unexplained diarrhea since nov 2008

[jsonk]

i've been having diarrhea for about 7 months now. I don't know what's causing it. i've done many tests including colonoscopy, blood work, stool test, lactose test, upper GI with small bowel. But all came out to be negative. I don't know what's causing it. Neither does my dr. I have been taking imodium to help control my symptoms. But i don't know if i can take that all my life. I've tried gluten free diet but nothing. I have 3-4 bowel movements a day if i don't take imodium. and my stools are very loose. Have been really depressed lately because i've lost so much weight (10lbs). Please help me here. Open to any suggestions.

[Matthew007]

*shrugs* it wouldn't hurt it's a healthy diet anyway but yeah...i'm not sure what else it could be.  Other than doing stool tests to see if there's a bug of some kind but yeah sometimes people are gluten/soy intolerant and it takes time ..or maybe you're celiac and been misdiagnosed *shrugs*.  Something is up..welcome to the club i'm on week 3 now and I wish I had your no-nausea symptoms.  Good luck trying to figure it out :S

[jsonk]

To add more details to my original post: I feel normal everyday. No vomiting, or anything like that. Just little weakness but that might be due to not enough vitamins im not gettng. It just diarrhea that giving me problem. and my stool is very loose. Abdominal pain on the left side, below my rib cage at night. I'll try gluten free diet for long time as matt suggested.

[Matthew007]

well not sure how long you did the gluten free diet..usually that takes months sometimes to get a result.  

One test you could look into is the SIBO test, or maybe it could be fructose/citrus intolerance..there is casein too that can cause those symptoms.

what I'm doing (I'm intolerant to soy/wheat but tested negative for celiac) is just eat eggs for breakfast/salads with safe dressings, avacadoes corn chips whatever for lunch and then for dinner meats/rice..and just snack of veggies and use a multivitamin for like 2 weeks and see if you have any improvement

course it could be eggs to you never know..you could go see an allergist and get your skin tested..it might show something weird like mine did.  I'm allergic to oats (never knew that..) so *shrugs*.  Also if you do that food elimination diet you could use citrucel fiber to help normalize things..it's non-allergenic.  I was taking benefiber and noticed it has gluten/wheat dextrin as an ingredient and was making me sick so it can be anything but it sounds like you're intolerant to something unless you're having some SIBO infection deal.

hang in there - hope we both feel better soon

[jsonk]

I've tried drinking those protein shakes to put on some weight but that also gives me diarrhea.

[perfectly_4given]

how about a lactose diet? have u tried that? though above  said u had a lactose test. try bulking up your food a little. high calorie high protein diet. thats what we give a lot of patients at the hospital when they are malnutritioned. High Cal High fat try to absorb some of it so maybe u can put your weight back on. just a suggestion

bbut definatly dont decrease your fluids u need that! since ur losing it a lot drink extra fluids during the day like 3000cc, (about 3 liters) thats definatly important since u have chronic diarrhea.