I've Been So Unwell , Digestion Wise ............

[willows]

I haven't been on post for a few days as I've been so unwell I didn't know what to do with myself , in fact in a few hours time I'm going to the eye hospital on an emergency appointment , which is a side effect of what's been going on .

As some of you may know having read my history I have been having problems with my digestion for years and years now , what with the contractions, lack of actually 'going ' to the loo and generally feeling 'blur' because of this my weekly food intake has been somewhat erratic to say the least.

Well by Wednesday mid week I started to feel very sick and was having problems swallowing again , it got so bad that even the smell of food made me sick and I just couldnt eat more than a mouthful...................then an alarm bell went off in my head .............OMG by Friday I will not have been to the loo for 21 days no wonder I was having side effects. I have been taking my good bugs every day but it appears even these are now unable to cope with my digestion condition .

My stomach was looking like I was 6 months pregnant by then and travelling any distance made me car sick, poor hubby had to do some real emergency stops to save the interior from being 'pebble dashed '

So I took matters into my own hands and in top of my normal daily 'Mr shift its' I downed 1/2 a bottle of picosulphate ............and waited

Sunday the pain was so bad I couldnt stand up for more than 2 mins, but by the evening I had been to the loo about 9 times and it was so bad I was now dripping blood and my whole abdomen was tender , swollen and just screaming at me 'no more , no more' in between all this and the trying not to vomit , joint pains, headaches and trying not to choke swallowing on drinks now, I was generally feeling like I'd like to go into a corner , curl up and quietly go to sleep and never wake up again ........................... then to crown it all off today my right eye went again, this time worse than before as is so painful and swollen and my vision is blurred .

So today I'm off to the hospital as I look like Dracula's daughter and the eye is very painful I cannot remember what the doctor last night called it when she saw me , but she wanted me to go to the hospital there and then , which just wasn't going to happen as this trip was my first out since Wednesday of last week and I was feeling so bad again .

So with strict instructions that until I see my doctor again on Thursday that I have to write everything down I eat and drink ................and as well as this I am going to have to rethink my diet for the rest of my life now or risk even worst kind of problems with my bowel and I know what she was saying as I had pre-cancer cells taken before .

So from now onwards its no more; Chocolate, biscuits, cakes, ice-creams, sweets (any kind) red meat, sauces , gravies, desserts of any kind. alcohol ( ha , she must be kidding ) hard cheeses, fatty deli meats , sweetened cereals ................

All I can eat in very small quantities until then is ; veggies , fruits, low fat yogurts, sugar free jelly , chicken , lean ham, tuna , fresh fish ,smoked salmon , wholemeal breads, oats, wholemeal pasta & rice and fruit or veggie juices .

When doc said small amounts I thought she must be joking , but my digestion is so bad at this time I'm lucky if I can eat 2oz ( 50 grams ) of food at one sitting without feeling sick , sweating like mad or starting to choke again.

My hubby and son who have watched me struggling over the past week have agreed to help me to stick to the diet and if needs be will take stuff from me or not let 'nice kind friends' talk me into 'just a little but wont hurt' as we have now after 30+ years of me struggling to eat ..............and get it to leave my body afterwards discovered that 'just a little bit ........does hurt ' in fact it makes your eyes water

If any of you have any suggestions as to food wise , plain stuff no sauces etc , I'd be very please to hear from you .

Willows .............sitting on cushions resting her poor old tum looking like Dracula's daughter.

[willows]

Was at hospital today for 3 hours.

I was supposed to be an A & E eye emergency , but on an appointment which didn't make sense to me .................but then does any hospital !

So arrived 30 mins early and saw the A & E nurse who on seeing my eye proclaimed ' ow , bet that stings something ' 'well yes I replied rather ' she then asked me to cover one eye and read from the back wall a line of letters , now the letters were just behind a large door which at the time was closed , so no problem.

When it came to changing eye's and doing the same with my bad eye , I said to her ' opppps NO sorry cant see one letter at all now' the nurse looked at me and went pale 'are you sure ' she asked looking at me with concern ' positive 'I said ' she looked straight at me .............and I had a job keeping a straight face by then .............so grinning ( I must have looked rather silly with my right eye full of blood and a silly grin on my face ) I said ' it would help if the doctor who just went into the room over there had closed the door behind him , as I cant read a letter ..........because I cant see them ' she turned and had a look at the wall and laughed out loud ...........' OMG ' she said' I thought you'd been struck blind since you came in here ' and shouted out to the doctor to shut the door , she giggled away to herself as we finished the rest of the checks !

