I stopped constipation with this.

[crystalfresh]

Twice a day "all mixed together" in an 12oz cup of water. I had a better formula but mixing it was too complicated so I went with TeaSpoons to make it less complicated. I might change the formula around next week. For now this is working. Each of us would fine tune our own formulas that work best on us. Just wanted to let everyone know that each by them selves even if I took different ones on the same day DID NOT WORK. But MIXING them TOGETHER is WORKING. :) I hope some of what I learned helps someone. Feel free to comment on this or if you found something better for IBS constipation.

In between breakfast and lunch
2 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
4 rounded tsp Citricel Powder

Again 2 hours before bed.
2 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
4 rounded tsp Citricel Powder

Then for the irritation which I still feel, like a burning feeling across my colon I am taking ant-acids too. The ant-acids for the stomach are still making their way to the colon and easing some of the burning that is causing my gas. I am FAR from being fixed but at least constipation is not so much an issue anymore. For all I know I am irritating my colon even more and the irritation is causing fluid to make things flow. But one thing at a time. Constipation needed to be dealt with first!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you get irritation cut back on Metamucil and Benefiber first. The Mirilax doesn't cause irritation I believe as it is synthetic and the Citrucel should not cause gas so that should be easily tolerated. I had no irritation or gas from Citrucel.

Each one didn't work. Taking them separate lead to irritation and gas. But mixing them all together is working! I am taking less than prescribed of each mostly but all mixed does just what I need.

Still work in progress. This is how I came up with this.
Metamucil Powder - was great for making stool soft. But too soft to come out. It seems to just hang around. So I used this to keep things soft. The side effect was when it sat around it caused gas. So I could not tolerate the full dose to gas problems.

Miralax Powder - This stuff worked really well at keeping water in my stool. It made things kind of messy in the bathroom for cleanup. But still it left stool hanging around leaving me feeling like I still had to go. Another problems was even though it kept water in my stool it wasn't moving the stool. So I would still have a backed up colon.

Benefiber Powder - Worked the best of all. But after a few days it started to cause irritation and that then backfired. This produced lube to help make the stool slide through my digestive track. The nice part was it wasn't getting headaches from being hungry with this as I still absorbed my calories. This alone lead to irritation so it was not working.

Citricel Powder. This is great stuff. While it did nothing much to help me poop it does however do a great clean up job of holding all the stool together. It probably works differently in me as this product would sometimes constipate me further while other times help me go. But what I loved about it was it binding properties in me. All the stool that was hanging around to irritate my colon was picked up by this and carried trough. This by it self did not help much at all. I ended up taking it for loose stool to bind it together in to a solid stool.

All in all my body was dehydrating my stool. So a product that should help me go might have been further constipating me. Seeing how each product worked for me I took the benefits of each and mixed them all together. I might add they make a great tasting drink mixed. I got the ones with out artificial sugar. Should taste great with all that sugar. They do make sugar free ones too.

Among the other drugs I tried
Amatiza 8mg and 24mg. Amitiza caused really bad upset stomach, then flushed lots of water in to my colon for about 2 hours. This worked if I could time it perfectly, I'd have a movement. If I didn't time it correctly my body reabsorbed all the water back out of my digestion system and I became constipated again. The side effects of an upset stomach was very unpleasant for 2 hours each pill and all the water in my digestion sys seemed to prevent calories from absorbing and I had strong hunger headaches, and eating more food did not help the headaches until my body stopped producing the water in my digestive sys. This might work for some people that don't dehydrate their stool so much. I could not tolerate this drug due to the upset stomach and headaches.

I also tried other laxatives which all caused either LOTS of GAS, or irritation that caused clear liquid to come out my hinie. I've gots LOTS of irritation in my colon. It looked like I went food shopping for laxatives. I tried to buy one of each kind.

Also used Colace a while ago with tripple the pills with no affect at all a few months ago when my problem was worst. But then again I also used to used Mirilax too with no results back then and now I use Mirilax works well so I might try Colace again to see if it will work on me now that I have healed up some. But so far my mixed drinks are working. So I will hold comments on Colace for the moment until I can retest this product with my more healed up digestive system. I had no side effects from Colace at all.

I have not tried FiberCon yet. I was looking for a powder and could not find one. Can't comment on how it works.

