January 2006 Archives

I'm 28 years old today. My problem with birthdays is the same problem I have with Christmas - the fact that whatever happens you're probably gonna remember it, so if you're doubled over with pain then you just get another miserable memory.

But this year was pretty good - no pain at all, nice quiet day, organic sausages (don't ask me why, they're just nice). Previous birthdays have included terrible constipation, lots of crying and, during one particularly depressing year, a blood test, so there's definitely been an improvement.

And at least this year I can say, yes, that's another year gone, and I've still got IBS, but at least I'm fighting it now, at least I'm trying. There's a lot to be said for simple hope.

Well, OK, not destiny, but it sounds better than "my appointment with nutritionist". Anyway, I had it.

And it was pretty good - I actually, genuinely came OUT of the appointment feeling better than when I went IN, which, if you are an IBS sufferer and have visited a number of healthcare people, you will know is exceedingly rare and quite exciting.

I now have a pin-prick test kit to do the food intolerance ELISA test, and I'm going to do a CDSA (comprehensive digestive stool analysis) test as well to check for bad bugs and beasties (I was going to write a separate blog entry about these but time got away from me, maybe next week I'll catch up).

The first thing that the nutritionist said to me when I walked in was that he thought that my severe food poisoning episode I had when I was 12 may have left me with some bad bacteria, so the plan is to a) find out what kind of bacteria they are and then b) kill them, leaving me with c) a perfect working digestive system and no worries in the world.

OK, not c), but definitely a) and b), and if c) can just be "get a bit better and function a bit more like a normal person" then that's good enough for me.

I should have all the results of the tests in around a month, and obviously I'll let you know what they say, and what treatments are recommended. But at least I'm doing something rather than just resigning myself to another 15 years of this rubbish.

So - the first aspect which my new therapist looks at is food intolerance. There are a lot of different theories and arguments surrounding IBS, but I think that one thing that is pretty much beyond doubt is that food affects our symptoms. The question is how much of an influence it has - and perhaps more importantly, how on earth we can figure out which foods are causing which problems.

There are two basic approaches to trying to discover whether an IBSer has a food intolerance. The first approach is to try an elimination diet, which involves eliminating various foods from the diet for a week or two and then keeping a record of any changes in symptoms.

Elimination diets have proved very successful in some cases, but their major downside is that they have to be very strict, and can take several months to complete fully, in order to give you the time to eliminate each food or group of foods. When you've been ill for months or years, this is not an easy thing to cope with.

The second approach is to use some kind of laboratory test to look for certain reactions in the body to certain foods. This is much easier for the patient, because all they need do is provide a sample of, for example, blood, and then that's it.

The problem here is that most tests are unproven, and some are downright ridiculous. The test that I personally have most faith in, because of its widespread use and the fact that it has appeared in a respected UK peer-reviewed medical journal showing good results, is something called an ELISA test, which looks at the level of IGg antibodies in the blood.

I'm not gonna explain exactly what IGg antibodies are because, well, I don't really know, but the basic idea is that if you have a 'traditional' food allergy it is caused by IGe antibodies; if you have an IBS-type food allergy or intolerance, it may be caused by IGg antibodies, and these reactions can take two or three days to show up as symptoms.

And the ELISA test, looking at the IGg antibodies, is the test that my new therapist uses. So that's the first investigation...

Right - I've made the appointment, hurrah for me.

Over the next few weeks I'm gonna write some blog entries looking at the approaches which this particular IBS clinic uses, ie: looking at food intolerance, plus yeast overgrowth, plus the presence of bad bacteria.

And if anyone's inspired to go for a similar approach themselves then the clinic is called IBS Solutions and they see people in London and Oxford (and also use telephone consultations if you can't make it to one of those cities).

So - have you booked your appointment yet? Or started a food diary? Or bought a new IBS book? If not, what are you waiting for!

OK - the Save the IBS Hedgehogs (and Save the Sophie) campaign has got off to a rather rocky start, because I've had the cough from hell over the past two weeks. It was really quite impressive, resulting in some spectacular and lengthy coughing fits. On several occasions I was quite disappointed to find that I had not, in fact, managed to cough up a lung.

So, this meant that I couldn't really hold down a conversation without choking, and so I haven't yet made my appointment to see the nutritionist. But first thing Monday, I'm doing it.

The nutritionist I'm seeing treats IBS on the basis that many cases are due to a combination of factors - food intolerance, an imbalance of good/bad bacteria or parasites, and an overgrowth of yeast. In each patient, one or more of these causes may be found, and they all need to be treated to achieve relief.

I have decided that this is the approach I want to try first for a number of reasons. Mainly, it just seems so sensible and logical that it has to be worth a try - I sometimes think that researchers into IBS over-complicate matters when they try to look for deep and hidden meanings and obscure physical causes.

After all, one day I was fine, the next day I had awful food poisoning (caused by some bad bacteria in my digestive system), and from then on I wasn't fine. And there are some docs who seem to think that the food poisoning was almost irrelevant, but that seems a bit crazy to me.

Isn't it possible that the bad bacteria wiped out some of the good ones, or lived on to keep causing more havoc? Seems logical to me, and there are certainly some bacteria that can live in the body for years. Apart from anything else, the discovery that most stomach ulcers are actually caused by a bacteria leads me to think that this is a useful way of thinking.

Like all aspects of IBS, the research in this area is not conclusive, but there have been some studies which show that probiotics can help IBS symptoms (as long as they're strong enough and contain the right strains), so it's not as if it's a completely unscientific theory.

Anyway - that's the kind of therapist I'm talking to first. Once I'm well enough.

Right. This is my New Year's resolution - that 15 years of IBS is far too much for anyone to take. So I'm not going to take it anymore!

I intend to spend 2006 looking for some real, genuine improvements in my IBS. Because I'm exhausted, and sad, and restricted, and so sick of being sick all the time.

And because my poor cheerleading hedgehogs are exhausted too.

So, I hereby launch the 2006 Save the IBS Cheerleading Hedgehogs Campaign. I'm going to start by booking an appointment with a UK IBS treatment centre (more details soon) and actually getting some expert advice from a nutritionist rather than being fobbed off with "take some milk of magnesia little girl and go away". And I promise to document every step of the way in this blog.

And if you would like to join the campaign and save your own hedgehogs, then please do! Just leave your comments on this blog to let me know what you are doing, and what treatments you are trying.

We really don't deserve this much pain, and it's time we got some relief!