Sunday, March 23, 2014

Part 2 of the story

<<continuation of previous post>>

On this particular day I had messed up my sleep so bad and hadn't slept all night. I was in the living room trying to fall asleep on the couch around midday. I got into a fight with someone who will remain unmentioned and after that incident my symptoms were clear as day. They weren't like the muted ones I had before. The pain had gotten worse, the episodes more frequent and more severe.

I decided to go to a specialized hospital this time and they ran a bunch of tests on me (Blood, ultrasound, etc). The doctor suspected that I had Helicobacter pylori.

Definition: " (/ˌhɛlɪkɵˈbæktər pˈlɔər/; H. pylori), previously named Campylobacter pylori, is a Gram-negative, microaerophilic bacterium found in the stomach" (Wikipedia)

Basically its a kind of worm found in your stomach that has similar symptoms to IBS and Crohn's. 

Definition: "Crohn's disease, also known as Crohn syndrome and regional enteritis, is a type of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) that may affect any part of the gastrointestinal tract from mouth to anus, causing a wide variety of symptoms. It primarily causes abdominal pain, diarrhea (which may be bloody if inflammation is severe), vomiting, or weight loss,[1][2][3] but may also cause complications outside the gastrointestinal tract" (Wikipedia)

The tests came back negative and I went back home glad that I didn't have this worm but a little frustrated over not finding out what I had. The doctor said that there was nothing wrong with me and I really wanted to believe him so I tried to convince myself that really I was fine and this was nothing.


Predictably I got sick again and was in pain that I could not stop (Again) and was so frustrated at the doctors that I decided to take matters into my own hands and started googling it. I became paranoid and started washing my hands and tried to avoid eating out as much as I could to avoid food poisoning. At the time the only search result that came up that made sense was food poisoning.

I then started researching about things other than food poisoning that had similar symptoms. IBS and Crohns came up and I was scared. I did not want to have a functional disease that altered my life and was incurable. I did not want another diagnosis of another chronic disease that I could not control or avoid. Another disease and more medication and more doctor visits.

 I was terrified. I even started suspecting Cancer...

On my 19th birthday I got sick one more time and went to the same hospital again.

This time my doctor uttered the words "Irritable Bowel Syndrome" and I was both relieved and horrified. Relieved that I finally knew what was wrong with me and horrified because I'd have to live with this for the rest of my life...

 

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