# My life as a teenager with IBS



## MasaiLorrn (Nov 20, 2015)

Hi, I'm 17 years old and I live in London.This is going to be quite a long story, but please if you can, take the time to read it and help me.

I've had IBS since I was about 9/10. It started off with excruciating pain in my lower left abdomen. I'd cry for hours in pain and my parents could do nothing. Everytime I went to the GP, they would ask if I was eating properly and I had endless blood tests. When I was in year 6, I found that I would get hungry pretty quickly and my stomach would always rumble so loudly. So lunchtime was always a relief. Sometimes I'd have school dinners which were quite varied and other days I'd have a packed lunch (which consisted of a sandwich, a packet of crisps, fruit and juice). In the afternoon, the gas would start. The strange thing was that it didn't have an odour, it was just really loud. My partner used to notice but he never once said anything about it (something that I'm very grateful for).

I then started secondary school. The first year was good, I had forgotten about the gas and the pain and I was having the time of my life. However, when I got to year 8, everything came back, every afternoon, after lunch, my stomach would rumble and I'd pass gas. Everyday was a battle between my grades, making sure nobody had heard my flatulence and my mental state. My attendance started to drop and I'd always make sure I missed the afternoon lessons. My parents couldn't understand why I was 'making such a big deal out of it' but it was ruining my life, seeing everybody else being 'normal'.

I got to year 9 and my mum and I went to visit her family abroad and itwas the perfect opportunity for me to get treated. I went in for tests to see if I was lactose intolerant, had coeliac disease and for many other things. They all came back negative. However, they found that I had a Helicobacter Pylori infection. I then had an endoscopy where they took a biopsy. I was given antibiotics and omeprazole for the infection. It was the best week of my life because I thought that I had finally been cured. I think I lost the ability to hope for anything after I found that nothing had changed.

My grandma stayed with us for a month, she made sure I was eating healthily and I think that to this day, she's the only person that has ever sympathised with me. Unfortunately, there were hardly any changes. I was still frequently passing gas, my stomach hurt all the time and I'd spend about an hour in the bathroom every morning. So I decided to stop eating at school.

Unfortunately, I had a big group of friends who noticed what was going on with me. I told one that I could trust about it but all she did was laugh. That made everything worse, I started to push people away and I always wanted to be alone but my friends were always there. Thinking that if they knew my secret, they wouldn't look at me the same way was awful. It hurt a lot. There were times when I'd get so fed up that I'd lock myself in the toilets and cry. I'd wait for a few weeks to let all the emotions build up, the stress and the anxiety and then I'd cry to let it all out and the cycle would begin again.

In 2013, I had a hospital appointment to see a gastroenterologist. He said that I'd been suffering for years and the only diagnosis he had was IBS. I had thought the same thing for years and nobody would believe me.

I immersed myself in my schoolwork because it seemed like my only escape. At the end of year 11, I got the best GCSE grades in my school. I should have been happy, nobody had ever done as well as I did and 'coming from a state school, I had done a lot better than the majority of those who were privately educated'. As I walked home, however, the only thing I could think was that I'd do anything to exchange these grades for good health, for no more IBS.

I'm in year 12 now. IBS gave me social anxiety, I hate talking to people and my self-esteem is very low. But thanks to my GCSE grades, I was forced to talk to people I had never spoken to. I never go to assemblies because they are in the afternoon for an hour, the claustrophobia would make me anxious and my IBS would be ten times worse. I told my head of year that I couldn't do it and he said he'd sort out a bathroom for me. But I don't want my peers to ask me why I have the code to the disabled toilets or why I use it. I never go to assembly now and my attendance is being affected because of it. I have started on a low fodmap diet but it's really hard for me because I don't know how to cook and I have to eat separately from the rest of my family. I found that anything with gluten in it or anything sweet would cause pain, gas and diarrhoea/constipation. A lot of the time I'm forced to eat these things when I can think of nothing else to eat for lunch or dinner.

As I said, it is quite long. I'd really like to get to know any other people, especially those my age, who suffer from the same thing. How do you cope? My dream is to study medicine and work in international aid. I really want to make a difference in the world. But I won't be able to do that if I'm constantly passing gas. I have considered running away often but I'd have nowhere to go and I don't think my parents would ever recover. Is it worth it, going through 5/6 years of medicine with the prospect of passing gas a lot of the time, my stomach hurting and having to go to the bathroom all the time?


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## missanniev (Nov 21, 2015)

On the first days of October, things started to go downhill for me. My intestines just started to screw up. I had this urgency to go to the bathroom but when I did, nothing! The only thing that got my bowels moving was cardio, and it was just a short lived relief. The moment I ate and digestion began, I felt the same urgency. I've been having alternating constipation/diarrhea, urgency to go, occasional abdominal pain, pushing to get a BM, flatulence and feeling I did not empty completely my bowels.

So throughout the month I started to exercise a lot -- something I had not done for a full year. I ate more fruits, incorporated yogurt and drank a lot of water. I got better. There were a few bad days, but mostly, being in school with friends and trying to live more healthily got me better. But then, vacations arrived. (I have a different school schedule -- February-November) While it's true I began to eat a lot more of chocolate, fried foods, brownies, milk, I thought I would feel better after school's stress. But no! I had almost gotten a normal life, and then it got worse!

To say I'm scared is an understatement -- I'm terrified. Could this be cancer? I am so scared that it's cancer, but my parents say I'm being paranoid because we're generally a cancer free family. Still, I could be the exception that makes the rule. I guess we just have to cope with this, and try to make the best out of life. I get how you want to make a difference in the world -- I have dreams too, and I just wish I'll be able to fulfill them.


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