I've ended up with steroid drops 4 times a day and I'm to go back to the hospital next week to see the doc again, it appears that POTS may have taken up residence in my right eye ! because the hospital keep saying 'this isn't right ' .

If you know me you will know that I have bleed vessels bursting in my fingers, on my feet ( small ones) and sometimes in my tongue ....nasty those ones , well its now spread to my eye of all 0laces .

So I wont really know much more until next week when I see 'the eye man' again.

At least I'm not going blind with the family's old 'glaucoma' rearing its ugly head again, so what if I have to look like Dracula's daughter every 3-4 weeks , I may start a new trend .

The Best thing of the day was.................this nice young doctor ( male I saw ) said then he came out to call me he looked at the name and then scanned the room for a 'miss Marple like person' when I stood up his mouth dropped open !!!!

He asked me , are you really 50 + ????? ................OMG life's cool , life's good to me ...............even if I still look like a bride for Frankenstein at this time ................WILLOWS.

[persephone]

It sounds like you need to do an exclusion diet and have an endoscopy. Have you tried these things before? I only ask cos my mum and I had similar symptoms digestion wise to yours and we found that if we avoided all wheat and dairy we felt heaps better and found it easier for things to 'pass through' without the 'bumps'!!!!

[Jacquie802]

Hi there,

I just wanted to wish you luck with your new diet. Hopefully your stomache settles down a bit.

Jacquie

[goldicedance]

Willows,

Hope by the time you read this you are feeling better.

Good luck with your new diet. My husband follows now a similar diet; however, he does not eat anything that flies or crawls. You might want to check out this cookbood; it is online. I have made many recipes from this book (favorites - ratouille with spaghetti squash; squash and fruit casserole; and quick chili.

Is there any chance that you eye problems could have been made worse by straining at the loo? Just a thought.

Re: eye charts. One day I was wearing my contact lens and noticed that everything was really blurry. I went to the opthamologist and he had me read the eye chart. I could see nothing. He said something is probably really wrong. He had the technician check my contacts. I had them in the wrong eyes. All was fixed.

Be "weller."

Lois

[becky]

i find if i don't eat bread or ave any dairy my tummy doesn't hurt any more! never had a problem with digeston before i got pots i was a regular three poo's a day, one after evry meal! it is etting better since i have cut down m meication but still three times a week is doing marvelously!!

re: eyes, willows thought thi would make you laugh, my lovely mother was drivng me to work one day (yes this was quite a few years back) now mum is vrtually blind in one eye and has an astigmatism (sp?) in the other, on the journey she was complaining that she couldn't see, there must be something wrong with her contact lense! so i was very worried thatwe would crash as sh couldn't see out of her good eye! anyway she droped me off and continued on her way to work. she phoned me later to tell me that she'd found out what was wrong, she hadn't taken her contact lense out the night before and had put another one in on top of it in the morning! My mum really makes me laugh she does some really silly things.

becks x x x

[willows]

Thank you ALL so much for you replies , this alone makes me feel much better.

My eye is better now but I've had to have steroids for it which i dont really like or want , but I suppose a short course to clear it is better than the pain , which was so horrible and it did seem to effect my ability to travel , dont know why but this to seems a bit better now.

I'm off to the doctors later today , its now 2.30 am in the morning and I'm due to see her at 10 am so I'd better TRY to sleep for a couple of hours if I can before hand

Crumbs I'd love to go to the loo 3 times a day , or once a day or every other day , well any sort of normal day .................

I've had an camera down one end and up the other ..............no not at the same time or the same camera oooooh ! painful if you did !

I think your right I am having to take out certain foods that just down want to wave bye, bye to me , its as if 'now were in here, were going to stay put' and by golly dont they just .

I never ever want to have another few days like I've just had ,I'd rather starve first than go though that pain again, mind you cutting down as I am will make me loose some weight, which in turn will help the old joints , which in turn may make me a bit more active, which in turn may help the jolly old bowels .................well I can only hope , cant I .

