Thickened intestines, permanent?

Ever since my severe flareups from years ago, I feel that my intestines have thickened up and feel very stiff.

Even on the CT scan, it shows thickened bowel in all areas, unfortunately, consistent with IBD.

I'm not a fan of working out my oblique muscles but whenever I do them, I can feel the ascending colon(right lower abdomen area) not being able to stretch out. I don't know how to explain this correctly.

If I put my fingers to some parts of my abdomen, I can feel the linings of my large intestine. It's even worse when I'm going thru a flareup. I feel that my transverse colon and it hurts like **** when I press against it or when gas gets trapped.

I'm doing okay right now. Down to 2.5mg of prednisone..

I need your insight on this.

I met another fellow IBDer around my age and he said that he had the exact same thing until he tried acupuncture doctor who treats treats just by using acupressure Meridian points, which are in feet and hands without putting them needles in the areas of belly.

Okay, I'm getting off topic.

It's like, I NEED TO RENEW MY INTESTINE. I NEED A NEW ONE. sorry for caps. this is what I truly feel.

I really want to grow out a new one even if it takes going back to my mother womb.
Just kidding.

Post Edited (PatrickLee) : 8/10/2013 10:34:44 PM (GMT-6)

garylouisville said...
I hear ya. My doctor thinks my UC is in remission but that now I have IBS. My only real symptoms are frequency and occasional urgency. By frequent BM's are always small and I can sort of feel that my colon is all shriveled up. I think this contributes to having a lot of gas as I believe my colon is actually closed up in some spots until enough pressure builds up to force things through. I'm hoping it's not permanent but it never seems to get any better.

oh okay. I feel the same thing.

bump:

Anyone else have the same problem or resolve this issue with medication alone???

If the thickening is caused by inflammation, then in theory it should go once the inflammation does, but repeated healing of the colon over the years can cause structural damage. The normal folds of the colon are erased and it becomes stiff and smooth like a leadpipe in appearance: that is permanent.

My colon was described as 'featureless' back in 2007, so sometimes I wonder how mild my 'mild' disease really was in those first few years :-/

Anyway, you can try acupuncture. It won't actually heal anything, but if it makes you feel better perhaps it will have some value in that. I feel you on wishing I could grow a new colon (and in my case have it transplanted): stem cell therapy and the growing of whole human organs has not panned out yet, unfortunately.

My colon walls are covered in scar tissue. It stills works pretty well, although my stool is always softer. I never thought about it feeling different. I guess I would not know what a normal colon feels like! It is what it is.

I once saw a pathology photo of a (removed) IBD intestine compared to a normal one. The IBD one was definitely shortened, looked way less flexible and stiff compared to the normal one. I read somewhere that the scarring does make it this way and that (sorry) it remains that way. I have a few bad skin scars and those scars I would describe the same way--less flexible than non-scarred skin. And the intestinal epithelial tissue is very similar to skin except skin has the outer keratinization........yeah it sucks to be us, doesn't it?