Excessive Flatulence for Months

Hi, for about 4 months now i have been having issues with bad flatulence, i had if for 2 months followed by 1 good month however the past month it has returned.

My symptoms are are as follows; I get pains and rumbling in my left side (stomach), i also get stomach bloating and pains in my abdomen on the right side.

I have also been a lot more tired than usual (sleeping 10 hours rather than my usual 6-8 hours) and have had slight headaches from time to time, also on occasions i feel a bit confused.

The Flatulence is constant through out the day and doesn't seem to have a pattern as to when it comes and goes. at worst i could be passing gas every 5 minutes, at best every few hours. Every gas passing is of a very strong foul odor. I don't have any issues with going to the toilet and pass a stool once every day/day and a half.

I don't have a set diet and haven't changed my diet but i generally eat well.


any ideas?

Candida? IBS?

[patient915]

Welcome to the gastroenterology community!  I could recommend trying to eliminate 100% of all lactose from your diet to see if that helps.  If you haven't had any changes in your stool, it is not IBS.

[BeeFree]

Bloating, gas, pain, nausea, indigestion and fatigue are signals that your body is fighting something you either ingest or a bacterial infection in your stomach or intenstine. If you notice no change in your bowel movement, I highly doubt it's IBS. Candida is possible, as is a food intolerance or allergy. If getting some tests done is not an option for you right now, try reducing your intake of common allergies like dairy or gluten and wheat and see if you notice improvement. Artificial sweeteners are my man cause of bloating, gas and headaches, so if this is a possibility for you, try going a few days without them and see if you feel better.

All the best.

[mrQandA]

I did try a 48 hour rapid detox, as for detoxing it was useless, however the not eating for 2 days (1 1/2 days) did seem to help somewhat towards the end but as soon as i ate food again the symptoms came back to their fullest relatively quickly.

I don't know what food it was that may or may not have been the issue as i started eating again on christmas day so i ate a variety of foods however what i thought was strange was when i started eating again within 15 minutes or less the flatulence came straight back to how they where before the detox. (consistent gas, foul odor)

[patient915]

I would recommend eliminating 100% of all lactose for 2 weeks to see if that helps.

[mrQandA]

Does it take that long for the body to clean itself out from something like lactose? (or anything for that matter).

Lactose intolerance is one that first came to mind quite sometime ago as my mother has issues with lactose herself, she is currently taking questran however my symptoms are not the same as hers thus thinking my issue may be caused by another underlying issue as well as the lactose.

As i mentioned before i did the 48 hour detox and my issues seemed to lessen, now i don't know what i first ate after the detox however i know it wasn't lactose as that was the main thing i was trying to continue to stay away from however the flatulence still came back straight away.

Could this mean that it is not lactose causing my issues or is it still likely that it is and if that is the case then why did the flatulence come back without a lactose product?

Also can lactose intolerance lead to fatigue like candida does?

ps i will try to cut back or stop my lactose consumption as much as possible. Is there anything i can take or do to counter the inability to metabolize lactose. Lactase enzyme tablets etc?

[patient915]

It isn't that the body is cleaning itself out from lactose, but it is that sometimes it takes that long for the symptoms to subside.

Lactose can cause many many different symptoms and it caused different problems in different people.

My personal belief is that detox's do nothing and the effect people get from them are either because they were constipated or because of the placebo effect (you want it to work, so it does, not because it is actually producing real physical effects).

If you only cut out 90% of all lactose, you might not get relief.  I believe that you need to cut out 100% of all lactose to really know if that is causing your problems.  There are enzymes that you can take to help digest lactose.  However, I recommend you don't try these at first.  If you conclude that lactose is your problem, then you can try enzymes and see if those help your problem.

[mrQandA]

Haven't had any lactose in my diet now since the 3rd (5 days), symptoms still there however severity of the symptoms has lowered somewhat. Will continue on my lactose free diet and see how it goes, i still believe that some of my symptoms are from other underlying causes but i won't know until i get this issue sorted first. Patient thanks for your help, will keep you posted.

[patient915]

Good, keep it up!!

[mrQandA]

Went to my Gastroenterologist and he has stopped me from taking Nexium which i use for heartburn/reflux, apparently it causes excessive gas and foul odor. He is also getting me to go for blood tests to check for Celiac disease. He has also asked me to cut back on my lactose consumption. I have to ring him in a week to tell him how im going.