# Stool Color



## andi smith (Jan 15, 2011)

I know talking about stool can be gross, but I want to know what others are experincing . Lately I have been having constipation problems. I take meralax to make it softer and easier to go. Now when I am constipated, and finaly go, my stool is very dark with small specks of red. Not bright red, more the color of bricks. Then when I have diarrhea the color is a nasty green and white. Once the color was a clay color. I'm worried that something really wrong is happening in my bowels. I'm trying to avoid, at all costs, a colonoscopy. Should I tell my doctor if it gets worse? Are the colors normal? Help please!


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## mania (Jul 29, 2010)

With the diarrhea, the green is most likely bile. When bile is added to the stool it is green, and as it moves through the bowel it changes to yellow, then to brown. But since the stool is rushed through the bowel so fast with diarrhea, the bile doesn't have the chance to change. The white stuff may be mucus.You can always google it and find very helpful information, e.g. google "green stool"


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Mostly normal, the color change of stool was explained already.Clay color is a bit more concerning as that can mean stool that never got any bile in it, so if you have upper right pain (usually quite severe, may go into the back) you really would need to get the gall bladder checked out (colonoscopy doesn't do that, usually start with an ultrasound)Usually the more constipated you are the darker brown the stool will be.I do worry a bit about "brick" as blood gets browner as it ages, but could also be something from food, which is what "specks" tends to be, usually higher up bleeding is more well mixed in.


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## andi smith (Jan 15, 2011)

Kathleen M. said:


> Mostly normal, the color change of stool was explained already.Clay color is a bit more concerning as that can mean stool that never got any bile in it, so if you have upper right pain (usually quite severe, may go into the back) you really would need to get the gall bladder checked out (colonoscopy doesn't do that, usually start with an ultrasound)Usually the more constipated you are the darker brown the stool will be.I do worry a bit about "brick" as blood gets browner as it ages, but could also be something from food, which is what "specks" tends to be, usually higher up bleeding is more well mixed in.


 Since I started getting the brick color I stoped eatting anything that could make it have a red color. I still get the specks and the brick color. And when I do have constipation its not just dark brown its like.......black, but not BLACK. Its more like a softer, shadowy black. Could having a peptic ulcer(small) make my stool a different color? Can I even have a peptic ulcer that does not bleed a lot? That can go unnoticed?


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

The stool can get a very dark brown (verging on black) just from the normal darkening of stool and concentrating as it becomes hard and dry.Blood from a peptic ulcer is usually black AND tarry, not just very dark in color.


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## andi smith (Jan 15, 2011)

Kathleen M. said:


> The stool can get a very dark brown (verging on black) just from the normal darkening of stool and concentrating as it becomes hard and dry.Blood from a peptic ulcer is usually black AND tarry, not just very dark in color.


That's good I don't have tarry stool  hopefully these color changes go away. Thanks for the in put. I don't have to spaz out anymore


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## Shawna-one (Jan 30, 2011)

andi smith said:


> I know talking about stool can be gross, but I want to know what others are experincing . Lately I have been having constipation problems. I take meralax to make it softer and easier to go. Now when I am constipated, and finaly go, my stool is very dark with small specks of red. Not bright red, more the color of bricks. Then when I have diarrhea the color is a nasty green and white. Once the color was a clay color. I'm worried that something really wrong is happening in my bowels. I'm trying to avoid, at all costs, a colonoscopy. Should I tell my doctor if it gets worse? Are the colors normal? Help please!


Andi, I have IBS/Spastic colon, and I just had a 2 month bout with colitis. I had every color of stool one can imagine. However, my food was not digesting at all, but passing right through. When I had green or black stool it was because I had taken Pepto-Bismol, and charcoal tablets, which both turn the stool black. Sometimes if I only took 3 or 4 charcoal tablets for gas during the day, the stool was sort of greenish. I don't know about the red specks. You should get your doctor to give you the home testing kit for blood in the stool. I've never had it, but hear it is simple to do. Good luck.


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