Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards | Re: Survey! When IBS Began

My IBS started with a bit of mucous in the stool when I was 18. No other problems then. Over the next few years I started to get attacks with loose stool and sometimes D and maybe a bit of pain, but only like once every few months. The frequency of these attacks slowly increased and at the same time my bowels started to get more sensitive to and react more strongly to nervousness, like before exams and presentations et.c. Then in 2005 when I was 26, after I had had a really stressful few weeks at work and then had my vacation the IBS got bad. My bowels have more or less constantly been working too fast since then. I had to fight to get examined properly since my GP was of the old-fashioned-and-not-educated-on-IBS-kind. She was pretty much convinced the problems were caused by my worrying and wondering if it could be something more serious, which just goes to show how little she knew. Finally in the spring of 2006 I got my IBS properly diagnosed (though actually it wasn't specified as IBS but rather just a functional digestive disorder, but since I have pain too that is exactly what is called IBS). I found this webpage in the summer of 2006 and gradually switched to the EFI diet. I still need loperamide daily though and I think I will probably always need it unless they find a cure or a better medicine for IBS. I am just thankful that it works and I pray and hope it will always work for me.

My situation is a bit complicated because I had a paralysis condition as a child so I also have bladder problems and anal incontinence issues, the latter of which I am now waiting for treatment for. Unfortunately it can take years if I am unlucky so from mid summer I will probably go on full time medical leave as it gets too much for me to try to juggle work as a PhD student with hunting down doctors and going through the treatment program all at the same time.

/Ulrika, IBS-D

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