NOTHING WORKS!!
#260148 - 04/26/06 08:57 AM
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I am so frustrated right now. I have been on the diet, acaica, calcium, probiotics, vitamins, and hyoscamine for six months. I improved somewhat and now I'm back where I started. The what to eat when you can't eat anything has not helped me for the past week and a half. I eat it for a couple of days and then introduced some plain protein. The diarrhea never ends and the cramping continues to worsen. I don't know what else to do!!!
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Have you tried an SFS other than acaica? I have never tried it, but I know acaica doesn't work for every one.
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Have you talked to your Dr about some medication options? I have severe IBS-D, and one thing that helps me *SO MUCH* is narcotic pain killers. Percocets work very well, but near impossible to get a prescription for... Another that has helped me leave the house and stay over 100 pounds is Emtec (not sure what the US name will be... its like tylenol 3 but without the caffeine... which we all know is a trigger that us IBS-D folks do not need! It's no miracle cure... but for when you suffer so badly, its priceless. The constipating side effect and pain relief will let you be cramp free and not have to stay within 5 feet of the bathroom. I've run the gambit myself with meds and various suppliments, things like immodium, lomotil, antispasmotics (buscopan, dicatel etc) sometimes work, but never for long. As well, I've had a lot of luck with having some xanax on hand... take a half of a pill and helps soothe your nerves while you sip peppermint tea in the bathroom haha. The codeine may be helpful to regulate your body while you work with the natural supliments, dietary changes etc to slowly regain control over your IBS.
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Zeus turns to Narcissus and says, 'God, look at yourself....'
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I haven't tried another SFS. I just feel like I'm doing everything I can possibly do and not seeing results. I NEVER cheat on the diet, not even a bite. I don't understand...
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What vitamins are you taking?
I'm IBS-D and stable, and yet I cannot for the life of me find a multi-vitamin that doesn't give me a massive D attack. I have tried at least 4 kinds, and tried ones with the least amount of iron and minerals that can sometimes upset the stomach. For now I'm simply taking calcium and B12 which is probably the only thing I'm missing in my diet.
Just curious which vitamins you're taking,
Kat
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Kat
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Just a suggestion but did you start trying all of these things at the same time? Maybe there are one or two things in that mixture that aren't helping and you don't know what they are because you are doing too many at once? Maybe you could start back at square one as frustrating as that might be. Do the diet for a few days and slowly add in some Acacia. If that is going well take a probiotic and so on?? I am so sorry you are feeling this way, having D all the time is not a fun way to live your life. Keep us updated and hopefully you will get some more suggestions here.
Take Care
Beth
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Microscopic Colitis, IBS-A, GERD, Hiatal Hernia
Bethany, Ontario, Canada
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Hi Cupcake, You are quite right. However, the problem in the
US is that if Doc's issue a fair amount of scrip's for drugs
like Percocet,etc., believe it or not, they are liable to be
arrested by the FDA. It may sound crazy, it is, but that's our
screwed up FDA. That's why US doc's refrain from prescribing
effective pain killers. I recently saw an article in the AARP
magazine about it. -Bob
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<img src="http://www.math.mtu.edu/~rwkolkka/BritPicA.jpg">
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Beth & K2,
Beth- I actually started with the diet first, slowly added in the acaica, and added the probiotics and vitamin supplements months later.
K2- I just take centrum. I take it before I go to bed because I take the calcium supplementin the morning.
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I took centrum too, pre-IBS. When I was really stable, my doctor had me switch to pre-natal vitamins, because I wasn't eating enough and he was worried about nutrition, etc. That was terrible, terrible....then I was sitting on the toilet with D AND throwing up. (Made me wonder...maybe there is no such thing as morning sickness...maybe it's the vitamins that do it to you!). Anyway, I tried going back to centrum, but I couldn't get stable (not that I was stable before then, while taking centrum either...) I finally decided to try without them and (among other things, diet, fiber, etc.) I got stable. Tried centrum again (was anemic by then) but still couldn't handle it. Now, I'm more stable, and I can finally handle these organic children's gummy bear vitamins, but I couldn't even handle those at first.
