# rock bottom?



## skye d (May 3, 2013)

*Warning: This may be long because my IBS has caused so many other problems for me. Please bare with me and take the time to read it anyway, I may be able to use YOUR help.*

I never know how to start these things off so i'll begin with a little bit of background info on myself and my IBS. I am a female who just celebrated (well, hardly) her 19th birthday yesterday, and was officially diagnosed with IBS-d around 2 months ago, after months and months of pain, illness, hospital visits, needles, etc. I do not feel as though my IBS is new to me as I can recall moments from my childhood and youth where I would worry about going out with friends to the movies or dinner because in the back of my head I knew it would result in abdominal pain and the d (diarrhea). Is it possible that for awhile my IBS had been dormant? because my IBS did not seem to majorly interfere with my life until I caught a very bad stomach flu back in January. I had the flu for a total of 2 weeks, back and fourth to the doctor and emergency room very often because I could not deal with the pain I was experiencing in my stomach. Not only that but I would vomit consistently every 5 minutes no matter where I was (in the car, in my doctors office waiting for a needle, in the ER, etc) during this time I felt like for the most part the vomiting replaced my diarrhea, however the stomach pain felt amplified more than ever. I ended up receiving a pelvic exam, an ultrasound, and a lower body CAT scan in order to try and find where the pain was coming from. No idea if this is relevant or not but the contrast dye from the CAT scan also made me very ill and restarted my vomiting. After my 18 hour hospital visit, I was sent off with just a prescription for Dilaudid for the pain and the words "just because we dont know where the pain is coming from, doesnt mean it doesnt exist." Could this flu have caused my IBS to be increasingly worse? You can bet I felt beyond hopeless, but not anymore than I do now..

So since around January, I've now run into many complications. Every single day, I wake up usually around 7 am, sometimes 6 am, sometimes 5 am, or sometimes if im lucky, 8 am. I don't even need to open my eyes anymore to know what i've woken up to, I immediately have to hold my stomach and run to the bathroom. This doesn't mean that I wake up and immediately have diarrhea, however, I immediately begin to suffer from EXTREME abdominal and intestinal pain and also bloating. I will spend around 20 minutes either having the d or just sitting there crying my eyes out, wishing it would go away, wishing I could sleep in for once. Now I know about stress and crying and how much worse it will make you feel and I'm so aware of this that I now just feel stupid for crying because thats how badly it hurts. I have to cry. Normally I will have the d around 10 times early in the day. The pain I experience from the moment I wake up, *has not once ever lasted less than 4 hours.* My boyfriend will leave for work around 9:30 am and by that time, my stomach still has not even begun to calm down. Around noon to 1, most of the severe pain has gone away however I still feel generally ill, with severe abdominal and stomach pain randomly throughout the entire day. Sometimes my stomach will fool me into thinking I do have to go to the bathroom but I will go and just suffer from a sore stomach instead of actually going. Sometimes I feel my IBS switches from IBS d to IBS c but now time to explain my eating habits, again my apologies for the length of this post.

Before I got SUPER sick in January, I can admit that I did not have perfect eating habits meaning I did eat junk and fast food often and was a little bit overweight. My height is 5'4 and in JANUARY I would say I weighed around 155-160 lbs. I was completely uncomfortable with my body at the time. When I had the flu I lost around 7 lbs and then the rest has been ever since, assuming it's the combination of my very frequent diarrhea but also my lack of eating sometimes. I currently weigh 120 lbs, I went from sharing clothes with my older sisters to stealing pants from my *15 year old sister.* I do not starve myself to lose weight, I would first off like to make that very clear. I cannot eat whatsoever during the hours that I first wake up and deal with the pain and diarrhea. This usually causes me to fear food because I know I will experience pain and diarrhea after eating. Sometimes this means I will just not eat, or I will replace that food with something better and healthier. I love vegetables, I love fruit, and I have cut out dairy from my diet since being diagnosed with IBS. I have always wanted to lose weight but would never imagine it would be happening like this. I tell myself everyday that I would rather have my old weight back and lose weight normally than to ever have to deal with IBS again. At my last doctors appointment I was tested for Celiac disease and although that wasn't found, what they did find was that my *potassium levels are extremely low. (Hypokalemia)* Yes, sure, eat a couple of bananas is what everyone told me but unfortunately that just wasn't going to do. I started suffering from tingling fingers, tingling toes, very sore joints and muscles, just feeling overall weak and small and like I was deteriorating. I ended up having to get potassium supplements I think they're K-Lyte 25 meq. My problem is that they must be dissolved into water and Im really not good with flavored water, it's just really disgusting and makes me gag the whole time Im making my crappy attempt at drinking it.

Another issue of mine is that I do suffer from anxiety and although i'm not 100% sure i've overcome it, I would like to call myself an ex social phobe. Went through a bit of therapy, saw it as pointless, and took my social phobia into my own hands, doing little things everyday to help. Some things I still cannot do but one thing I did manage to do was have a job..... that was, until I had to quit due to my IBS and being deemed as an "unreliable employee." I absolutely loved my job, loved the people I worked with, and LOVED being the one who always got the 6:30 am opening shift. I do not have a lot of friends, that's a whole different story, but I hope that helps you realize how much I valued my job, not just because it helped me deal and overcome with a lot of stress and anxiety, but because it was basically one of my only forms of communication with the outside world. I quit not long after getting sick in January and just slowly felt like my whole world was starting to become so pointless.

My life is a broken record. I sit at home all day, close to a toilet and close to medication. I live in an apartment with my boyfriend because my mom separated from my dad and immediately went to live with another man. I did not know him whatsoever, he wasn't my Dad and from day 1 he tried to be, kissing me and telling me he loved me, it just made me sick and i couldnt stand to live in a house with him anymore. I feel like my mom chose him over me. I don't own a car and anybody with IBS knows how much fun it is to take a bus (not) so my mom usually picks me up and drives me to my doctors appointments. She makes a big deal out of it and then after she drives me home it will be weeks or even months she won't text or call to ask how i'm doing. I have no friends because I don't trust anyone to take all of this information about me in and not later throw it in my face. I already feel bad enough about it. I know that I don't exactly have to tell everyone all of the specifics but it's very difficult to continuously make up stories when im too ill to hold up my end of the plans with someone. I just always feel like my stories have too many holes and in the end I just end up looking like a poor friend who ditches all of her friends and then those "friends" decide hey, if she ditches me all the time, whats the point of continuing this friendship? It's a good question.

I feel like I am hanging from a very thin thread. I have nothing to look forward to anymore. I have a doctors appointment May 14th to check up on my potassium and to discuss pain medications as I never got my prescription for the Dilaudid after reading up about it. My doctor wanted me to try natural ways to cure the pain such as baths, excercise, etc. Unfortunately these things can only do so much for me. Are there any medications out there that you could recommend for me to ask my doctor about? Any other advice or even support?

*Thank you so much for taking the time to read this, it really means a lot to me.*


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