Help! I want to find that road to recovery!

[Lisa27]

Hello to everyone!

I have not been diagnosed with IBD. I have an appointment with a GI Specialist in a week. I wanted to get some opinions from some real people with these diseases (you can only get so much information from google) and ask your opinions as to my condition. So I was hoping to arm myself with some information and some good questions to ask the GI doctor.

1st, I am a 27 year old female and I have been experiencing GI problems for 9 months (among other things). Here are my top 5 complaints:

1) Extreme Fatigue/Exhaustion
2) Diarrhea (for 9 months)
3) Abdominal cramping
4) Tachycardia
5) Recurrent yeast infections

My abdominal cramping is in the morning (whether or not I have a bowel movement - pain is not associated with bowel movements). It can last from 30 minutes to hours. It can be so painful it is like I'm having contractions and about to give birth to another baby. By mid-day the pain has subsided and I'm left with a general ache/irritation feeling in my intestines. - this happens every, single day. The diarrhea varies in severity.

I've been tachycardic for 7 months. I have seen a cardiologist and nothing is wrong with my heart.

My fatigue is to the extreme. I am amazed I can even get up in the morning and function. I have had this for 9 months, since the start of the GI issues.

I have had 8 yeast infections (both vaginal and thrush) in the past 9 months.

I have seen several different docs about these issues and I have been tested for so many different things:

Thyroid
Lyme Disease
Mono
HIV
Parasite infections
Various other Infectious Diseases (like Rocky mountain spotted fever - oh yeah)
Hepatitis
Blood Cultures
I've had 3 CBCs done

and a few others... All negative!!!

The reason for the delay in seeing a GI Specialist is because when my sypmtoms first started I had just come back from out of the country (it was a tropical place and I live in the States). The idea was that perhaps I had picked up an infection or parasite (I presented with a petechial rash, low platelet count and high WBC) .. but now the thought is that whatever infection I had back then could have triggered an event in my intestines that has caused an IBD to emerge.

My questions to you are: Can IBD cause all of these symptoms? Could it just be IBS? Or something else entirely?

I have not been able to find a connection to IBD, tachycardia, or yeast infections. Other than IBD can cause stress on the immune response which might lead to yeast infections. And perhaps the tachycardia is a result to stress on my body in general from IBD???

So any help would be greatly appreciated or even any suggestions as to what could cause all these symptoms (because your guess is as good as any of my doctors).

Thanks so much!
Lisa

 

[shazamataz]

Welcome Lisa!

Sounds like you still have some work to do on finding an answer. Sometimes it can take a while. Have you been tested for inflammation levels in your blood? This can often indicate IBD. Also, have you not had any tests like a colonoscopy done? I am surprised they haven;t done that for you?
It's frustrating isn't it?
I hope you get some answers soon

 

[Lisa27]

I'm going in a week to see the GI Specialist... so we will see what he says.

I have not had a colonoscopy. It is probably in my future though.

Thanks for your response! I hope to find the answers VERY soon, hopefully!

 

[My Butt Hurts]

Hi Lisa,
The only I was going to suggest was to have your thyroid checked, but I see you've already had that done. I was tachycardic at the time of Crohn's diagnosis, but I was hyperthyroid at the same time. If I remember correctly, there are 3 tests to check thyroid levels. If they only did the one, they might have missed something. Just a shot in the dark there, but worth looking into if you have trouble finding an answer down the road.
Are you betablockers for that?

Odds are your GI will recommend a colonoscopy, and hopefully that will give you some answers. Good luck, and welcome!
MBH

 

[D Bergy]

Welcome to the forum Lisa.

That is quite a laundry list of symptoms.

You may want to try taking 200 mg a day of Magnesium Citrate for the Tachycardia.

If you do have Lyme, you would likely be deficient in Magnesium as the Bacteria steals it from your body. Even if you do not have Lyme, you could be deficient and this can easily cause Tachycardia. Lyme can also cause heart problems directly.

Lyme also suppresses the immune system, and this suppression can and does cause Lyme induced autoimmune diseases. There is no 100% accurate test for Lyme and my wife never had a positive test, but she does have Lyme Disease.

Most Lyme starts from a Deer tick bite, but some have been infected by Spiders and some do not recall a bite of any kind. There is even a small possibility of a mosquito bite causing Lyme.

For a quick and dirty self test for Lyme simply buy some Cat's Claw from heath food store and try a normal dose. If you get Flu like symptoms (Jarisch-Herxheimer reaction) then you can be fairly certain it is Lyme Disease, or a rarer Spirochete based disease, such as Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever or Syphilis.

This self test can only give you fairly good proof you have Lyme, but cannot rule it out completely, as there are some rare individuals that do not react to treatment by getting a Herxheimer reaction.

Good luck on the GI appointment.

Dan

 

[OliveBranch]

Hi Lisa,

To my mind, you might possibly have Crohn's--I've had it for 15 years (ack!), and when it is active, I'm always intensely fatigued. One other thing you should look into, though, is Celiac disease. I've actually been investigating it for myself and learned a lot about it due to fatigue problems that did not go away between my flares (although I am almost ready to come to the conclusion that celiac is not causing my problems). Celiac can present with an incredible variety of symptoms, including all of the ones you've mentioned. You can find a lot about it on the Celiac forum at www.celiac.com.
Good luck in finding a diagnosis and getting on that path to recovery!

 

[imisspopcorn]

:welcome: Lisa,
9 months is along time to go undiagnosed, unfortunately it can take some time to get a proper diagnosis. I really hope you don't have IBD. I hope you get a great GI to help you sort things out. Please keep us updated and good luck.