Constipation? And laxatives?

Hi Again,

So I was finally referred to a GI here in England, and I saw him on Friday. He believed I was quite constipated (he did an x-ray to check) and suggested that all my pain was due to that. So he suggested I take a gentle laxative to clear things out. In the meantime he'd arranged for a sigmoidoscopy (within the next three months) to look further at my left side to see if there was inflammation there at a later date. I had been taking Prednisone enemas and so the lowest portions that he was able to see at the appointment looked perfectly healthy. He also wanted me to come off of the NSAID and Codine pain pills that I had, and just to use normal paracetemal. Two GIs that I have seen now have told me that these attacks that I have which are associated with a lot of pain and the need to go to the washroom are not related to UC. But I don't think it could be from anything else, I was bleeding when this all started.

I did as he suggested and took the laxative, and when that "worked" I definitely was cleared out, but have never been in that much pain before. It was agonizing, and after it was all done I could actually feel a good amount of pain in my left side there, and of course there was again bright red blood at the end. This leads me to believe that there's still some inflammation in my left side that the prednisone can't reach.

I've never had problems with constipation before, so for me this is somewhat troublesome. I'm also a little concerned at how readily the GI told me to take a laxative and just see what happens. He said something like "We can't treat the UC when you are constipated, for reasons I can't explain to you."

I guess my question to you all is would you push to get back in to see the doctor again and explain what happened when I took the laxative? And maybe get that scope done sooner, because I'm concerned that maybe this is more of a slight blockage than just constipation. My only other thought was to try and control it on my own with foods that have a little more fibre and can help act as a natural source of roughage.

As always, any thoughts or ideas would be welcome.

Thanks so much.

My husband has chronic constipation and doctor prescribed fiber like Metamucil and a stool softener - no laxative.

ElaineNY