# Soup diet to rest bowels and ease constipation



## Colette111 (Jul 29, 2012)

For the past month my bowels have not emptied properly. I have felt bloated and swollen no matter what I eat. When it's been really bad I have excruciating pain in my left lower abdomen, which I am led to believe is just pain from constipation?I'm wondering, however, if it is wise to try eating just soup for 2-3 days to give my digestive system a rest and hopefully clear out, then begin again with a normal diet? I am waiting for an appointment with a dietician but in the meantime, need to try something to ease the pain and try empty my bowels. Hopefully somebody has tried something simila with results and can give me advice. Please reply if you can! X.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Usually the no residue/liquid diet to rest the colon is more seen with diarrheal diseases. Especially if you the lining of the intestines is ulcerated and fiber can be like rubbing wool on a rash.Are you planning on adding as much osmotics as it takes to keep stool wet enough to move? Or just doing that with your regular diet? It can take a few days of osmotics to make a difference, but it tends to be easier on the system, you just don't want to take enough to really clear all the stool out like you would for a colonoscopy prep as that can set you up for another round of bad constipation.When you have severe diarrhea going on you don't have to worry about stuff not moving enough and causing a blockage, if you are already backed up and what is in there can just stay in place and dry out that might be counter productive.Pain can be from where the backed up stool is sitting, but it doesn't have to be. I can just be that is where the colon over-reacts and spasms as you can get pain like that with any stool consistency/frequency.If you regularly have 2-3 BM's a month at best with your constipation then they would put you on a low residue diet with lots of osmotics as 15-20 days of low residue is the same amount of stuff as 2-3 days of a normal diet and too many days of fiber in there can be painful.


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## Colette111 (Jul 29, 2012)

Thank you so much for your reply. Although I'm not sure I really follow. I take fybogel everyday to try and help with constipation. I was prescribed lactulose at one point but I didn't find that helpful. I found it caused a little bit of diarrhoea but then stopped working. I was just hoping that if I had a few days of just eating soup and things easy on the digestive tract, it might calm the spasms in my intestines/colon and ease the pain and bloat. I'm at a loss at what to do at this point as I am still waiting for an appointment with the dietician and my appointment with the Gastro isn't until September, but nothing seems to be working. I'm very uncomfortable and can feel it beginning to affect me mentally but like I said, have no guidance on what to try.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

You can try no fiber all broth diet, but that usually isn't about reducing spasms and it usually is a constipating diet used for diarrhea (and to make sure you don't irritate ulcerated lining)I'm not sure it would rest anything as it might make nothing move. I'm not sure just blocking yourself up more will reduce spasms, but if you think that will do it for you...The only time they usually recommend little to no fiber at all with constipation is with severe slow transit constipation (when people really will go a week or two between BMs) and that doesn't sound like you.I just don't think it will give you the results you want.Do you do anything that is directed at spasms? That may be more helpful. There isn't much you can do with diet as for which type of food, but smaller more frequent meals may help as then the colon has smaller spikes of activity.Over the counter you could try peppermint (teas, candy with real peppermint oil, capsules) as they reduce the amount of spasms and are not usually constipating.How much water do you drink, the one thing soup may help with is keeping you more hydrated if you don't regularly drink enough water, and you might play with the amount of fiber in diet to see what your optimum is. Sometimes you need fiber from the diet in addition to the fiber in a supplement, usually ti is hard to get all you need from the supplement alone.You could try other osmotics, but sounds like that is off the table, and I usually wouldn't recommend stimulatory laxatives, but that can help some people, but that is usually when other things fail.If you think the block is right at the end and enema may be more helpful than just not adding anything you need to move that along into the top of the colon.


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