The blood vessels in the eye bursting wasn't to do with straining , this happened when I did the Halloween event and I wasn't straining then , also its not just the bursting of them the actual vessels in the back of the eye where all inflamed and swollen as well, I'm now having my field of vision checked again as I they are still thinking I'm starting the old glaucoma road .............never mind , Hubby has said if I go blind he will dress me ...................... I can just see myself now ;

Bright green tights , purple shoes, scarlet top , pink skirt , green dyed hair , blue lipstick , fluorescent orange coat ...........mmmmmm yes dear , dont think so

Well I'd better go as I now feel my pethidine starting to work and I need to lay down before I fall down,

Bye for now , thanks again for you support .........willows.

[dizzygirl]

wow willows feel better dear.. and good lcuk with your diet!

[Maxine]

Hey Willows, Nice to be back ---and actually reply to your poatings-------

This digestive junk is for the birds-------nothing worse then feeling like you've swallowed a bowling ball.

I know it stinks to have some of those wonderful yummy treats limited in your diet, but you will find that things will pass better.

My Dad has glutin sensitivity---and actually has problems producing yeast--(you don't want to know from where). He has only noticed this in the last few years. He was bad about the time I crashed with POTS in early 2001---and now it's back. He needs to eliminate glutin products to get rid of the yeast problem.

Any tips on diets free from glutin would be very helpful if anyone has some tips for my Dad----I will pass them along to him---------------

I know I must have some sensitivity also----but I just don't want to know..... NOT YET.....Doing pretty well on watching refined carbs----or other heavy carbs. Pretty good for a girl that could live on potatos, rice and any type of wheat breads---or rye breads. And let's not forget chocolate. I think we can all benefit from a little bit of chocolate---just a small piece-it's good for the spirit. But I'm lucky---I can be satisfied with a small piece of chocolate.

I hope you get rid of the misery soon----and get that eye of yours in shape.......

I love reading your posts----you have a great attitude, and you manage to keeo your sense of humor----I love people who like to laugh at this sometimes---or just laugh in general. It helps keep us sane....

HUGS to you---

Maxine

[Tessa]

Hi Willows

I am so sorry you have been feeling so bad. I hope you are better by now.

Take care and good luck with your diet

Love,

Tessa

[juliegee]

Oh Wilows,

I'm so sorry for all you are going through!!! Unfortunately, I'm having VERY similiar problems- sans the eye thing. I can sooooo relate. I'm going about once a week ( if I'm lucky) and feeling horrible, so bloated and nauseous. Is your doctor considering gastroparesis? Mine is. I'm sometimes so nausous, I get car sick- even when I'M driving. I have cut out all dairy, but haven't considered wheat. I'm on zelnorm, colace, miralax and now my GI has added Amitizia. Have you tried any miracle drugs yet? Please know you've got a fellow-sufferer across the pond. Keepme posted on your progress.

Julie

[douglas]

have you ever considered becoming completely VEGAN??? if you follow a very healthy diet it forces your fibre intake to mulitply ten fold and may help with your digestion...

i know it helped many people before.

[juliegee]

Unfortunately, Douglas, for folks with severe motility problems mega-fiber is a no-no. Goes against current wisdom....but, if things aren't moving correctly because of uncoordinated nerves in the GI tract, the fiber sits there and swells and swells and swells. It can actually cause obstructions.

Low fat, low fiber is the best diet for motility issues. Not only am I affected, but my son as well. He sees a motility specialist at Johns Hopkins.

Thanks for the thought. A vegan diet would be very helpful for most folks with "garden" variety constipation. (Excuse the pun!) And many folks with gastroparesis and other GI dysmotilities do enjoy vegan diets. They just have to cook the dickens out of veg until they are mush. And, eat canned soft fruit.

Julie

[Guest dionna]

last on posting: my eyes are killing me so i couldn't read all of the post but i think i have an idea of what you were saying or atleast at the beginning of your first post.

when i was at boot camp, none of us recruits went for the first month! the senior drill instructor had us standing in line eating prunes. we had problems because of the diet change, stress, and actually we were to busy to take the time out. i had not even realized it until another recruit mentioned it.

does diet change or stress make it worse for you? i feel horrible that this is going on with you. right now i am at the other end of the spectrum. i would give you a hug if i were there.

dionna