Hello to all,
I am a 49 year old male who has recently been diagnosed with GERD. Here is my story. about 2 and 1/2 months ago I starting getting a tickling sensation in my throat and thought I was catching a cold. Around the same time I started getting a pain in my chest and noticed that I was burping alot more than usual. The tickling sensation led to very harsh coghing (especially at night).After the problems persisted for a few weeks (at this point I was rather sure that this wasn't just a cold) I went to my family doctor who diagnosed me with GERD. He prescribed Pantoloc (40mg once a day) for me. My situation has improved, but I still get acid shooting up into my throat causing me great discomfort, the chest pains have also subdued but are not completely gone. My last visit to my GP, this week, and he now has me on 40mg of Nexium once a day. I did go for a barium meal test and it showed no abnormalities (ulcers or hernia), so my doc tells me to be patient, (no pun intended) and try Nexium for a while. I have another appointment with him in a month, and I just hope that I will be better by then. Is it normal to have these symptons for so long?
I have problems with anxiety (although I am no longer taking any medication for that) and I was 30 pounds overweight. I use to smoke 4 to 5 cigars a week, and drink beer and scotch every time I smoked a cigar. Since I have had this illness I have lost 20 pounds due to my changed lifestyle (walking an hour every night and eating healthier food) and have not had a cigar in over 2 and a half months (man do I miss those Cubans). I will have a couple of beers a week but I still have not had a glass of scotch since I had this illness. Another of my bad habits was eating big meals just before going to sleep, needless to say, doing that now would be a disaster.
Regards
Bobcat