# How long should I try FODMAP?



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

Hi,

I got intense stomach pain for about 4 week ago, I then started with food that you eat when you got the flu. After a week I started with the FODMAP becouse my stomach was extremely

swollen.

Now after 3 weeks I still got the same problems, not changes have been made to my problem. How long should I try FODMAP before giving up?

This is what I eat :

Breakfast : Oat milk and Cornflakes

Lunch : Rise cookies with small amount butter and ham + Oat milk and Cornflakes

Meal : Boiled/Fried chicken, Fish(no Crumb), Fried Biff, Rice, Boiled Potatos, Potatos in the oven.

no candy, no Ice cream, no milk, no sauce.

In these 3 weeks I have lost about 11 pounds (171 to 160)


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Even though you are limiting fodmaps sounds like your diet is still a lot of starchy foods. Also fried anything usually isn't the best, baked or broiled is better than fried.

You might try a low carb approach while sticking to the low fodmap veggies rather than the only starch and meat approach. Avoiding all the starch foods will get rid of some of the fodmaps.

And sometimes diet doesn't make any difference, so if after you play around for awhile see what your previous diet does.


----------



## LivingHappyWithIBS (May 22, 2013)

I have some issues with oats, so I avoid them, unless they are certified gluten free. Also, I limit my corn, as well. I would suggest you mix up your diet since you are consuming these for breakfast and lunch. Also, for dinner, fried food could contain wheat and a large amount of fat, which could cause issues.

Another point about the diet is to eat smaller quantities. I eat 200-300 calories meals about 6 times a day. Even if I follow all low FODMAP foods, if I have a large meal (400 calories or more), I will have stomach distress. It's tougher to work into "real life" but the differences in symptoms can be worth it.


----------



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

Thanks for the reply

I did start out with only broiled but did not feel any difference between that and fried? Also according to FODMAP potatoes should be fine?

What you say Kathleen M. is that I should limit my already limited food to only veggies? That is no easy task indeed.

LivingHappyWithIBS, do you mean that oat milk is no good? I tried regular cow milk but that was even worse  . At least 1 week was with only broiled food and then I started with some fried but no changes, the stomach hurts as much anyway.

Yes the size of the meals could be a problem, I will see how I can change that.

How long should I try out a new diet? Is it 4 weeks? 6 months?


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

You can have protein on a low carb diet. Usually that is the meals, protein and veggies. Really didn't mean to imply youcut out all meat? Just that you may want to be choosy about which veggies than someone who is just doing low carb to do low carb. So spinach rather than something like cabbage that is full of fodmaps.

Usually the difference between the regular low carb and the low fodmap is a lot of low carb diets avoid all fruits, but the low fodmap diet has low fodmap fruits added in. Both limit starch, low carb is usually unlimited veggies (although some are basically meat with a side of meat and fat) but you may want to be choosy.

It just sounded like most of your meals were starch and starch with a side of protein. Even with lower fodmap starches if all you eat is starch you are going to be feeding the colon bacteria a fair amount of fermentables.

Usually with IBS, if it really is just IBS, a few weeks should be enough to know if the new diet works. It isn't like celiac disease where even if you do finally get every last bit of gluten out of the diet it make take a few months for the villi to grow back.


----------



## LivingHappyWithIBS (May 22, 2013)

I have never tried oat milk, but I think it may be a risky replacement for regular milk. I swear by rice milk (unflavored), which is the closest replacement I've found, and I have no IBS issues at all. Try to swap that out and see how you feel.

Also, when do you have pain? For me, I can usually pinpoint it to a meal because the pain will usually start about 2-3 hours after I eat the food. If you notice the pain prior to lunch, it's probably due to your breakfast. Because pain prior to lunch can ruin your whole day, I am very safe with breakfast and lunch and then I am a little more relaxed when it comes to dinner.

Potatoes are fine (and a favorite food of mine), but they are very filling, which is why I have to limit them to small quantities. Hope this helps!


