Major setback tonight!

I had felt fairly well for the past two days until tonight. Got a full meal at Piccadilly Cafeteria that consisted of a small chopped beef steak, some macaroni and cheese and fried okra with a dinner roll. The okra was not greasy at all and the portions were small. Boy did I pay for that big time hours later. Started stinging badly in my lower pelvic area, much discomfort from I am sure gas. Took some prelief for the stinging and two activated charcoal capsules and it eventually helped but I felt totally horrible. Have I got a problem with dairy I am not aware of??? And my sides around my ribs are tender. Felt really horrible. How much longer am I going to have to put up with this before I get some relief or help from my doctor. It will have to wait until after our trip now. Is the protonix taking away too much of my acid needed to help with the digesting of my food or is this Asacol giving me awful problems. I felt great today until after eating that larger meal, and of course some was dairy. My tolerance has really run thin now.

There is nothing good about this meal that I can see. You have red meat, probably has some bad seasoning on it, wheat and dairy and OKRA. I can't handle wheat in pasta form. I'm not celiac but I don't react well to it. I don't do well on dairy either and I'm not lactose intolerant nor was I before I got IBD. Your last mistake was thinking that okra was a neutral food. Okra in raw form affects me in a negative way and I suspect it has something to do with the viscosity of the mucus barrier. Also the seeds in okra don't get digested properly and can be irritating. What part of this dinner do you think is aimed at reducing the inflammation in your colon? Who's advice are you following on what foods calm your irritated gut? Why would activated charcoal help whatsoever? You'd be better off with URSODIOL. I can't imagine what you were eating BEFORE you got IBD? Seems like you are following your old diet before you got ibd. Where's the effort to at least TRY to eat something mildly NOT irritating. It's no wonder you keep irritating your colon with these foods.

Stick with chicken turkey and fish. Cut out all spices for awhile. ALL spices. Only LIGHTLY salt your food for now. RICE and foods with corn-not corn on the cob, will have to make up the bulk of your grains. Stay away from YEAST, highly acidic foods, wheat, fruits, fruit juices and jams, jellies, you get the idea. If you are in a flare you need to live on soups. You can slowly add ingredients to your various soups as you tolerate them but soups are the easiest to prepare and make the food soft and easily digestible. Slowly start to add resistant starches in to your diet such as tapioca, beans, and corn chips and corn flakes for breakfast. Don't drink alchohol or carbonated beverages. Drink water and flavor it with crystal light if you have to. Start taking psyllium husk and inulin in the form of fiberchoice. Go super slow and only take a 1/4 of a tablet. Tiny amounts but add them slowly. However no one's diet should be without these. I haven't had bread, alcohol, yeast, hot spices, whole fruits accept berries, or wheat in over 5 years. My diet keeps me stable as much as my asacol.

Why are you taking protonix? Do you have or think you have gerd/acid reflux?

The doctor thinks I have acid reflux though no endoscope was ever done to verify this. He was going by my symptoms. I was fine all day with smaller meals. Activated charcoal helps the intestinal gas which I have been having huge amounts of periodically, more on than off lately. Even my upper gut stays knotted from gas when I get up in the morning until I belch it out and take some gas-x for it. And I stay away from fried foods, do not eat pizza, chili, tomato based anything, like spaghetti, etc. No fried foods as a rule. Don't understand the stinging in that area from gas, even after having a bowel movement. Have no diarrhea, bowels work normally as to using the bathroom. And this has had me stressed for quite a while. I also lost my 13 year old dog back in early April to cancer, he had been sick for a month. Since he first got sick I was highly stressed and haven't even relaxed since his death, haven't been able to. And as for my diet before IBD, I was living with my parents when I got colitis and wasn't eating that bad a diet back then. Just happened to be unlucky enough to get food poisoning that triggered most of this. This is the first year I've had any kind of flare at all in many years. And my diet does consist of alot of chicken, not crazy about fish, but I eat tons of grilled chicken, that is 3/4 of my diet. Cereal in the morning with Lactose Free milk now. I don't even eat barbecue.

Post Edited (at wit's end) : 8/23/2007 6:01:57 AM (GMT-6)

When you eat out, you never really know what you're getting. Sometimes you take the chance and accept you'll pay for it the next day, but I try to limit my eating out to once treat meal on the weekends... and no fast food.

I agree with Horus. All of your choices were potential problems for someone with active UC. Like Horus, I avoid dairy and gluten. I take it one step further... I feel better avoiding all grains. Corn is a common offender for food allergies and reactions. Rice is a safer choice. It's entirely possible you have a problem with dairy. Folks with impaired digestions often struggle with both dairy and gluten.

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Diagnosed with ulcerative colitis spring 1999

If I've developed a dairy and gluten problem, it just has come on over the past two months. Used to not have these bad problems. Trying to use Lactose Free milk. But gluten free food just tastes horrible. Most of it. the waffles taste good though.

It takes some getting used to, but yes, in general it doesn't measure up to the wheat/gluten foods we're used to. I've found the waffles and cookies to be good, but breads and cakes not so much. I bake breads with almond flour and enjoy them. The consistency is heavy, similar to cornbread.

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Diagnosed with ulcerative colitis spring 1999