Is there any history of food intolerance issues like celiac in your family? Your description of brain fog and whole body problem along with abdominal discomfort can be found in some with celiac disease. You may want to consider trying an elimination diet (wheat, rye and barley) to see if it's of any help. I know it sounds strange, but many docs simply can't find and diagnose this problem and the blood tests for it are less than optimal.
I second that idea. Most ER doctors probably wouldn't even think to run a Celiac Panel. Ask them to do so. It isn't 100%. The only sure way is to have an endoscopy, but hey, if eliminating gluten (the bad stuff that hurts your intestines) helps you, who cares what the tests say.
You should see a GI specialist, not just an ER doctor or PCP.
Thanks for replies!
I will definitely check into Celiac Disease.
I do know that all my life, I have been allergic to most all fruit, and nuts.
I'm not sure about gluten. But I will check it out.
Can this hit a person suddenly, out of the blue?
That is what happened to me. I was fine one minute, and then all my symptoms started after a really tight "squeezing sensation" around my abdomen.
I have been in misery ever since.
Thanks for the replies!!
I appreciate it.
It's typically not something that hits all at once. It's something that many people have from early on, but the actual symptoms don't seem to show up in some people for many years. We found out about my husband's condition 2 years ago and he had had 'small' symptoms for many years, but he didn't feel they were bad enough to do anything about them. When the horrendous fatigure hit, we figured we finally HAD to find out what was going on. All tests were negative, and we thought what the heck, we'd try to rule out food intolerance problems with elimination diets. When we saw the results of taking gluten out of his diet, we finally had him tested by enterolab.com and lo and behold the antibody test came back positive. We also found he was cross-reactive to casein (the major protein in dairy). With a change in diet he's lost the brain fog, fatigue, rashes (sometimes) and leaden feeling in his stomach. However, if he gets a 'hit' the symptoms are instantly back.
I can't swear it's what you've got, but it's worth checking it out. There are far too many people with this problem and it often goes undiagnosed.
Get tested for c.difficill bacterial overgrowth