Hello All,
First post for me.
I was finally diagnosed on Thursday afternoon based on colonoscopy and MRI evidence after suffering from severe anaemia since November.
In the past couple of years I've had several bouts of stomach and duodenal ulcers - after the third round and more dramatic weight loss of around 6 stone (~ 84lbs for our American cousins) my GP started to take this more seriously.
I've always had a dodgy stomach ever since childhood. Sadly back in the early 1990s in rural Derbyshire the GPs told my parents it was all in my head. Forget switching between constant diarrhoea and constipation lasting weeks, it was all in my head!
When I hit 18 at university I started to get it looked at again. This time was the early 2000's when every stomach issue was automatically diagnosed as IBS. So I was told to eat lots of fibre, take fibre gels and was prescribed anti-spasmodic to slow my colon down. In retrospect the worst possible thing they could have done.
My second year at university was hell. I spent hours every day clamped to the (sadly for my house mates!) shared loo. I was almost kicked out, as we lived several miles off-campus and I just couldn't get in.
Post university things did get better, but the diarrhoea remained. GPs still told me it was IBS and got me in all sorts of work trouble.
I started taking codeine OTC to control the diarrhoea. Sadly it was Nurofen Plus and the NSAID probably caused a six year long flare up!
I picked up my first ulcers at Christmas 2011. Everyone assumed it was just stomach ulcers. Got better, had more stomach ulcers a year later which I just dealt with.
Picked up more stomach and duodenal ulcers in November 2014. By this time my work were getting very annoyed, and my GP was starting to take notice of my family history - ulcers pretty much on all relatives on my paternal side, and my paternal grandfather had most of his stomach removed in the 1950s long before proton pump inhibitors were developed!
Anyway long story cut shorter after a nasty colonoscopy and a silly MRI (I have a vagus response to needles, and the trainee nurse putting the cannula in collapsed a vein) which lead to a blurry MRI the consultant could see narrowing and inflammation in the small bowel just past the terminal ileum.
Sadly due to 20 years of misdiagnosis the damage is quite extensive. We are talking surgery to remove xxcm of small bowel as soon as I am in remission again.
I've been put on the course of prednisolone (30mg first week, down over the next five) and the straight codeine controls the diarrhoea.
First post for me.
I was finally diagnosed on Thursday afternoon based on colonoscopy and MRI evidence after suffering from severe anaemia since November.
In the past couple of years I've had several bouts of stomach and duodenal ulcers - after the third round and more dramatic weight loss of around 6 stone (~ 84lbs for our American cousins) my GP started to take this more seriously.
I've always had a dodgy stomach ever since childhood. Sadly back in the early 1990s in rural Derbyshire the GPs told my parents it was all in my head. Forget switching between constant diarrhoea and constipation lasting weeks, it was all in my head!
When I hit 18 at university I started to get it looked at again. This time was the early 2000's when every stomach issue was automatically diagnosed as IBS. So I was told to eat lots of fibre, take fibre gels and was prescribed anti-spasmodic to slow my colon down. In retrospect the worst possible thing they could have done.
My second year at university was hell. I spent hours every day clamped to the (sadly for my house mates!) shared loo. I was almost kicked out, as we lived several miles off-campus and I just couldn't get in.
Post university things did get better, but the diarrhoea remained. GPs still told me it was IBS and got me in all sorts of work trouble.
I started taking codeine OTC to control the diarrhoea. Sadly it was Nurofen Plus and the NSAID probably caused a six year long flare up!
I picked up my first ulcers at Christmas 2011. Everyone assumed it was just stomach ulcers. Got better, had more stomach ulcers a year later which I just dealt with.
Picked up more stomach and duodenal ulcers in November 2014. By this time my work were getting very annoyed, and my GP was starting to take notice of my family history - ulcers pretty much on all relatives on my paternal side, and my paternal grandfather had most of his stomach removed in the 1950s long before proton pump inhibitors were developed!
Anyway long story cut shorter after a nasty colonoscopy and a silly MRI (I have a vagus response to needles, and the trainee nurse putting the cannula in collapsed a vein) which lead to a blurry MRI the consultant could see narrowing and inflammation in the small bowel just past the terminal ileum.
Sadly due to 20 years of misdiagnosis the damage is quite extensive. We are talking surgery to remove xxcm of small bowel as soon as I am in remission again.
I've been put on the course of prednisolone (30mg first week, down over the next five) and the straight codeine controls the diarrhoea.
I feel lucky that I was diagnosed at 17 after only about 10 years of symptoms but I too already had extensive damage in my small bowel.