Do you have pain - confused!

I just read someones post about how it affects your daily life when you are in a flare and most peoples response was urgency and the number of times they go a day.  This I can handle but when I go into a flare it is the pain that I cannot handle and find it very hard to function at all when I am in a flare. 

I always have to take about 4 - 5 weeks sick leave when in a flare.  My kids have to be looked after by other people.  I have pain all the time throughout the day which escalates when I need to go and basically feels like I am in labour when on the loo accompanied by hot sweats and sometimes vomiting.  I am fatigued and sleep mostly throughout the day (or cry)! I have broken sleep through the night as I have to go numerous times.  I eat very little as I completely lose my appetite which probably adds to the fatigue.

I find it hard to believe that anyone could function doing the day to day normal things knowing how I feel when in flare.  For those of you who say you never miss a days work you must be superwoman/man.

 

I always felt the same way, I don't know how in earth some people can work while flaring. You sound very much like me in my early years. I can honestly say, in that horrible gut wrenching, sweating, shaking, nausea, labor type pain actually got better for me as the years progressed.

Wow! I have yet to find someone who had my same symptoms as my last flare in the summer of '08. I had someone practically belittle me telling me that throwing up wasn't part of a "normal flare". Well obviously they've never really had a severe one like the one you just described. I was bedridden all summer with everything you just described.

I have a high tolerance for pain, but this pain can get so bad that I begin to sweat, shake, and almost pass out. This happened to me out of the blue a couple of weeks ago too. I'm not currently having a major flare, but I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. Towards the end I started to sweat, then shake, and just when I thought I was going to pass out I woke up my husband for fear that I might not wake back up. It's a horrifying experience. I've passed out a few times before and it's not pretty.

Yes, Yes and Yes. I get all that too. I often cannot function beyond the basics and have pain mostly in my lower abdomen and stomach-flu symptoms with each bm. The fatigue is awful. I am sometimes worried that I am not being a safe driver when I go out becaue I am so tired.

Geez. I'm sorry everyone is hurting so much.

Most of the time I am not in pain. The pain comes a few times a day when I need to go. However when I have urgency or when I go to the washroom during a flare, the pain is exquisite.

What can I say, I am not glad that other people out there go through what I go through but after receiving your replies to my post I now know that I am not just being a baby!

I was talking to my cousin last night who was diagnosed with UC 4 years ago and she just had her first severe flare like what we are talking about.  She was off work for 8 weeks and said she didn't know how I have handled having a flare each year of the 7 years I have been diagnosed, it's something she doesn't ever want to have a repeat of however unfortunatley you cannot control it.

One thing I would say though and I told her this is although my flares are still bad they are nowhere near as bad as the very first 2 flares I had. I remember at this time that I had to lie very still as any movement would send me to the loo, don't know why. And I lost about 4 stones in weight, weighed 6 stones when I started to get better. (Although needed to lose weight as was still carrying extra baby weight but 4 stone was a bit drastic)  My husband honestly thought I was dying. It was really terrible made worse by the fact I had a 6 month old baby who I couldn't look after and then you have all the guilt issues which I still have to deal with now and my kids are 7 and 4.

Also with regards to what someone said about working.  I too have an office job which has no stress involved, it is very easy going.  I changed jobs after my diagnosis to my present one as I knew I would be able to cope better.  But during a flare even having a bath tires me out, I need to go back to bed for an hour or so as I am drained so I just physically could not get to work.  The fatigue and pain is something that I had never experienced before getting UC and I think it probably just goes down to the severity of the disease.

Seems we don't all experience symptoms in the same way.

My worst pain during flaring is during the bm process. A teeny turd the size of a pea feels like the size of a watermelon. I call them white-knucklers, reduced to whimpers, squeals and tears... Horrific! I've not given birth, but I truly feel my experience could rival it. I'm totally exhausted after the process...only sure to repeat itself a number of times within a few hours. I do seem to get a break between the early day and evening, however.

Between bms, constantly I experience rectal throbbing/pulsating or whatever else one would call it....just feels like it's in constant spasm...that goes away in a few days once the enemas start to take effect on the inflammation.

I have the aches in my lower back, fatigue and cramping down into my legs (like I did during periods).

Nausea is pretty much a constant just before flaring and once the rectal cramping and painful bms start. I do get nausea between flares, however...seems not necessarily flare related, maybe food related or liver related.?

Bentylol is very helpful for general spasming and nausea, but during the bad times, I do use Gravol.

I read once in the CCFC magazine....a doctor stated that UC isn't painful. It seemed strange to read the opposite of what I experience, but if I'm not flaring, I do not have UC-related pain.

quincy