Distressing Bowel Symptoms at 20 Year Old

[nerrit]

I'm a 20 year old female and for the last 3 months now I've been experiencing very worrying and distressing symptoms.
It seems every single week at least 1-3 times during said week that I will become briefly very, very ill.

My sickness always occurs during night time periods and last all the way through this night usually up until the sun  begins to rise. My symptoms include shaking, quick breathing, constipation, diarrhea, intense nausea as if I could throw up at any second and painful headaches. I am unable to sleep completely and after the sickness has passed I am left feeling exhausted, extremely dehydrated and delirious.

Coincidentally I also happen to have had an anal fissure for the last 3 months that was first caused by the constipation and is having a tough time healing on it it's own so I am also experiencing bleeding from my rectum when making bowel movements, but I believe this is on account of the fissure.

I've been to my doctor and he took a quick look at me down there, confirmed I had a fissure and said he thought the random bouts of illness were being caused by me subconsciously holding off going to to bathroom on account of the pain, which was in part true, and that this was causing me to "back up" my bowels and was causing me to be constipated and get sick. He recommended I switch to a diet of foods that have the consistency of toothpaste until the fissure has healed and gave me Xyloproct ointment for the pain.

I followed the diet for around two weeks and it seemed that my bowel movements were becoming more regular and my fissure was beginning to heal, but I was still getting sick randomly at night.

Tonight I have gotten sick again and the constant bathroom trips appear to have reopened the healing fissure once more. I am going to book another doctors appointment soon but I would like if anybody could offer me any clarity on what is going on with me? At first I thought the thing about the fissure preventing me from going to the bathroom made sense, now I am starting to think there is something seriously wrong with me.

[maggs67]

A few years ago I was suffering from bad IBS and no visits to the doctors ever helped me or medication they were prescribing... I was anxious, had either lose bowels or constipations with severe pains and bloatnes all the time, day and night. It was a nightmare. I worked out by myself that alcohol and certain citrus fruit, tomatoes and lettuce had mostly to do with it. Large part of this having irritable bowel was STRESS and anxiety. I stopped drinking and went to the doctors (I also have irregular heartbeats), she prescribed beta blockers (Oxprenolol) for anxiety and my IBS had stopped :) I can eat everything now and obviously from time to time hard to digest foods can cause constipation but that's all. I am so much better now and trying to avoid stressful situations helps a lot.

[Ricobord]

Sometimes significant pain can cause nausea and vomiting.  But what you describe sounds like more than that. You probably want to go see a gastroenterologist to discuss your symptoms and explore possibilities like IBS, Crohn's, stomach problems, or issues with other digestive organs.