----------



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

LivingHappyWithIBS said:


> I have never tried oat milk, but I think it may be a risky replacement for regular milk. I swear by rice milk (unflavored), which is the closest replacement I've found, and I have no IBS issues at all. Try to swap that out and see how you feel.
> 
> Also, when do you have pain? For me, I can usually pinpoint it to a meal because the pain will usually start about 2-3 hours after I eat the food. If you notice the pain prior to lunch, it's probably due to your breakfast. Because pain prior to lunch can ruin your whole day, I am very safe with breakfast and lunch and then I am a little more relaxed when it comes to dinner.
> 
> Potatoes are fine (and a favorite food of mine), but they are very filling, which is why I have to limit them to small quantities. Hope this helps!


The problem for me is that I have almost paint all the time, a couple of hours per day I can feel like I never had problems but then it starts again. I have really tried to find out if the food is cousing my "IBS" problems but never find any key. I have switch food around, I have excluded specific type of food and also tried LCHF in 2 weeks but never seen any change in my problems 

Yes when my stomach was in better condition then now I could get some pain in the stomach from some kind of food, often from a lot of fat like extra fat bernese souce on a Pizza or so. But when this happen it was often easy to see where the pain come from and the pain usually last only for a hour or so.

I have now tried the FODMAP in 23 days and I have lost about 13 lbs (now 158 lbs on 175 cm tall) without any change to my stomach pain  Its possible that I don´t handle FODMPA as I should but its not easy. Even if I eat Boiled chicken and rice 2 days in a row I don't see any changes. I will try rice milk, but my stomach have worked fine on oak milk before but I supose time can change.

I do really not think that the diet have anything to do with my swollen pain stomach but I need to give anything a try at this point. My doctor says that I have to learn to live with this and I don´t see how. Now it just feels like Im hanging in the end of the cliff on my finger tips.

Thanks for your input!


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

So food is NOT in any way shape or form the one and only cause of symptoms in IBS.

If you've given diet a good shot, and 23 days sounds like a good shot, you may be getting pain from things like your colon has to have activity to move things, and it is more active at sometimes rather than others which can mean you have more pain when it is more active and less when you have less activity.

So no doctor is willing to prescribe any medications what-so-ever. No antispasmodics, no low dose antidepressants, none of the things normally prescribed for stomach pain from IBS (or other functional GI pain?). Not sure how Swedish doctors are for IBS, but surely one of them has read something in the medical literature about IBS. One would hope.

So assuming you have to do this 100% totally on your own, this is what I would recommend.

1. Peppermint. It is an over the counter antispasmodic. It can increase heartburn so some people can't take it. Try either the tea or capsules. You can either just take the capsules regularly (see what the dose on the package is) or try drinking some peppermint tea (OK if it has fennel in it as well as some teas for abdominatl stuff do) 20-30 minutes before pain sets in or just every couple of hours. If you know you get pain after meals, taking the tea before the meal can help.

2. Are you open to a mind-body approach. Your english seems pretty good. There is the IBS audioprogram out of England that does clinical hypnosis and it can really reduce pain quite a bit for some people. You could also see if any clincial hypnotherapists in your area are trained to do it for IBS if you need someone in a different language.


----------



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

Kathleen M. said:


> So food is NOT in any way shape or form the one and only cause of symptoms in IBS.
> 
> If you've given diet a good shot, and 23 days sounds like a good shot, you may be getting pain from things like your colon has to have activity to move things, and it is more active at sometimes rather than others which can mean you have more pain when it is more active and less when you have less activity.
> 
> ...


Thanks,

Yes, there is hours (1-2) on the day when it feels like I never had problem with my stomach often it is shifting from time to time so some days it is better on the morning and sometimes it is better on the evening. All other time there is different scale of pain and some days I can hardly stand it.

2 paracetamol 500ml do not make any of the pain go away and when I tell my doctor that Im in alot of pain I get Ibuprofen 200ml!? Diklofenak could probably solve the pain better but its not good for the stomach and this is also the big reason why my doctor don't prescribe anything stronger then paracetamol and ibuprofen.

