Reged: 12/13/04
Posts: 4490
Loc: West Orange, NJ (IBS-D)
Well, if you read old novels you hear about people who suffer with "delicate stomachs" or who are "martyrs to their bowels" (I love that one) so I assume they did without calling it IBS. I do agree with Dajara, though, that their lifestyle may have made it less of a problem. The limited food supply would have made it difficult to get rich foods (dairy, egg yolk, fatty meat). The hard physical labor would probably have helped IBS-C (there's nothing like walking 3000 miles to loosen things up) and for IBS-D there was always laudanum (alcohol plus opium derivatives).
Plus I bet if you were too sick with IBS you never joined up with a wagon train. And while it's true there was no Quilted Northern back then there was a bathroom behind every rock.
-------------------- [Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate. - Sandra Boynton]
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Re: Do you think the Pioneers suffered with IBS?
