Can too much peppermint cause constipation?
#207157 - 08/21/05 10:01 AM
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I've been taking 2 of Heather's peppermint/fennel/ginger capsules 3x/day and they've really helped reduce pain and spasms. However, I've been even more constipated than normal. Could the muscle relaxing effects of the peppermint be causing this?
Thanks,
Chris
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I think so, although frankly I'm just feeling pretty confused by the whole IBS-C/spasm connection right now. Anyhow, here's my thinking on your question:
I used to think that Heather was saying that IBS-D and IBS-C were both caused by an overactive gastrocolic reflex, but after going back through "The First Year", I'm not so sure about this anymore. If you look at Footnote 2 on this page from "The First Year", it sounds like the last thing someone with constipation would want is a more relaxed colon. Given that, it makes sense that peppermint would be helping with your pain and spams, since it's an anti-spasmodic, but could also be relaxing your digestive tract more than you want.
On the other hand, "Eating For IBS" says "Constipation may follow an attack as the colon 'shuts down' in response to the earlier spasms, and can then become an ongoing problem in its own right." (The quote in the book differs from the quote on this Website.) This makes it sound like constipation IS the result of colon spasms. This is also in keeping with the description of IBS in The New York Times article jaime_g posted. In this scenario, it sounds like reducing spasms should reduce constipation, since it's the severe spasming that leads to the constipation.
Hence my confusion.
BTW, how did your Sitz marker test for STC go?
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[Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate. - Sandra Boynton]
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I just purchased the peppermint tea, and while I LOVE it, and it helps with the pain ect...my C gets worse. I thought it was supposed to help the overall problem, but perhaps it only treats symptoms. I'm afraid I won't be able to enjoy the tea after all. 
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God is Faithful!
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Hi Sand!
The results of my sitz marker test were (to me at least) inconclusive. I was really constipated when I started the test and at some point during it the aloe vera I was taking kicked in and I got diarrhea. So the markers were gone by the time I went back five days later.
Anyhow, even if the markers were still present, what would the test have told me? That I'm constipated! You don't say! Yes, I understand that it can tell me the difference between slow transit constipation and some kind of obstruction. But I'm mostly interested in results. Even my primary care doc said a lot of allopathic (Western) diagnostic tests are "mental masturbation" (his words, not mine!) because it's just a bunch of high-tech neato gadgetry that doesn't produce information that can lead to a successful treatment.
In other words, the doctors mostly still don't have a clue about IBS. But then we knew that already.
I'm reading a book (and following the program) called "Restoring Your Digestive Health" by Dr. Joseph Brasco and Jordan Rubin. It's a completely different approach than what is followed here. I've been seeing some positive results for the first time in a long, long while. Anyhow, Dr. Brasco says in his chapter on IBS that it is "very likely a group of many disorders that have been clumped under one name because we don't understand the individual disorders enough". I know Heather has said something similar, and that to me explains why people respond so wildly differently to a given approach (like the IBS diet, for example).
In the case of what you mentioned, I suspect that constipation can be caused by both an overly relaxed and overly stimulated colon. And unfortunately (for me, and other IBS-C folks) it can be both. I know that when I have a lot of cramps and spasms, I won't be having a BM the next day. Likewise, there is a familiar "nothing happening" or "dead" sensation when it seems like everything is just completely stopped that also tells me I'm going to be backed up. What's bizarre is that for some people, the exact opposite is true: spasms mean an immediate trip to the bathroom.
It's a mystery. Just stinks that we're the subjects of it.
Chris
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I am IBS-A, and I can't tell if the C that often follows my D is just the normal A thing or if it's because of all the peppermint caps and tea. Can you please help us understand?
Thanks!
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Amanda
I live in the Big Apple, but I don't eat the skin
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as relaxing the colon will just let it contract more normally and rhythmically.
The newsletter that just went out pointed up a study about the differences between IBS constipation and chronic constipation. One key difference is that pain/spasms are a part of IBS, but not chronic constipation. They haven't really nailed down the cause of CC, but it doesn't seem to be from the dysmotility, mis-timed gut contractions, and weird brain-gut disturbance that characterizes IBS. My guess here is that CC won't be helped by peppermint, since there is no need to relax the gut, and who knows? Maybe the gut is TOO relaxed with CC. But with IBS the motility is just off-kilter and spasms are a hallmark part of the syndrome, so peppermint and the relaxation it causes should only help, for both D and C.
- H
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Heather is the Administrator of the IBS Message Boards. She is the author of Eating for IBS and The First Year: IBS, and the CEO of Heather's Tummy Care. Join her IBS Newsletter. Meet Heather on Facebook!
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Thanks Heather!! I'm still loving the tea, by the way!! I think I must have been having a bad day on one of my early cups of tea, because everything is great now, and the tea is better than ever!
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God is Faithful!
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Hi Chris, Say, when you get this 'dead sensation' is it painless? Also, spasms with D people means an immediate trip
to the bathroom because their stools are totally watery,
whereas with C their lacking too much water and don't
readily move. I'll have to check out this book you mention,
it sounds very interesting. -Bob
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<img src="http://www.math.mtu.edu/~rwkolkka/BritPicA.jpg">
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Yes, when I have a "dead sensation", there isn't any pain. But I also have the experience of being curled up on the floor in excruciating pain. So it varies. Based on Heather's post, there's no question I have "IBS-C" rather than chronic constipation. I still question what that really means and how useful the information is, though. I'm still interested in learning what the etiology of my particular "version" of IBS-C is - not as an intellectual exercise, but as a means of finding a treatment strategy that is effective. For example, if my IBS-C is caused by bacterial dysbiosis that resulted from the severe parasitic infection I had years ago, then any treatment that doesn't resolve that dysbiosis is unlikely to heal the condition. I might find temporary and partial symptomatic relief with other approaches, but not get at the root of what's causing the problem. The book I mentioned gets at the root of what the authors (and I) believe causes many digestive problems. Not all, but many.
Chris
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Chris
#208090 - 08/24/05 09:57 AM
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Cyndy
Reged: 03/05/05
Posts: 1301
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when you say "I'm still interested in learning what the etiology of my particular "version" of IBS-C is - not as an intellectual exercise, but as a means of finding a treatment strategy that is effective", are you saying you think there is a specific cause and cure for IBS? Or do you think IBS can only be "mangaged"?
Are you following Jordan Rubin's diet by eating Ezekiel bread, taking his primal defense or Super Seed Fiber supplements, etc? His diet seems very IF based...was wondering how that approach was working for you.
I admire you not "accepting" this and trying to get to the basis of your problem! Isn't that a full time job though, I bet! I applaud you. 
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