Colitis with IBS

Thanks for your replies... and also your encouragement, kazbern and imagardener2. I've started keeping a food diary as, despite 6 months of intro-ing SCD properly and then intro-ing allowable foods every 3-4 days, I've found it almost impossible to identify trigger foods. Except coffee... and the ones I cut out before starting SCD, like wheat and most dairy. I have also started to feel that no practitioner is going to solve this problem for me. I haven't seen one naturopath, nutritionist or functional doctor who supports SCD - they all think it's too extreme and say things like, 'just try introducing some potato' or, '2 squares of dark chocolate a day is actually good for you'... I might try the psyllium thing, but I see from other posts on here (have been circulating for a while before committing!) that there's confusion between psyllium husk and psyllium seed.

Kazbern - would you mind advising me on which you think is better? Does it help IBS as well as colitis?

Dennyrae - no wonder you've become such a self-managing patient after that experience! It's like an extreme version of how I was diagnosed in the first place. My GP/family doctor kept telling me I had post-infective IBS coupled with paranoia. I just had a feeling about it, so I got rid of her and found a new one who immediately sent me to the specialists for a colonoscopy.

All I really want now is to maintain a good enough level of health to look after and enjoy the baby when she comes. Obviously I would like to be totally symptom free but I think that's a long way off.

Madeleine, I take psyllium in capsule form, which turns out to be husks. It took me a loooooong time to get to the point where I was even willing to consider psyllium, and I only did it relatively recently, to deal with some motility issues that some GIs might call IBS. Psyllium helps bulk my stool and keeps it moving. Without this, my bowel is very slow and I end up having upper GI pain and nausea. Even with a slow bowel, though, my stool is always soft. It's a mystery. My last scope found no evidence of inflammation.

Psyllium is good for UC because it is considered a pre-biotic. It provides nutrients for the kind of gut flora you WANT in your colon. Psyllium is also good for motility issues. Psyllium is NOT good if you have active inflammation in the terminal ileum (or probably anywhere) because it can raise the risk of an obstruction and/or cause additional pain. I tried adding fiber very early in my life as an IBDer and it was awful. So this time I started with one capsule per day and built up very slowly to three. I recently added another (it's been two years at least) and now I'm at four.

I hope that's helpful, it's probably more information than you asked for!