Flare or Not?

Question re: flares. Typically when I am flaring I have blood, mucous and D as well as abdominal soreness. I don't have the B or M and mostly formed stools that are very dark - nearly black and occasional - maybe 3 X per week watery D. Questions - dark stool - is this indicative of bleeding higher up in the colon? The watery D, since it is minimal could this just be due to all the scar tissue or perhaps IBS? It tends to come on for 3 days, roughly 3 X per day typically after eating then back to formed stool. Thanks in advance! By the way, I really appreciate everyone on the forum sharing their knowledge and experience.

I only use them when I see blood or mucous. Haven't had to use them since August. Had a blip in symptoms due to being on vacation and eating and drinking with abandon.

"dark stool - is this indicative of bleeding higher up in the colon?" Yes, bright red is rectal bleeding, darker wine colored red indicates sigmoid colon through some of the small intestine. Black is usually stomach or high small intestine.

Intestinal scaring or lead-pipping results in muscle motility issues which impacts the movement of your stool. It's either one extreme or another as a consequence: diarrhea or troubles passing stool. It really depends where it is and how severe. A normal large intestine has thin walls and a ripple pattern when seen through an x-ray. An intestine with scaring appears thick walled and has no or little wave pattern, looks like a lead pipe in x-ray, hence the name. That impacts the muscle motion that normally moves stool along at a normal rate. It happens after decades of having uc, damage from repeat flare and heal cycles.

just curious, what kind of reaction to the mesalamine oral ? so you didn't try the enemas ?

Adverse reaction probably wasn't the correct choice of words.

Mrs. Brady said...
Soy - no other meds - adverse reactions to mesalamine and Imuran.

iPoop - Thanks, I was thinking it was indicative of bleeding higher up as well, just looking for confirmation in the absence of other symptoms. Looks like I'll be heading to biologics, most likely Humira.

If you can get your insurance to pay for it by all means try the Humira. The injections are no worse than a flu shot and it's been a godsend for me.

Good luck with it.