You are currently browsing the monthly archive for March, 2007.
The Hubby and the Kid are outside playing ball.
I’m sitting on my couch nauseated and crampy, missing out on the fun stuff. Again.
Life sucks right now.
I hate camping. I have only gone twice (once with the girl scouts and a port a potty right next to us, and once with no bathroom for hundreds of miles) and am not eager to go again. I am no longer that stupid.
But I own a camping toilet.
It’s on the floor of my bedroom. Why do we own a camping toilet you might ask? Because. I live in a one bathroom apartment with another bathroom using adult. It’s a bad situation, even though he is my husband and I have used the bathroom in front of him countless times.
You see, a few weeks ago, the Hubby was really sick, explosions from both ends, and it caused too much stress for my IBS stressed belly while he was monopolizing the bathroom. I decided I needed something as a back up other than a bucket in case I needed it. So a trip to Wal-mart and $70 dollars later, I own a camping toilet. And I feel so much better. The best $70 I have ever spent. I haven’t used it yet (I swear, not even once to just break it in), but it’s way better than a bucket. I just have to remember to hide it when company comes. I am really not sure why it’s still in the middle of my floor. Maybe some day we’ll put it away…
In my other life I am a gourmet chef! I have an iron gut so I can eat anything I cook while maintaining my weight at at perfect 125 pounds of lean muscle. My specialty is lasagna with lots of meat and gooey yummy cheese. Raspberry cheesecake with a wonderful graham cracker crust is my desert of choice. I tour the world trying new foods and eating what ever I want when I want it. I never have to ask “Is there milk in that?” and I can have all the ranch dressing I want. I live on beef and pork and rarely have chicken. I had a steak, medium well, with lots of A-1 sauce and french fries and salad with lots of tomatoes for lunch. And I am making shrimp scampi for dinner. Then there will be an after dinner coffee drink, spiked of course with yummy Kahlua or Irish cream.
And there is never one hiccup or bubble of gas or moment of worry.
Yeah, right. I wish.
It’s never a good day when IBS sends you home from work. Luckily it doesn’t happen to me often. I can handle running back and forth to the bathroom all day. Inconvenient, and annoying, but do-able (Especially when I don’t have any sick time). But when I am sitting at my desk feeling like I am going to vomit at any second for over an hour, I throw in the towel.
It came on suddenly, as usual. I wasn’t feeling so hot yesterday, but managed to have a movement and figured it was all better. Nope. Early this morning at work all of a sudden I had to sprint to the bathroom. But I figured after I had been in there, and successfully I might add, for twenty minutes, that I would start to feel better. But an hour after getting back to my desk I was still cramping and sick to my stomach and feeling horrible. The Boss said “Do what you have to do” so I found coverage and came home.
Damn it.
I HATE when the IBS gets in the way at work. Even more so then when it interferes with my personal time. Because then it comes into play in how my boss sees me. And I hate looking unreliable. I feel bad when I have to leave, even though it is not something I can control. I have worked with other people with syndromes and diseases that are uncontrollable and never thought worse of them. And I never felt my that my boss held it against them. But I hold it against myself. I hold myself to impossible standards. I never want to be sick. I never want to be out of work. I never want the Kid to be sick so I never have to be out or leave early. HA! All impossible.
IMPOSSIBLE.
People who have perfect attendance at work obviously have no lives, come in and share germs that really should not be shared, or have children that are old enough to stay home alone. I am a super hard worker, but I will never have perfect attendance. I’m human after all, maybe I just need to get over myself.
Or maybe not.
We traveled this weekend, the Hubby, the Kid and I. And I lived! Wahoo! It is really a short trip but there are times when it feels like twenty hours. We know all the pit stops from here to there and one in particular is my favorite. It’s a major chain store and it has the most stalls so I never feel rushed. And if I get stuck for an extended amount of time, the Hubby and the Kid can entertain themselves. Of course, it usually ends up costing me money. 
I also managed to survive a girls night! It was so great! I haven’t done anything like that in a long time. Up until last year we lived down south, way to far away to come up for make-up parties. So I really enjoyed myself this weekend. Adult conversation! Expensive beauty products to buy! No kid to have to watch! I really wasn’t feeling to well when it started but I guess I got distracted. Or the spastic colon decided not to ruin a perfectly good evening for once (I’m sure I’ll pay for it eventually….) It helped that the party was at the house where I was staying so I was already nice and comfortable and wasn’t stressed about being out and about somewhere at someone’s house. It would have been a simple thing to go up stairs if I really wasn’t feeling well and it would have been no big deal. But I am really glad I didn’t have to hide. Although it might have saved my skin from what ever aggravated it. That’s the problem with parties like that, you put too much stuff on your face for me at least, my skin likes to revolt. So I have to be nice to it today, because it is really sensitive and red today. I’ll take the sensitive dry skin any day if it means I get to have a fun night with the girls!! :)
Ahhh, it is great to be living outside the bathroom.
What should I tackle next???
Some days you just need a little perspective. I was reminded of that when I was on my way to work this morning in a crappy (ha. ha. ) mood because I wasn’t feeling so hot. And I heard a song on the radio and it reminded me of the things that in my life that work right.
