Been pretty unwell for about the past 8 weeks, very little appetite and as aresult have lost over a stone in weight. Feel sick all the time no enregy and a stomac like a washing machine. Doc thinks its IBS but I’m not so sure.
Used to ride three or four times a week but haven’t ridden for a couple of months now. I seem to be hungry in the morning but as the day goes on I fell worse and in the evening I’m only eating a tiny portion of bland food and it seems to just sit there in my stomac till I go to bed. I’m also really tired all the time. Any tips or advice?

Sounds like IBS, best thing is ti get tested, they check for every other disease and if all clear it’s probably IBS, there isn’t a test specifically for it though. I’m guessing ur late 30’s, bit stressed? The condition is self propogating, mine was worse in the mornings, improved at night

100% what RD said above. Mine is far worse in the morning, I am much better now I eat a version if the iDiet. For me I need to eat 3 big meals a day with little snacking. Bread helps me, but isn’t on the iDiet but I eat a thick sliced sandwich for lunch. I made a food diary to see when I was at my most toilety and ruled out nuts, sweetcorn and other things that are hard to digest. I get a bit of discomfort after a meal, but i am much better.

Get tested by a DR (not a health food shop) and good luck. I just make a joke of it now, but it was pretty embarrassing at one point.

Hi GlynP, is it just the last few weeks you’ve had these symptoms or have you had problems in the past? The reason I ask is that I’ve been diagnosed with ibs and doctors have suggested to me that most ibs sufferers have had some sort of discomfort or problems for a while before they reach crisis point and see a GP. When ibs-like symptoms come on suddenly it’s usually after a gastrointestinal infection of some kind.

I’ve tried just about everything in a three year quest to manage my symptoms and I’ll offer what advice I can, but bear in mind that people do differ in how their symptoms manifest.

I find only eating soluble fibre on an empty stomach helps, as does generally increasing my intake of soluble fibre, and only having limited insoluble fibre and with soluble fibre foods.

Drugs you can get over the counter which may help are loperamide and buscopan. Peppermint oil capsules can help too. Be careful of ibuprofen and codeine painkillers which can make things worse.

Oh – and I found my symptoms were much much worse when having had artificial sweeteners (diet cola etc).

If your symptoms carry on in this fashion for another week or so I’d be asking the GP for a full investigation.

As others have said above get yourself checked by a doctor and maybe try and get yourself referred to a specialist .

My wife fobbed off with IBS for years before being diagnosed with Crohns and being rushed into hospital for emergency surgery.

Sounds like IBS, best thing is to get tested, they check for every other disease and if all clear it’s probably IBS, there isn’t a test specifically for it though.

This is my experience. GP referred me to a proctologist who put a camera up where the sun don’t shine. They ruled out all the big nasties after that and wanted to do more tests (eg, camera down from top end) but I said to the consultant that basically we’re heading towards a diagnosis of IBS, she looked a little embarrassed and mumbled yes, so I said thanks very much and asked her to discharge me from her care. IBS is the gut equivalent of your GP saying ‘you’ve got a virus’ – it’s a massive catch-all for a range of symptoms they can’t really explain the root cause of. Mine is very much stress related.
This is all IME and IM-not-at-all-medically-trained-HO.

Could be a dietary intolerance? I can’t digest lactose properly and if I inadvertently eat something with dairy in it I get pretty heavy-duty IBS type symptoms, among other things (I’ll spare you the details).

Anyway, if your guts don’t get on with dairy or gluten or something that might be part of the problem. There are tests for quite a few of these things so you might want to ask your GP to get you sorted just to eliminate the possibilities. Oh, and in my experience GPs can be flipping useless at diagnosing this sort of thing. When I first developed this problem, probably as a result of food-poisoning, it went undiagnosed for months and due to not being able to eat or digest properly I lost a couple of stone in weight – and I’m not a big lad.

Thanks for all the replys folks, I hate moaning and feeling down as there is always a lot of people worse off than me. I suppose if I look back on my life I have had problems with a nearvous tumm from time to time but it never made me feel this ill and weak. I’m scared to eat a meal at night now as it makes me feel crap. Has anyone tried therapy to calm down the stress? or just talk about the condition?
Thanks for your words guys.

realising what it is and that it’s not the big “c” goes a long way to easing it, it’s one worry out of the way and you can concentrate on trying the usual remedies, but everyone is different and something that works for one won’t for another, i found loperamide great for controlling visits and gave me confidence as i knew i wasn’t going to be rushing to the loo every 20 mins which is such a relief (pun intended) i missed out on lots of rides because of the frequency thing, imagine driving to a ride for two hours and wanting to visit the loo 5 times in that period, loperamide stopped this and visits began to follow a normal pattern, i gradually cut this down over a few months and just carry a tablet with me but haven’t actually used one for over two years *touch wood*

I suffered with it about 6 or so years ago. Mine seemed to come on over a few months from mild symptoms at first. I pretty much excluded everything from my diet – I think I pretty much survived on grilled salmon, chicken and brown rice for 18 months and would not eat anything that I did not prepare myself.

Overtime I started introducing other foods, pasta potatoes etc, pre-prepared sandwiches etc. At first it seemed that I would be OK for a day but not if I ate them 2 days on the trot etc. No pun intended.

It has only flared up once again since and thankfully seemed to resolve itself relatively quickly without all the drastic measures.

Still not convinced it was down to any specific food intolerance as pretty much anything kicked it off.

I have Loperamide but was told only to take them if I had the trots I did take Mebeverine which slows down the actions of the muscules in the gut. I suppose I am a little paranoid about the C word as I have lost two brothers to it but I dont think its that either, I guess I’ll just need to find out what works and stick to that, might try some relaxation or maybe even yoga!!!! 😆
Also I hate not enjoying a couple of beers of an evening

get yourself a colonoscopy.. never had so much fun on new years eve!!

have a read of that picolax thread (if someone knows where it is). you’ll feel much better about things then 🙂

As a doc i would say that loss of appetite weight loss and tatt ( tired all the time) does not sound like ibs to me. You need to be reviewed again and investigated!

It really does not sound like ibs at all!!

for mrs flap_jack it was intolerance to oats and rice. Other grains fine. Stopped the oats & rice, stopped the IBS.
Find your enemy…