Is stress the ultimate root cause of my GERD?

I read
www.healingwell.com/community/default.aspx?f=45&m=1525051
and feel enlightened like never before.

It tells when a person is under stress, the pylorus shut tight, and the stomach content has only one outlet, goes up. I have never taken stress as the primary cause, I have always been looking for solutions to food intolerance, insomnia, stomach acidity, etc....


before onset of my first symptom:
I was in a highly stressful job. I sometime felt nausea in the morning before and after breakfast. I often felt nausea before meetings where I could be repeated grilled by my boss.

I then had gastric attacks, heartburn before meals and grumbling stomach 2hours after breakfast. doc prescribed me acid blockers. I have then changed my job to a less stressful one.

1st onset of symptoms of GERD: heartburn, I felt terribly bloated and gassy after eating certain food (I have eliminated and avoided them one by one). I felt reflux at night and I couldn't sleep. I was diagnosed with hiatal hernia, GERD and esophagitis.

My prescriptions Nexium and later Pariet help, but could not alleviate the heartburn/reflux completely. I then tried to stop it and tried to control my GERD in a natural way, I attempted 3 times without success. It did work for at most 2 weeks in each try, during which I was symptom-free, and then I fell back to GERD again.

A review of my diary (I kept detail records of daily activities) showed stressful events from life, intolerance to food, indigestion, bloated, gassy stomach, insomnia, withdrawal rebound (usually happened in 1 week after I stopped the meds) are most closely linked to my relapses.

What do you think?

have I come to know this a little bit too late?

I should not have stopped the meds then, instead should have worked on my stress problems.
After a stressful day induced reflux. It didn't stop. Now I have reflux day and night. The pain is unbearable, antacid relieves only a short while, I double on my PPI for now. PPI only lasts for 10hours or so. I eat little. I fear my gullet has turned ulcerative. What should I do?

wjf

have you been seen by a doctor for your reflux issues?

your concern that you have injured your esophagus should be investigated given the collections of symptoms you indicate.

when you are steadily taking your medication are your symptoms controlled?

if you have been experiencing reflux for years and or if you are middle aged you are probably over due to get 'scoped" (esophagoscopy)

i hope you have been seen by your doctor regarding these issues, if not, i would recommend you be seen soon.

best wishes
mt

wjf

first dont feel guilty. we all struggle with this ugly disease and sometimes make turns in the decision making tree that turn out not to work out. many of us are desperate for answers and solutions, so dont beat yourself up... seems to me ive been where you are and it hurts bad...you are not alone

second...you said, "I feel pain after the effect of the drugs wear off, 3-4 hours after the PPI,..." just to be clear PPIs have a long period of onset for effectiveness and a long "effective" half life. while it is true the body eliminates the PPI from the system fairly quickly, the effect on the parietal cells (where acid in produced in the stomach) is long lasting.

i am not a doctor nor a medical professional of any kind so you should not take my words for granted as true...always check out everything with your doctor. but from what i have read and been told by authoritative sources is that PPIs shouldnt be "wearing off" three hours after last dose.

talk to your doctor, it may be that a different PPI or a different dose or the addition of an H2 may be appropriate...or some other solution. the best way to approach this is to be an informed patient AND to take that to your doctor and discuss and make a "team" decision

i would definitely put guilt behind me, go see the doc and tell the truth.

any doc that judges a patient harshly because of human frailty...well... i would change doctors because it is important for people in the helping professions to avoid being "judgmental.

please see your doctor

hang in there, and stay in touch, people here will help

best wishes
mock turtle

ps

i want to recommend a strategy that you may or may not have heard about

for several days,eat small meals...eat the same amount of food you usually do, or if overweight, a little less, but divide your daily intake into smaller amounts so that you eat no more food in volume than the size of your fist...and then wait at least two hours for the next meal

also during this time eat just skinless white chicken meat, steamed broccoli, brown rice, egg whites, mashed boiled carrots, light white fish (not oily...for example no salmon etc) water melon or other highly recommended foods that are helpful for people with gerd

(avoid all foods that are notorious for opening the lower esophageal sphincter.... that is... no chocolate, mint of any kind, no tomatoes nor potatoes (nightshade vegetables), and no alcohol) (check to see if you are taking other drugs that "open" the LES- talk to doctor if so)

then after 3 days of this see how you feel?

Post Edited (mock turtle) : 10/28/2011 12:04:43 PM (GMT-6)

wjf

you are welcome!

may i suggest you test to see if you can eat potato after you stabilize with the most medically conservative diet that reasonable...

then add foods one by one testing that one food for a few meals in a row and making no other changes, so you know for sure

i cant eat tomatoes but i believe one of our moderators here at HealingWell- gerd, can eat tomatoes all day long...we are individuals

best wishes
mt

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2036.2008.03883.x/full

There it is. Knowing what switched it on, however, isn't necessarily any help in switching it off!!

MMM

GERD in infants is different, and very much structural weakness combined with completely liquid diet!!

Sixteen year olds who have heart attacks usually have adult sudden death syndrome - a heart defect that never gets detected before they drop dead.

But it is reassuring, to me, that you know of relaxed folk with GERD. I guess what bugs me most is that my run in with GERD 4 years ago lasted six months and cleared up totally of its own accord. Three years later it came back, more or less overnight and just won't get back in its box!!

MMM

I think our lounge carpet will bear testimony that every baby has an element of reflux ;-)

Hi,
I have very bad similar situation for about 6 months of severe stress event where I constantly worried every day hour and minute of my stressful event for six months straight until I was relieved. But in the mean time I have developed Gerd. All off a sudden I started having reflux symptoms. I then went to my doctor and he sent me to the G.I. doctor for an endoscopy. The G.I. doctor diagnosed me with grade B esophagitis and Gerd. He then put me on PPI's every day and my symptoms went away. But then after three months off taking PPI's I tried to stop, and then my symptoms came back within two days off stopping medications. Currently I am taking 40 mg all PPI every day and I feel better once in a while in a day but my symptoms are even worse. I went to my G.I. doctor again and he just told me to keep taking PPI's and see him in a year.

My symptoms are like feeling Fullness of stomach after eating small meal and stomach is not emptying fast enough. It feels like my stomach stays full for longer period of time and I cannot lie down right away if I wanted to.
Do u think that I have bad pyloric sphincter which is causing delayed emptying of stomach and may be my LES is fine.

Any help would be really appreciate. I can't sleep due to this GERD. It is really stuck in my kind and feel totally depressed. Please help.
Thanks.