Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards

Well, the good news is the doctor is sure I'm not celiac. He was really good, spent loads of time going through my history and test results, examined me and was very helpful.

The bad news is he says I'm almost certainly intolerant to wheat and dairy (well dairy is out of bounds anyway) but the wheat is a big blow. Since I've been eating it over the past few weeks, I've felt awful - even had sore itchy eyes and a serious pimple breakout, the last time I had pimples was years ago when I was eating wheat on a daily basis.

This means I not only have to follow the IBS diet, but no wheat (and oats, at least initially). So this is gonna be fairly restrictive for me, harder to cope with and much harder to get my soluble fibre intake up. Anyone else have to avoid wheat too?? What do you recommend???

Also, my doctor told me to keep up with the soluble fibre supplement (I have acacia and he prescribed Normacol, which sounds very much like acacia - it's a vegetable gum which doesn't ferment and increase bloating etc, like acacia).

He also prescribed Colofac (Mebeverine) which I can take each day if I like or just when I'm worried about an attack (like when I have a 3 hour meeting, trapped in a room with 20 people!!!!) I tested it straight away before my meeting thisafternoon and it worked like a DREAM....I'm delighted! It works by relaxing the bowel wall so that the bowel can't go into spasm and therefore avoids any gas, pain, D...

He's also referring me to a dietician at the hospital, so I can manage my limited diet and don't become too deficient in anything.

Finally, he told me to exercise EVERY DAY, reduce stress AND reminded me that stress isn't the cause, but a trigger. Personally, I'm still reeling with shock that he suggested I'm 'INTOLERANT' to wheat & dairy. I thought every GP in this country would roll their eyes in despair at such a word, but no... He said he does get a lot of patients claiming intolerance to foods when they're a bit overweight and so on, which is utter rubbish, but some people genuinely do have intolerance to certain foods, particularly dairy...

Anyway, I'll shut up now. Armed with my new medication and cutting out the wheat I should soon be feeling much better than I have for quite a while

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