out because it was all in the hands of a CFI who seemed out of touch. Within 24 hours I had begun a flare that slid worse until I was in the hospital. New job was stressful too and I was not sure how much control I had over that at the time. I nearly called and quit from my hospital bed.

Stress is overall higher now but its actionable stress where I can do something, the other stress where all I can do is fret and worry that seems to be the killer stress.

I eat healthy, workout and am stress free for the most part.

If where an option for: it's a disease and we don't know the trigger I would have voted for that.

I know stress was key for me, but I definitely don't think it caused my disease. At the time I was diagnosed I was working full time, student teaching, applying to very competitive grad schools and studying for/taking two GREs. I think the disease was going to hit me sooner or later, but the stress caused the "sooner." I took my medications religiously and found severe stress to be a definite trigger for flares. It had to be severe stress though, like someone dying or major family strife. Day to day stressors didn't trigger a flare.

my vote is that this thing is genetic, and is triggered by something either in the environment or possibly in the diet as a food intolerance. 

I never thought stress played a big role in my uc.  I have had uc 21 years, with a 15 year remission from 1991-2006 (in 2001 and 2004 i had other issues emerge though, GERD, +H pylori, gastristis) .  And oh believe me i had HUGE HUGE amts of stress in those 15 years.  And when you hear about babies and little children getting this, well, they dont have stress.

i do think stress can weaken the immune system, but really who doesnt have stress these days?