New to the board...

[ls1krab]

Hi, my name is Sebastian, I'm 26 years old, and I was diagnosed with Crohn's at the beginning of the year. It actually wasn't too bad at first, mainly just some blood in my stool, but no diaherra. I'm a student and towards the end of the spring semester I wasn't eating right and I was staying up really late, sometimes pulling all-nighters, to study for exams and finish projects.

At the end of the semester, I had become very anemic, I ended up in the hospital and needed 4 transfusions. I've been on entocort, asacol and prednisone. I'm currently taking asacol, prednisone and I also just had my 3rd dose of remicade. The remicade seems to be doing the trick, so hopefully they'll be able to take me off the prednisone soon.

Anyways, just wanted to introduce myself here, I hope to learn a lot from everyone on the board. One question, I know everyone is different, but what seems to cause the bleeding?

 

[Isla]

Hello and welcome to the forum! I can't answer your question either, even though I am a bleeder myself. I think mine is mainly a side effect of constipation.

 

[katiesue1506]

Welcome... WOW you are a plethora of meds aren't you? Bleeding can be from two different reasons. There is occult blood which is old darker blood from the beginning of your intestines (comes from ulcers). Also if it is bright red, it's usually due to hemorrhoids, fissures, or an abscess (do abscesses bleed?) The other reason for bright red blood would be an ulcer really close to the anus and rectum.

I hope I'm right here... its all an uneducated guess. Ha... maybe I should keep my mouth shut?

I, too, like you, was/am anemic and when you are that anemic pulling all-nighters and not eating right make it worse. It seems like I can never get enough sleep. Plus those things, coupled with stress are very bad on your immune system which is why we college students get sicker more often... well and cramped living conditions. Anyhow, hope I helped a bit!

 

[Jeff D.]

Welcome to the forum.

Sorry about the diagnosis but this forum is great support. Katiesue is right about where the blood comes from. The darker red the blood the higher up the intestinal tract and also the darker it is the more reason to call a doctor. If it is bright red wait a day and then call but if it's dark you shouldn't wait a minute. Best of luck

 

[ls1krab]

Thanks for the reponses everyone, I'm glad I came across this forum. It's only bright red blood, none of the dark stuff.

katiesue: Yeah, I've been on a few meds already, but I didn't really take the diagnosis seriously at first since I had to worry about class work and all. In reality, I neglected this disease and didn't follow any strict diet (gotta love those hot and spicy buffalo wings!), which I'm positive contributed to my condition escalating to the level it did.

 

[Jeff D.]

Does it hurt when you go to the bathroom? or at any other time?

 

[ls1krab]

Nope, no pain during BM's or any other time for that matter.

 

[Jeff D.]

That's good at least it rules out fissures, hemmies, other butt problems.

I was just curious. Best of luck I hope you can figure out what is causing this bleeding.

 

[ls1krab]

Thanks, I'm going to try primal defense that another board member seemed to have some success with and see how I react to it.

 

[Isla]

I have hemorrhoids that bleed without any pain.

 

[Guest]

hi Sebastian, & welcome

i have bleeding too - & according to the last colonoscopy, this is due to an angry active patch of Crohns ulceration, for which i am taking pred to try & calm it down.

the bleeding worries me, but my fears have been alleviated somewhat by joining here & reading that many Crohns patients have this symptom - i guess it's just part of what Crohns does to some of us, sometimes.

 

[ls1krab]

Yes, the bleeding sucks, especially since it brought me down to my knees once already (hemoglobin was at 7.9). I don't have it all the time and I'm actually going up on my hemoglobin count with the help of my iron rich diet and iron pills I'm taking, but I do still bleed every once in a while. I'm hoping the primal defense stuff will control it better.