Do I just let this go?

[chelytoad]

Hi, I am 33 year old female who started having GI issues about 10 years ago. Three years ago I underwent an upper and lower GI after being diagnosed with gastritis for the 3rd time. GERD was diagnosed and some scarring/stricture was found on the esophagus. Irritation was noted in the small intestine but the colonoscopy came up clear. I was put on Zelnorm and Aciphex and things got better. Fast forward to now...I had my gallbladder removed this December after the HIDA scan came back low but I had no stones. I felt fantastic for about 3 weeks post-surgery then I started having yellow watery diahrrea. It became non-stop so I was put a bile salt binder. This did nothing for me. I kept trying to "be a trooper" and hoped it would "kick in"--no such luck. I started randomly throwing up bile and continued to have watery stool, sometimes up to 20x per day. They began to contain blood stained mucus so I finally saw my GI.

He did a colonoscopy two weeks ago and everything came back normal. So, I was put on Librax. This has helped some as I am only having 4-6 stools per day now but they are still running and there appears to be more mucus and more dark blood.

I hate to keep wasting people's time if this is nothing to be concerned with but I still find it hard to believe that all I am going through is "normal".

Anyone have any thoughts or similar experiences?

[chelytoad]

Just an update to this....after being tested for celiac disease (blood and biopsy) and having both come back negative I was about to give up. On a trip to the GI I happened to mention that everything that passed through me looked exactly like I did when I ate it...nothing is getting digested. This peaked his attention and we did a Gastric Emptying scan. The results were positive for gastroparesis and I had the results confirmed at Mayo. This explained my random vomitting and why my food looked that same coming out as it did going in. LOL.
It is nice to have a name to put to my symptoms but can't say this is an easy fix by any means. But at least I have a real answer now...

[crambone]

ya,mine only lasted like 2 day,,it put me in the hospital though,and on iv fluids for dehydration.
they gave me some meds to help with the extreme belly pain,and that realy helped me feel better....and soon i got good as new,but like i said 1 month to the day later,,i had same darn thing,,they checked everything even for parasites exct in the stool,and found nothing!!
i realy dont kn ow what to think,but thank god i havent had it in awhile,,,but if it comes again,im not leaving the darn hospital till they can tell me what is going on!!

[CalGal]

Chely, did they ever attribute the irritation in the small intestine to anything? Do you ever get rashes or brain fog? When I hear of someone who has ongoing symptoms my thoughts go to celiac disease. It can present in a lot of forms and mimic a lot of other diseases, unfortunately. You may want to consider doing a bit of reading on the subject and then if you think you 'match' any of the parameters, do the fecal antibody test put out by enterolab.com. They've got a lot of information on the site about celiac disease and gluten that might be of interest to you.

If you don't want to go through the bother of testing, you could try an elimination diet. You're going through far worse than what the elimination would mean, and if it works for you, you could get your life back.

To eliminate, you'd have to take out all wheat, rye, barley and malt products out of your diet - and take out all the 'hidden' sources, too.

Statistics now seem to state that fully 1/4 of those with IBS  are not IBSers at all - they're celiac and they don't know it. The standard tests don't always pick up the disease.

[chelytoad]

I totally agree...it is all hooked together and I have talked to too many people who had their gallbladders removed even though they didn't have stones and had issues like this.

My doctor did look for colitis microscopic and otherwise and nothing was there. We both thought for sure that was it. So yeah, it was diagnosed "IBS" which I seriously think is a cop out. I do find it funny that you mention a slight fever as I run one from time to time as well. NOthing major...like 100 or 101 so I have never really worried/mentioned it.

Thanks for the idea on carbonation. It does seem to be worse for some reason when I drink pop so I will lay off that. I haven't had the desire to drink anything alcoholic for a long time but that didn't seem to help much.

Did your bouts of water stools all last 1-2 days? Mine have been here now for about 3 and a half months and I am worried about dehyrdation and malnutrition as everything seems to be passing through. My last blood test showed I was low on most minerals, vitamins, etc. but I wasn't in a "critical" range so no one is concerned.

Well I am rambling but thanks for answering. Good to know others are in this boat so I know someone else out there can relate. Of course, I wish none of us were in this boat! :)

[crambone]

i too have weard similar symptoms but the one thing that stood out was the onset of the watery yellow stools!..wow,,like reading something from my past!
i got that out of the clear blue,,extremely sore belly,chilled,slight fever even,,,then the 20+ times a day watery stools,,,but it only lasted like 1-2 days,,,i went to hospital and has every test under the sun,ct scan,barrium swallow every blood test you could imagine,and nothing.
they said acute gasteritis.
........one moneth to the day later,,,BAM... it happened all obver again!!!
i do have gastro issues too,stopped drinking beer and pop,,,and watched the mc donalds and stuff,and have not had that again,and its been about a year now since.
i just cannot buy that gerd would cause it.
i still say its our gallbladder,pancreas,or liver in some way or the other,,,as there ALL HOOKED TOGETHER,AND IF YOU HAVE AN ISSUE WITH ONE,YOUR BOUND TO HAVE AN ISSUE WITH THE OTHER!!
check into colitis,,,,but i just dont think gerd or ibs fits it,,,as we dont have all the other COMMON symptoms with those things.