Mesalamine Enemas and The Color Of My

Poop.

Mesalamine enemas are an interesting thing. Long term I believe they help rectal and last part of the colon inflammation tremendously. However, on days when I did one the previous night, I often have a bit of "rectal urgency" when I need to go. I am sure you know the feeling, but it's like you have to pee out your butt.

So when you actually go, this portion of the BM comes out a bit like medusa's head... a lot of WHITE small snakes. Then the rest of the BM happens and usually its a nice solid snake, however coated in white.

Now whats really interesting is like, OK you can't fart at night after you do an enema. But in the morning I am always cautious when I have morning gas but low and behold... Just air comes out, yippee! And its like this until about oh say... 6pm then when I start having some gas I feel that "rectal urgency" I talk about, and then I know its time for BM. And the paragraph description above this one ensues.

But when I get to tapering mesalamine enemas, I am much more uncomfortable on the days I do not have to use an enema the night before. I usually have a much better looking turd. No whiteness, and no greek devil coming out of me lol.

So...does the white mean I am not absorbing all of the enema? Why can I fart dry but then other times, towards the end of the is it borderline?

To me its like the enema got further up, and takes all day to come down. To me, I take it as a good sign that I see white, this means that it was not absorbed , because there was no inflammation in that area, and therefore it does not need to be absorbed.

THANK YOUUUU!!!!!!

Also, SCD diet for the win. This + Enemas are key.

No, that is a completely normal response to enemas. It does not mean it wasn't absorbed... as long as what is coming out is (semi)solid, it absorbed just fine, and the remaining components that are left over come out white solids, followed by stool. It's like that for me every single time I use them. I usually have first BM in the morning when I wake up, but that's just my biological clock. The resulting BM after the enama does not tell you anything about how much inflammation you have.

When it DOESN'T absorb you can tell because it's all still white *liquid* that comes out. The only time this happens for me is if I have a gas bubble near the "exit" that seems to block the enema, so to speak. It's like I desperately have to fart all night, but I'm holding it in because I know the enema will all come out... and then in the morning when I finally do, it's still liquid white. I know on these nights to just go to the toilet and call it a lost cause because I know that not only will I be uncomfortable all night, but it won't get absorbed anyway.

Trust me - I've been doing the enema thing for eighteen years now. Another tip: make sure you squeeze all the air out of the bottle before you insert. If you hold it up to the light, you can see where the liquid level is so you can squeeze it right up until it's about to come out.

Correction....you will never absorb the entire enema. It's not meant to be.

The medication is in a liquid suspension that sits in the colon. The 5ASA that's in the suspension works on the area it sits on and the rest is minimally "absorbed" since it's topical and some water.

Since stool doesn't sit in the rectum unless it's ready to be released, there's still usually only the medication sitting in there in the morning until the download happens.

The medication that's higher just above the rectum and in the sigmoid and where there's stool, it will be covered, throughout or passes with it when the stool is evacuated.

So...normal for the mesalamine. I don't know about the steroid liquid or the mesalamine foam for those who have it available. I would think that the foam would be more readily absorbed into the stool in the sigmoid or lining or dissipate when sitting there over time before one has a bm. The volume of the foam is much less than the liquid.

Suppositories are the same....the melted suspension is expelled upon farts or bms.

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