Hello everyone. I want to say thank you for reading this, and thank you even more for your thoughts and/or answers.
I'm a 25 year old female who never had a sensitive stomach. I have a peanut allergy, so I don't eat out at restaurants a lot because of the risk. I don't eat fast food very often (for the same reason), I prefer wheat bread to white, and I don't like / drink soda. Apart from this, any food is fair game and my diet is varied. My BMI is 23. I don't get regular exercise per say -- I go dancing once a week, play club volleyball on Sundays and take a short walk at lunch every day. I don't smoke, and while I used to drink more than moderately in college, I have maybe five drinks a month now, if that at all.
Early this year I went through an EXTREMELY stressful situation that lasted about two months. During that time, I could not hold down food. When I get distressed, I can't eat, but the little food I did eat ran through me like water. I started to have bloody diarrhea, fatigue and dizziness. I lost eight pounds in about five weeks. I got a colonoscopy in February, and my results came back normal. I got my thyroid levels checked (there's thyroid disease in my family), and while I'm waiting for the T3 and T4 to come back, my TSH is 1.15.
Since then, my stomach has never been the same. It has been a rare occurrence that I have a normal looking or feeling bowel movement. I have tried to change my diet, like adding more bread and fibrous fruits to make my bowel movements solid, but this only works for a week or so, then my diarrhea returns.
Usually it is brown or green. For the past month my stools have been a strange yellow/orange color. Stringy things are intertwined in it; sometimes my rectal area itches as well. My stomach makes ABSURD gurgling noises that do not sound like digestion or hunger; it sounds like a small dog growling. And my god, it smells like something DIED. Within 20-30 minutes of eating, I have the uncontrollable urge to empty my bowels. I have a feeling of fullness in my stomach like I never fully empty my bowel no matter how many times I try. Despite this, I have gained about seven pounds since this started, all in my stomach. It used to be that after a night sleep my stomach would be flat, almost concave. Now I have a strange looking bloat in my lower abdominal area.
Another disturbing symptom is that I am insanely tired. No matter how much I sleep, I feel fatigued and fight hard to not drift off during the day. I am on 54mg of Concerta for ADHD, so still feeling tired in the middle of the day while on this medication leaves me very concerned. I am also on Yaz.
Everyone is saying I'm fatigued and gaining weight from my new job (I switched from a job which kept me on my feet to a job where I sit half the day) and stress. However, I just don't think this is right. I don't feel HEALTHY. I'm not a person with many health problems, and I try to give health concerns time to resolve themselves. It's been almost a year and I feel worse. Any ideas what this could be about?
Thanks so much for reading.
-K