The song is Lucky Man sung by Montgomery Gentry. If you haven’t heard it, go read the words. They’re really good.
I work in an environment where I am privileged to a lot of private information about the health of teenagers. I look at some of the stuff they deal with on a daily basis (like heart problems for instance) and I am so thankful that what I have won’t ever kill me. Its painful, and disruptive, and embarrassing and so much more. But it really could be so much worse. I have to work hard to remind myself of that on the really bad days.
***UPDATE 6/28/07 - I am updating this post today and removing the words to the Montgomery Gentry song. You can find them very easily with google. So easily in fact, that today when I searched for part of the song “my tickers ticking like they say it should” my blog was the FIFTH result returned. With all of the sites out there with lyrics on it, I am flabergasted that this blog was anywhere near the top of the return list. So, since I figure the people hunting for Montogomery Gentry are probably getting a bit more than they bargained for when they click on a link that leads here, I’m going to remove the wonderful lyrics. But! You can find them here, here, here or even here. Four randomly chosen sites I know nothing about. ***
As an IBS sufferer, there are some things I just never leave the house without. In my purse, there is an interior pocket that holds the keys to survival out in the big scary world. Immodium and Phazyme. It holds other stuff as well, but those are the most important. I have not left the house without Immodium in more than 10 years. I used to go out to the mall with my friends and a dose of Immodium in my front pocket hoping that I didn’t need to use it (I didn’t carry a purse around then). And I used to have it in my backpack everyday at school. Every purse I have ever owned has to have one of those interior pockets. That way there is no rummaging around in my time of need. And I never have to guess if I have any, because there it is, safely zippered away from the rest of the junk in my purse, ready and waiting to do it’s job.
The Immodium is only for the really really bad days. I can only take a fraction of a dose. I have IBS combo (wahoo! The two-for-one special!) and already being prone to constipation, Immodium seems to work way too well. And recovering from that is way worse than being stuck somewhere waiting for my bowels to calm down again so I can get home. The phayzme on the other hand, I think is the best invention of the modern world. Who ever invented it needs to be knighted and/or made a saint. People who don’t get gas on a daily basis just don’t understand what the big deal is. But really, it is a BIG deal. Having to fight to hold in huge gas bubbles when you work in an office with other people is a horrific experience. There is just no way to get around the embarrassment. SBD’s are one thing, they are easy to blame on other people while you are spraying the air freshner. But when they hear the tooting from you, there just no way to live it down. *sigh*
There used to me more of me.
There used to be more things that I did, more places that I used to go. I remember what a movie theater looks like, what it feels like to be surrounded by the story on the screen.
I remember dates with the Hubby. I remember long drives, one of our favorite things to do. We’ve wasted many tanks of gas on the back roads with the window’s rolled down and the radio blaring country music.
I remember going out on Saturday and not having to rush home because I can feel an attack coming on. We used to go from store to store because we didn’t want to be at home.
I remember being able to go out to our friends house and not be worried about having to leave suddenly.
Now I am a home body.
And some days I HATE it.
There are a limited number of pictures on my wall. And I’m sick of looking at them. We have a limited number of television channels and there is never anything on. I spend my weekends on my couch mostly, in safe proximity to the bathroom with the Hubby on the couch next to me with his laptop and the kid playing on the floor. Or we go to places that are close. The mall, Target, Toys R’ Us, Super Walmart, and my favorite store Barnes N Noble all fall outside the safety zone. I miss them.
I used to go out. But one too many “Oh shit where’s the bathroom??” situations has made me really hesitant to leave the house.
That has to change.
I had suffered with a sensitive digestive system all through high school. My mother had what she called IBS (although she had never officially been diagnosed) and my symptoms matched hers, so we figured that was what I had. She never took me to a doctor, never sought any help for me. So I suffered in silent embarrassment praying every time I left the house that I would make it back home in one piece.
When I got to college and it started interfering with life more I finally went to a GI doctor. He wasn’t that much help. He asked embarrassing questions, and poked my sore belly and said “I think it’s IBS. Try diet modifications and we’ll see what happens”. He told me to eat more fiber and to stay away from “trigger foods”. And he told me I was lactose intolerant. Thanks buddy, I had figured that one out on my own.
Can I have my money back???
I recently went to a new GI doctor. I was really sick a few months ago and my primary care doctor sent me to a GI. Took five weeks to get into see him. Because of my past he ordered a colonoscopy (more on that later…). I could have kissed him! I was excited to finally be moving forward. I wanted to know what was wrong with me and if it was anything they could treat. The biopsies all came back normal and he is sure “all” I have is IBS.
Yep. “All” I have is a painful, debilitating, embarrassing, massive gas producing, no cause, no cure illness that I will have to deal with for the rest of my life.
Yippie.
This is my first blog post! I am 27 and have been living with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) for over 10 years. I started to blog on an IBS help website but I decided I wanted to do more with my blog that their program allowed. So I followed another IBS sufferer over here to this website.
My name is… well, I don’t think I am going to tell you that. I decided to not leave my real name in case anyone I know came looking around. I will be much more inclined to tell you how I am really feeling on a given day if I’m not worried my mother-in-law may be reading it.