Just a thought....if you've tried everything else, and you take your vitamin and night, and then have D when you wake up, you just might give it a try...
Probably won't fix everything on it's own, but maybe it will be just enough of a start to allow your body to work itself out with all the other good things you are doing for it.
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Re: NOTHING WORKS!!
#260387 - 04/27/06 10:25 AM
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Toady
Reged: 04/06/06
Posts: 1299
Loc: A small city, Northwestern Ontario, Canada
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I take a bunch of sups, I do them throughout the day. I find if I take anything too late in the day I will be up all night on the throne. Just bring a blanket, wake me at 7 for work.
I take my Vitamin C, Iron and B complex in the morning with breakfast (which is between 9 and 10 while at work). I also take a peppermint cap and acidolpholis at the same time. And just before dinner, 5:30 or so I take the balance of my vits - B6, calcium, magnesuim, D, another peppermint cap and acidolpholis.
I was fed up with feeling crappy from vitamins!! I don't take a multi - there are less nutrients and minerals in the multi than I need. My dr. recommended taking all as mostly separate items. My calcuim, mag and D are together, and my B complex. I pop over 10 items a day - non-prescription!!
Good luck! Try you vits at a different time, maybe it will help!
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Cassandra
Live like there's no tomorrow. Love like you've never loved before.
IBS A 20+ years, Chronic Migraines, Chiari Malformation (decompressed June 22, 2010), Brachial Neuritis, and ??? the list just keeps growing, but I'm still shiny side up! 
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all multivitamins aggravate me too, i have tried liquids, powders etc to see if they'd be easier on my tummy to no avail.
so now i just take my digestive enzymes, probiotics and fibre supplement and call it a day, the ones i wonder about are my calcium levels and b12 since i am vegan, but i want to be tummy stable before i try extra supplements again.
my advice is basically to only take the supplements that you know that you need and avaoid the rest.
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Try Imodium
#260524 - 04/28/06 08:12 AM
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Nelly
Reged: 08/06/04
Posts: 4381
Loc: Within stray mortar fire of DC
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Have you tried Imodium? It stops D. Take 1-2 before eating or for an attack. It's been a lifesaver for me. Most D's on the boards swear by them, and they're available over the counter.
~nelly~ 
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Your continued problems can be caused by any one of a number of factors. Just to give you some examples ... some people can't tolerate acacia. I, personally, cannot tolerate vitamins or calcium. Some people may need to examine the source of their food supply and may need to purchase poultry without harmones and antibiotics and switch to some or all organic produce.
IBS is a very complicated thing to pin down and even the tiniest wrong thing, in some cases, can cause continued misery.
I have a very severe case of IBS and I am able to be pain-free about 90 to 95 per cent of the time. I can predict when I will get D because I know exactly what will cause me to have it.
I control my IBS solely through diet. I don't take anything else such as supplements or medication, etc. I lead a pretty normal life with the exception that I can't eat restaurant food and I have to prepare food in advance for work and if I am going somewhere. My wellness is in stark contrast to my younger years when I was beset with IBS attacks and was very ill.
Learning to control your IBS is challenging, but it can be done.
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I find that calcium gives me very bad cramping.
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Quote:
I am so frustrated right now. I have been on the diet, acaica, calcium, probiotics, vitamins, and hyoscamine for six months. I improved somewhat and now I'm back where I started. The what to eat when you can't eat anything has not helped me for the past week and a half. I eat it for a couple of days and then introduced some plain protein. The diarrhea never ends and the cramping continues to worsen. I don't know what else to do!!!
My advice would be to stop all your supplements and go on the Break The Cycle diet very strictly for 2-3 days. That should ease the diarrhea and cramping. If so, then start adding in other foods very slowly so you can detect any problems. Same with the supplements: add them in slowly (I'd start with the Acacia and go back to a super-low dose) so you can tell if any of them are causing problems.
Imodium and Donnatol are very helpful to me now, but before I got myself within hailing distance of "normal" with the diet, they didn't do much for me - it was like using a traffic cone to stop a freight train.
