Newly Diagnosed

Hey guys. I'm an 18 year old male, newly diagnosed with ulcerative colitis( 3 months ago). I have had on going symptoms and signs of a flare up for about 4 months now. I'm on a number of medication ( prednisone, mezavant, pro-biotics and a number of other supplements and vitamins). The 4 months have been ups and downs, some weeks have been complete hell and others have been bearable. I was just wondering how long is it before it calms down and if anyone can help me out with the diet? If anyone can lead me to a previous post about diets with colitis? I was also wondering what are my limits on juice? what kind of juice am I allowed to drink? also what fruits should I avoid.

Thank you

injuredguy

there is no one-size-fits-all as far as diet. I will give you my answer but there are others who will say diet has no benefits for them. you will have to do your own research, using yourself as test case and find out what makes your gut angry or happy. the place to start is eliminating dairy and/or gluten, both are common problems.

My diet is based on Specific Carbohydrate Diet (google it for specifics).

What kind of juice? Try eliminating sugary juices and anything with caffeine. I don't drink any juice (that's just me).
What fruits to avoid? You need to start a food journal about your reactions several hours after eating, even the next day (gas? D? bloating?).

You can't rely on anyone elses reports on what foods are good for them.You need to listen your your own gut (and take notes).

Good luck

Sorry Gordon, I only saw one reply .Thank you for your reply as well =). And wow really 3 years? how intense would you say the flare is? and I really appreciate this, my teacher was the one who advised me to get on a forum, he has crohn's and said it helped him to have a place to talk about it. Right now I would say i have to go to the bathroom 10-20 times a day, I was wondering if that will decrease anytime soon since its very disruptive during classes and I have a lot of trouble getting good sleep since I wake up like 5 times every night.

I am glad that you feel a bit better, hopefully that continue on to improve. Thank you again. I guess ill just have to live on and see how it goes. seems like it's a different experience for everyone

Sorry to hear that =( I hope she is doing better now.

since you are somewhat familiar with the procedure, would you mind filling me in a bit? I just want to know all my options, I don't know if I can live with this for life, my symptoms have been pretty severe for 4 months, the blood just recently stopped but I still go very frequently, and it's always urgent. It's just the thing that I think about every day... and I also recently had surgery on my knee and I have been unable to have any success with my rehab cause I am just so weak. I lost 30 pounds. My legs got very skinny. I feel like I'll never get back to the life I used to have.

I started out on 6 pills for around 2-3 weeks, then I was reducing a pill a week. At 4 I relapsed bad. Now I am on 8. so 40mg ( 5mg each pill)

I know this will sound a bit crazy, but be thankful that you were diagnosed early. This way, you can be ahead of the game.

I implore you to read Aajonus Vonderplanitz's books, "We Want to Live" and "The Recipe for Living Without Disease."

These books will give you a new perspective on food. You will see how you can heal and even become stronger with the knowledge you obtain.

Injuredguy,

I am by no means a veteran, as many as the fine folks on this forum. I consider myself a newbie as I was diagnosed with UC in late 2010.

So, as a newbie,  I can tell you that diet does make a big difference.  When I was first diagnosed I was on no particular diet - and had 10-15 bathrooms runs a day. Heck, some days i couldn't even leave the house, because I had to stay near the toilet. But after much research, I found that foods have a direct effect. By trial and error, I found I am intolerant of wheat, oat, dairy, and if I stay away from those I was able to cut the bathroom runs to about 6-8 a day. But then I came across and interesting book on food combining, and did strict food combining - and that helped cut down the bathroom runs to 4-5 a day. Food combining seems pretty complicated until you learn the basic rules: fruits are eaten alone, proteins can be combined only with watery veggies (not starchy ones like carrots, etc...), carbs can only be combined with watery veggies. So the old steak (or chicken) with potatoes (or rice) is wrong - because that creates gastric and colonic distress.  Anyway, if you are interested, I'm sure you can look it up.

And for me, during a UC flare, as I am undergoing currently, I found that if I add any veggies or fruits, it worsens the bleeding. So I am currently on protein only diet.

If you like dairy, you can easily substitute Almond Milk, which is lactose and dairy free for regular milk.

I have found this forum to be a great solace - a place to ask questions, get answers, and great support for living with a very difficult condition.

Good luck to you.

Hey Insofla

You had mentioned that you came across a book on food combining, I was wondering what the name of the book was?

Primal:

I would be a liar if I said I was happy that it happened this early, but I guess you'r right in the sense that I can set myself up right now so that it's easier to deal with later on. It still sucks, really sucks . I can never go out with any of my friends anymore . I don't know. I don't know how ill deal with this while travelling. I don't know how how ill deal with this while I'm playing sports. It's just annoying to accept at this age for me.

Hi,

you need to tread carefully when changing your diet - as already mentioned, what works for some doesn't work for others. It really is a case of trial and error for each individual case. I quite often read about a new diet or supplement and feel excited that it might work but nothing changes. But, for your reference, here's is a list of diet changes that have helped me:

Food that causes my flare-ups - wholemeal bread, fibre cereals.

Diet changes in my flare-up that noticeably helped me:

cutting out all dairy (especially cheese) stopped mucus.

cutting out peas, runner beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, potato skins stopped bloating

cutting out carbonated drinks, baked beans, brussel sprouts (in fact any food that creates wind and makes the colon work) stopped bloating and caused less bleeding

For your info - my diet for the past 3 months (which seems to have settled my symtpoms down):

Breakfast: porridge (made with water, sweetened with clear honey) with sliced pear, apple (both peeled) and banana

or gluten/wheat free toast with butter made from olive oil

Lunch: gluten/wheat free toast with butter made from olive oil

Dinner: roast chicken or fish with carrots (peeled), mashed potato (peeled) or white rice.

Please remember, it has taken 3 months (keeping an indepth UC/Food diary helps a lot) to find what works for me but it's trial and error to see what works or disagrees with you.

Good luck

get off the raw stuff asap and have your vitamin d checked to see if you have a problem absorbing it. i like dr's that start small and first. it took me a while to find the right one. use your gut feeling about it.