Colitis

Adding to all of my uncertainty about things lately, my ulcerative colitis has been flaring up. It has been about 3 weeks now - the first flare in over two years. To be honest, I can't remember a longer remission. So perhaps this was to be expected. On the other hand, I immediately start taking "inventory" to see what I might have "done" to cause it. A futile exercise at best. At first all consuming, physically, emotionally, and mentally, I am now relaxing and just doing my best to maintain a healthy diet. It is tempting at first to eat practically nothing. Maybe that instinct is good. It lets the digestive system rest for a few days. Unfortunately, one can't keep it up. It adds to the fatigue and the low blood sugar seems to add to the emotional fragility. Then it becomes important to eat at certain times in order to avoid being stuck in the bathroom 12 hours later when having to get to work. So far, so good.

I'm sticking pretty close to my "safe" list of foods: applesauce, apple juice, oatmeal, bananas, potatoes (white and sweet), rice, cooked squash, cooked spinach, cooked cabbage, cooked carrots, carrot juice, rice protein powder, soy milk, tofu. No raw vegetables, not even lettuce, no wheat bran, no corn, no dairy except yogurt. Adding flax oil to everything I can. Putting slippery elm bark in my tea. Taking extra vitamins and supplements. Yesterday and today have been pretty good days, and I am sensing that my overall energy level is improving. The depression of the first couple of weeks has lifted. The sores on my lips seem better (herpes has a field day when the immune system is out of whack...)

Someone asked me what it feels like. I sidestepped the answer, but I'll give it a shot here. Imagine that you have 4 or 5 marbles stuck up your butt. They aren't going anywhere. It is achey and crampy. And every time you have to go to the bathroom, it has to somehow get through those marbles. So instead of going once in the morning, you go maybe 8 times and there's a lot of blood and mucus. Then when it does finally move, it moves very quickly, and you hope to God that you make it to the bathroom in time. Then there's the persistent fatigue, and the constant low-grade fever, and sometimes you just feel achey all over. The inflammation can spread to the joints and my back. The back pain gets worse at night, so I have to get up and walk around. But too much walking and exercise makes my hips and knees and sometimes even elbows hurt. The inflammation isn't just in the colon. I never feel warm enough, and I crave lots of hot baths. I've even started putting plastic wrap over the overflow drain so I can keep the water high and have a sort of hot tub. But I think the worst part maybe - (after all, you can become fairly stoic about the physical pain and inconvenience) - is how emotionally vulnerable it makes me feel. It becomes very difficult to control emotions, crying at the drop of a hat. Fears and anxieties become magnified and difficult to shake. Everything feels out of control. There's a whole letting go process emotionally that takes weeks. I must be doing quite well, if I've reached that point in only 3 weeks. I hope this will be the turn around point now.