If following the Break The Cycle diet strictly for 3 days brings you no relief at all, then check to be sure you've had all the necessary diagnostic tests - you may not have IBS.
HTH.
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[Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate. - Sandra Boynton]
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I agree completely (and follow) Nelly's wisdom. Try Imodium.
Make sure it contains no lactose.
Kate, IBS-D.
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I have had ibs since age 7 as I can remember. It has gotten much worse in the last 2 years. I also have hemorrhoids and am iron deficient as in almost rock bottom numbers. I have to take iron pills. I normally am constipated but iron makes me D. I work in a hospital and type records so they understand the constant running most days. One day a month of peace. I am also high anxiety and take something for that. Motrin helps but is constipating and taking it daily worries me. [color:green] [/color] I am doing the fiber but seem to be worse. I have Gerd.Immodium helps but is that safe longterm?
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Post deleted by Heather
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Edited by Gracie (06/27/06 08:49 PM)
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Quote:
Try Benefiber. Its less expensive and you get twice as much. It is 100 percent solube fiber.
Benefiber is pure soluble fiber, but I don't calculate it as less expensive than Acacia.
Heather's Acacia is $13.95 for a 1-pound pouch that contains 60 Tablespoons. Each Tablespoon contains 7.5 grams of Soluble Fiber. So you get 450 grams of Soluble Fiber for $13.95 or 3.1 cents per gram of SF.
At DrugStore.com , 60 Tablespoons of Benefiber is $19.95. Each Tablespoon contains 3 grams of Soluble Fiber. So you get 180 grams of Soluble Fiber for $19.95 or 11 cents per gram of SF.
I certainly agree that people who have trouble with Acacia may tolerate another SFS better, but those other SFS are not necessarily cheaper.
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[Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate. - Sandra Boynton]
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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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Quote:
I am so frustrated right now. I have been on the diet, acaica, calcium, probiotics, vitamins, and hyoscamine for six months. I improved somewhat and now I'm back where I started. The what to eat when you can't eat anything has not helped me for the past week and a half. I eat it for a couple of days and then introduced some plain protein. The diarrhea never ends and the cramping continues to worsen. I don't know what else to do!!!
I'm sorry you are feeling this way. I have been striclty on a gluten-free version of this diet (as I also have coeliac/celiac disease) for about a year now and am also still struggling, but have improved somewhat. I wouldn't call myself stable yet but I'm not as bad as I was when I first started. My diet has mostly been rice, fish, a few steamed vegetable varieties like carrot, asparagus, zuchini and some snacks with soluble fibre (and gluten free) for quite a while. Lots of tea and done the hypnotherapy cds. Tried fibres of all sorts, and even imported Acacia, but they tend to make me feel nauseous, even in fairly small doses. I'll probably give acacia a go again sometime later.
So I understand your struggle. I still feel the principles of the diet are sound and that even though I'm still not there, with some adjustments or something I may hope to get stable. I'm going to experiment a bit with food replacement/supplemental meals (not Ensure though) again and just basically keep trying.
Now for my suggestion: I'm not a nutritionist but I've been taking Spirulina as my multivitamin. It's not a pill...it's a wholly natural green powder (though they have capsules I think) and is dubbed 'nature's richest food'. So basically it isn't artificial like vitamins. It has many of the nutrients we need and may not get and can be put in smoothies etc, but I put it in my rice as I don't have smoothies (like I said I have a very basic diet). It is concentrated, so you don't need much. Anyone else use this instead of standard vitamins?
Also, has anyone heard of this: A nutritionist here in Australia said on the radio recently that REHEATED starches like rice (my staple) and potato can cause people with IBS problems. I've just heard this so I'm going to try and see if it makes any difference. Most my meals have reheated rice as I make one big bunch to cover several meals. Anyone else heard of anything like this? Or why? I missed that part...something about it changing the starch or fibre of the thing and making it harder to tolerate....
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I've never heard of the reheated thing, it's and interesting theory.
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