I also used Fiber Choice. This one was not tolerated at all. I had too much irritation right off causing cramping and pain. The irritation caused direarra and lots of clear liquid from irritation. Even in small amounts I could not tolerate it. Very similar as if I ate veggies like stringbeans or squash, ect... My stomach gets ripped up from veggies. Otherwise it definitely got things flowing. Could not tolerate this product in any amount due to irritation. My constipation may be a result of irritation so I'd not base the affects on this product because of me. But if you can't eat veggies like me due to irritation I would suggest maybe not using this. Actually I just looked up the ingredients from CVS website and it says Vegetable Fiber. Yea that makes sense I can't tolerate veggies. If I could eat veggies I'd not have constipation in the first place. I now would recommend this product to only people that can eat veggies that would like more fiber not for people with IBS.

[barsini]

Thank you so much for posting your fiber formula. I plan to try it out for sure!

[Deltamama55]

I tried your last formula, only 1 time and before bedtime, still nothing 2 days later, I also got some detox tea and some bedtime helps you flow tea, and the tea seems to be working better, and also tastes better than the formula, everyone is different, so I guess this formula only 1 time a day did not work for me, I cannot imagine drinking it 3-4 times a day, #1 it is a thick yucky tasting concoction, and the tea tastes better with a little honey added for sweetening the taste a little, might want to look on your grocery store shelves for different teas?? In case the formula isn't what you can tolerate?

[milkshakesNY]

I made an account on this website just so I could post, SEVEN YEARS LATER, that this is the ONLY thing that has helped me beat constipation!!

CrystalFresh, whoever and wherever you are, thank you thank you thank you!  

I have tried EVERYTHING and was using harsh stimulant laxatives and suppositories and enemas, but this simple "Fiber Cocktail" has changed my life and I've been going daily with little effort - never has happened in my life!

LOL - thank you so much and I encourage everyone to try this out and adjust the levels for themselves :)

-Milkshakes

[crystalfresh]

Once I found the perfect mixture of fiber and laxatives to get me started flowing:
3 TIMES A DAY - LUNCH - DINNER - BEDTIME
REPEAT for 4 days!
2 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
4  rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
4  rounded tsp Citrucel Powder

But then after 3-4 days my body was flowing properly and I started to get very cold, weak, and woke up from cold sweats shaking. Once I figured out it was sugar levels I ate pure sugar and or jello and with in a few minutes the cold shaking would go away for an hour. Ok.. So too much fiber. It was working better than I needed going 3 times a day with out effort.

NOW:
As long as I stay on this perfect schedule of fiber/laxative drinks I'm able to cut back the fiber drinks by 50%. I can't miss a scheduled drink or I start to get backed up needing more fiber. The goal is to limit the assistance of the fiber drinks. I'm not looking to loose weight and energy.

So here is my finished formula once I got flowing.
3 TIMES A DAY - LUNCH - DINNER - BEDTIME
1 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
1 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
2 rounded tsp Citrucel Powder

Oddly it is not that much fiber lax at all but it works for me. The adult dosage is usually in TBSPs not TSPs (3 tsp per tbsp) but when I started mixing them the laxative effect was completely different using less. I'm sorry I never learned this effect years ago.

You might only need to take 1 drink a day or 2. I need 3 or 4. The mixture was the key for me.

I'll just remind everyone again, always consult your doctor before starting a laxative diet. I am off Amatiza finally. That stuff made my stomach so upset.

It was so strange how each fiber drink did something so different.
To recap from my body...
Metamucil - made stool mush (still wouldn't come out)
Miralax - added water to stool (made things messy)
Benefiber - added lube to help slide through colon.
Citrucel - Sort of constipated sometimes but binded everything together to clean me out. (also made things very clean the potty)

Some of you might benefit from Citrucel and Miralax only. The Miralax was needed to keep enough water in my digestive sys to prevent the Citrucel from binding too much.

If someone had messy stool the Citrucel might make it cleaner.

Ok too much stool talk. I need to figure out what to do with my extra hours a day now that I'm not stuck on the toilet. Years to make up.

