Search the Community

Hi, I'm here because I'm desperate. This is complicated. To start I want to clarify that I'm not diagnosed IBS. I think I have IBS after having been on a FODMAP diet (I started it on my own) for the last 3-4 months. I've been in a year long battle with my body, through various health issues that seem to keep getting compounded. Currently I'm trying to keep myself out of the hospital and I feel like I might end up there anyways before the weekend is out unless I can somehow get nutrients in me. My current situation is that I've been trying to follow a FODMAP diet for months now, it was going ok and seemed to be helping. I snuck in foods that I know were considered high in FODMAP's because it seemed to be ok...until it wasn't anymore. I recently lost 12 lbs in two weeks, I felt like my stomach was suctioning in (very uncomfortable feeling,) almost any food I tried to eat resulted in abdominal pain just below my ribcage on my left side and then it would get even worse on my right - turning into what felt like really horrible bloating that made me feel short of breathe and dizzy, I had to have a nap once sitting up because it made me feel so tired. I'm on two antibiotics for what my doctor thinks is a case of diverticulitis (it was a phone consult.) I randomly started having constipation over the course of 4 weeks (which has never been an issue before,) I would start feeling bloated randomly. I noticed that whenever I tried jogging etc I would begin to feel what felt like a small knot of pain in my abdomen in my left hand side, in line with my belly button. When the bloating and pain started to happen after I ate any food I started myself on a clear liquid diet of bone broth, popsicles and jello for the weekend until I could call my doctor. On Monday is when he started me on antibiotics, telling me to get food in when I feel like I could handle it. Except that almost anytime I eat food the bloating begins to happen under my ribcage. The antibiotics have been helping, the little knot of pain is gone but I can barely eat anything in one sitting. I'm on day 8 of mostly doing a clear liquid diet because anything else results in horrible bloating under my ribcage. I ate an egg the other day, had a cocoa with a little bit of almond milk and thought that was going to be ok, plus the clear liquid stuff. That night (around 6pm) I had really horrible bloating in near my midsection with some pain in my left hand side in line with my belly button and the next day I started back on the clear liquid diet again. (It has seemed for months now like my bloating begins at 5-6pm and I can't eat anything the rest of the night, I lose my appetite until about 10pm.) I'm very nutrient and mineral deficient, I've been really low on iron for years and have had a constant uphill battle to get it up for the last 6-7 years. I have mild lactose intolerance, I'm afraid to try any milk products in case it makes it worse. I suspect I'm now having a phosphorous deficiency because my lips have started to randomly, throughout the day feel like the after effects of numbing (I saw that lips going numb is a potential sign of a phosphorous deficiency.) The antibiotics have been helping a little, I'm starting to get back to having a semi-regular BM (it's not normal yet, because I'm intaking so little food it's only happening once every second or third day,) it used to be once a day and healthy. But the bloating in my ribcage is what's the most uncomfortable part that is keeping me from eating. I had a gastroscopy back in October to see what was going on with a different health issue that had resulted in me being unable to swallow solid food at all (it went on for months before I got the gastroscopy) and I was diagnosed with "gastritis that looked to be healing" and got put on a PPI to help with healing. I stopped being able to eat on the PPI and lost a lot of weight because of it. When I got off it is when I went on the FODMAP diet because my appetite didn't come back at all even after being off the PPI, and started a high salt diet (I don't eat processed foods, I wasn't salting food either and became suspicious that I had low stomach acid. My doctor was unwilling to test me for it because to do the test I would have to go to a city two hours away to do it.) My appetite started coming back, but I started noticing bloating symptoms. At one point two months ago I just asked if he could test me for H. Pylori, just to be sure, on a general blood test we ordered he included looking for antibodies, it came back negative for any signs of antibodies so that's as far as we took it. When the constipation started occurring I went to the hospital, they tested my blood for white blood cells and found nothing (they did an xray and found I was extremely backed up but there was no impaction so I was grateful.) It was really pale, no tarriness or blackness. This is all really complicated. Because of the current issue with covid-19 any testing that was ordered for me is pushed back past June. If anyone who's experienced this, or knows anything about this could help in any way whatsoever I would really, really appreciate it. I've been anxious and worried. I've been trying not to be stressed out except that I keep feeling like any time I try to eat anything it's just pain and suffering. Thanks for taking the time to read this. -Tsuki