# IBS and Social Anxiety



## hiddy (Dec 7, 2017)

Hi, I'm new here.

I'm a 24 years old university student. My story involves IBS and Social Anxiety. I've had Social Anxiety (SA) since as long as I can remember. I was really shy as a child and still am and I'm constantly insecure about my self when socializing. This has caused me a lot of stress, which I do believe has led me to develop IBS.

I was 18-19 years old when the first symptoms came. I would have involuntary spasms in my column and with that a lot of embarrassing sounds. At first I thought I had Gluten intolerance, so I cut out all wheat products. That helped foe sure, but then I developed more symptoms. I'm just gonna list them here:

I frequently have stomach cramps/pain most often in the mornings, that can be very bad.

I have constant constipation that has caused me to develop anal fissure/hemorrhoids (not sure what exactly) that is of course painful at times

I often get bloated and gassy, it can be awful especially if I have to sit lectures/meeting in school/work 

My stomach makes a lot of funny sounds all the time that I try to control by eating only specific foods on the days I have school/work or have to meet people (so almost always, it sucks)

Those where the main symptoms. My symptoms get worse when I'm stressed out, which happens alot since I have Social Anxiety. Thus I feel best when I can be at home all day and don't have to see other people. But of course thats not good. Its, just the only time when I don't have to think about these stomach problems and be stress-free.

What I hate most about how these symptoms affect my life is that they make almost everyday hard. Almost everyday I have lectures to attend to and every time I'm stresses out about my stomach. Simply put I just can't enjoy life as much. I don't participate in activities that I normally would like to do, both because of my IBS and SA (though mainly IBS). I for example am about to go to this group trip to Estonia in a few days, where I most likely will have to share rooms with other people and be surrounded to people all day and I'm just mortified. I'm so stressed out, that everyone will hear my load stomach and it will be so embarrassing and I'll ruin the trip. I really don't know why agreed on going, I guess I din't know we would have to share rooms, if that was the case I would feel a lot more at ease, becasue then I could hide away the most difficult time that is the evenings and early mornings.

I guess, I'm just tired of this and sad that this limits my life so much. I will have to be careful choosing a job with not a lot of meetings for example and limit social activities. I'm not even sure I'll manage to find a suitable job  My dream would be to work from home but I really don't know any such jobs and my education doesn't open doors to any such jobs I believe. Its just so hard, battling SA and on the same time have IBS to make it all so much harder.

But, I'm still grateful. Because I know there are people with worse symptoms and are dealing with more serious diseases. I just pray that my symptoms won't get worse by time.

Anyway, thanks for reading


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## Sudhir (Dec 8, 2017)

Hi. I agree that this can be very troublesome. I used to and sometimes still do get the cramps and pains mainly in the mornings. So there are always a bit of anxious moments if I have to go anywhere in the morning, till 1130 or so. The symptoms rarely come up after this time. Make a note of what you ate the previous night and what you have had for breakfast. Try various permutations and combinations and I am sure you will find out a way to keep it under check.


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