Now I want to find a way to make this happen naturally and loose the fiber and lax. My IBS stops me from eating the foods needed to help me go. Also turns out I wasn't getting gas from foods it was gas from irritation caused by constipation. Sure there is still a little new gas from the fiber but its a small price to pay compared to what I had before.

Please post if you tried this and if it helped you. Sure beats prune juice!!!!

[NikkiMatte]

Thank you! So helpful!

[crystalfresh]

If this formula doesn't do the trick I will just increase the Mirilax 1-2 tsp and the Citrucel to 4

Should have been

If this formula doesn't do the trick I will just increase the Mirilax 3-4 tsp and the Citrucel to 4

[crystalfresh]

OK. I am half better now that I added 1 tsp of Metamucil Powder back in. But it's still not enough. I will have to deal with the gas from 2 tsp of Metamucil Powder. Although I did not get any gas from 1 tsp the gas is better than having trouble going.

* indicates maximum benefit for me. Still playing with the formula.

Getting closer to my original formula.
2* rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2  rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2* rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
3  rounded tsp Citrucel Powder

I could always increase the Miralax to 3 tsp to add water for the Citrucel to 4 tsp but that just seems like too much. As it is when this is digested it wipes out my energy after it goes in to my small intestine because it flushes the food though. The idea is to have as little as possible to do the trick so I can absorb more calories. Right now I am doing this 3 times a day. Also pooping 2 to 3 times a day. Wow right. Pain in the neck to find bathrooms. But the time in the bathroom is being limited to less than 10 min from the hour it uses to be. So definitely improvement. No more bleeding and no straining. Not cleaning out perfectly but pretty close.

If this formula doesn't do the trick I will just increase the Mirilax 1-2 tsp and the Citrucel to 4 tsp and be done with it. I'm pretty sure that will work. But thats too much 3 times a day. I would start to loose weight.

I recommend getting the powders with sugar to help keep up your energy. This stuff flushes your food through so the sugar really does help.

[crystalfresh]

I changed the formula a bit.

FROM
2 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
4 rounded tsp Citricel Powder

To NEW
0 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
4 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
2 rounded tsp Citricel Powder

I was getting gas keeping me up at night. So stopping the Metamucil stopped the gas. However my stool was getting harder with out it. Then I increased the Benefiber to compensate and started getting too much fluid like liquid coming out before a poop. Then reduced the Citricel because it was too solid.

This now formula is not working. Going back to constipation. But I can't handle the 2 tbsp of Metamucil so instead of 0 tsp I will meet in the middle at 1 tsp of metamucil. The extra 2 tsp of Benefiber doesn't really seem to be adding assistance just more lube. So I will go back to just 2 tsp rather than 4. It was just right at 2. And lastly it wasn't binding enough so I will add back 1 tsp of Citrucel to make it 3 tsp in the middle.

So lastly my formula will be this.
1 rounded tsp Metamucil Powder
2 rounded tsp Miralax Powder
2 rounded tsp Benefiber Powder
3 rounded tsp Citricel Powder

Amazing how such a small change starts to plug me up again, cause irritation, and produce gas. This above will do the job. I think this will be the best I can do with these products. I am going so that's a relief but not like a normal person yet. I will try new products and see how they work. This was my last formula for my body. The only think I hadn't played with was increasing the Miralax. I could always try 3 tsp of that and see what happens. My body doesn't really like Metamucil and rewards me with cramping and gas but it's very effective at softening.

[margypops]

Wow good information there I have copied it  in case it is a help to others, Thank you

[crystalfresh]

More water the better. You use 16 oz of water if you want to. 12oz is the minimum you can use with this.

And as always check with your doctor or pharmasist before taking my advice. I am not a doctor. Just sharing what I learned to help other people.

[crystalfresh]

These 4 powders mixed together the way I measure make up around 3oz before adding water. You can start with half to start with if you want. My idea of a rounded tsp is pick up as much as the tsp will hold and give it a gentle shake to just get a rounded top. More than level but less than heaping. If you end up with more than 3oz than try less next time. Less than 3oz try more. But you will find what works best for you. We all will be very different with the amounts of powder each of us needs. I just wanted to point out mixing products for the moment is working very well for me. I will let you know if I become too irritated from this which means I am not tolerating Metamucil or Benefiber well. In that case I would start cutting back on both.