My Doctor have prescribed the following that make no diffrence : Egazil, Papaverin, Asacol(on my request). I have also tried some antidepressants but only tryptozol have worked a little bit but I got nasty sideeffects that is still with me today 1 year later. I have Cybalta prescribed but I have not dared to try it yet. As I see it antidepressant is only a symtom solver at best and do not treat the real problem and in that case maybe hypnosis can do better for me.

After a lot of searching on internet these seems to be possible solutions :


Rifaximin, this medication says to help about 40% of the patients with IBS but the problem is that the medication is not register in Sweden so the doctors says that I have to order it my self some some other country (how can I be sure that I really gets the real deal?) whitch will also probably be vary expansive.

Maybe I got Clostridium from all the antibiotics I have taken during the years (for other things then my stomach), Im not sure why the doctors haven´t taking this simple test.



feces transplant is really hard to get in Sweden for IBS patients and I have also read that it have not proven to work att all for IBS yet.

Special hypnoses fitted for IBS, not easy to get and its expensive if I have to do it outside the hospital (15 meetings = 2000 EUR)

Painkillers is impossible to get for the stomach here in Sweden but I dont see how Im supose to be able to live with this pain.

Stomia, Im not sure if this would really solve my problem and its a BIG procedure. If it however would for sure remove all my problems with my stomach I would go for it if no other solution existed.

Could it be false ileus I got? Intestinal Pseudoobstruktion (vary rare but not impossible)?


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Your English seems good, so if you want the at home hypnosis it is much much cheaper than going to see someone.

http://www.healthyaudio.com/content/irritable_bowel_syndrome?r=Ni9VPZFD

Actually on sale this week, but normally about 75 Euros at the most.

I never ever had any times without pain when my IBS was bad and the mind body approach worked well for me.

Feces transplant is experimental everywhere, not easy to get.

Ideally if you want to try the antibiotic for SIBO you would get a breath test first to know if you actually have it.

It is most likely IBS, they probably are not going to remove your colon as that can also cause unending abdominal pain from the damage done during the surgery and the scar tissue. They usually won't prescribe narcotics for IBS anywhere because over time they can make the gut nerves even more sensitive to pain. So narcotics are hard to get anywhere. Antispasmodics are often used, but sometimes do not help much.


----------



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

Thanks, I have now tried FODMAP in 29 days total and I do see that my stomach is less as swollen but the pain is still there. Its possible that my stomach would have been the same way even without the FODMAP.

A couple of times per day the stomach really hurts and at this points it feels vary/more swollen.

Kathleen M, your post was not fun to read but I suspect you are right, there is simple not help to get even when the pain is unbearable.

Im of to the doctor today and I intend to suggest the suggestion I made above to see what hi says, Is there anything else I should suggest?

I can add that I have neck problems that come about 1/2 year after the stomach problems began. I also often feels as I hungry and at the same time I feel ill and dizzy on the bring to vomiting.

.


----------



## Lexer (May 9, 2013)

I visited the doctor and he prescribed me something called Flagyl and Magnesium.

The Flagyl is to check if I got Clostridium, according to the doctor the regular tests is not that good but if it is Clostridium then the Flagyl should make some improvements. I have been on the Falgyl for about 5 days but Im not feeling any better, its the opposite(how that is possible) more feeling ill. The feces is however not so loose anymore and more brown then yellow,

thus could of couse be due to the diet change(the doctor thought that 30 days was more then enough to test the diet).

If Flagyl would maky any diffrence he could probably fix Rifaximin.

The Magensum is not tested yet(don't dare to mix to much).

If none of these worked I would get new versions of the anti depressive.

But at this point its hard to wait on any improvement.


----------



## DeterminedToGetBetter (Feb 1, 2014)

Apparently you are meant to do it for 8 weeks before you start to reintroduce food back!! I was quite surprised at this I thought that after a week I would start to see improvements. I had already noticed that I had problems with fructose and things like beans/lentils, but usually noticed a difference hours after eating, so thought the nutritionist was just being annoying when she said I had to do it for longer. But now about 8 weeks in I have noticed less gas, but not a complete miracle cure sadly, and the diarrhea maybe got a bit worse.


----------

