Achalasia Cardia - Support - My life with it after POEM.

Hello,

    I am Shrihari from Chennai, Tamilnadu, India. And yeah I am one among the rare who got affected with Achalasia which followed into depression and still I am battling with depression and anxiety disorders due to my fear of loss of weight. I still have no clue why I got Achalsia. Maybe it was because of the stress due to my college days or it was an auto immune problem which damaged my nerves associated with my Lower Esophageal Sphlinter (LES) muscles, i have no clue. Neverthless I am here to share my experiences and give whatever support I can to battle this crazy swallowing issue.

Okay. I used to swallow well with no issues when I was young. I could eat all my favourite foods with ease as far as I can recall. My problem started when I was in my college 2nd year and I slowly started finding difficulty in swallowing. I used to cough and regurgitate at night sleep. I used to be health fitness freak also. I wanted to have a healthy body and I used to workout. I am a 5 foot 8 inches adult who used to weigh around 66 kgs when I was 18. So when it started and the condition got worse as doctors didn't diagnose it was Achalasia as it was rare. So i lost almosty 10 kgs in a matter of 1 month or so. And i suddenly developed so much pain while swallowing that I couldn't even eat anymore. Thats when we went to a gastro. He did an endoscopy and found out that I had achalasia. So then I had to have a baloon dilation to ease my swallowing and yes my swallowing was better but it was just a temperory cure. All broke to the same difficulty in 2 weeks. But i somehow manages to push my food inside and drink a lot of water and have like 3 or 4 pillows to sleep at night. 

Then my dad found out about the latest remedy for the problem. The POEM surgery. Its a surgery through endoscopy without any incision. I underwent the surgery around June 2013. I had to be on liquid diet for 1 month slowly starting with semi liquid followed by solids. Well, my swallowing improved a lot after the surgery. I could swallow with so much ease. But i had lost a lot of weight by then due to no food while surgery and 1 month of liquid diet. My lowest was little below 50 kgs. I looked so weak and that took over my confidence levels slowly. I just couldn't accept my health condition at that time. I couldn't go to my college or perform well in my studies and then I slowly slipped into depression as well avoiding a lot of social activities. Then I had to be on anti depressants for a year or so. But I slowly started to gain weight. 

Now I have finished my course even though I have some backlogs to complete. I am working on that. Probably would finish it in a year or so. But I have gained a lot of weight now. I am now at 68 kgs and I gained that slowly over a period of 2 and half years. Even though i seem to put a lot of fat on my stomach. The situation now I feel like is I am able to swallow. Not like i used to just after my surgery. But still I am able to swallow my food well. I used to take my time and chew the food well and swallow properly. Practicing your swallowing action is very important I believe. So my advice would be is to not do any activity while eating. Try not to have any conversation while eating. Just focus on the food you eat and have your conscious on the chewing and swallowing action. I think if someone practices that well, it ll be fine for you.

 And one more important thing I'd like to share is that, I have experienced that my swallowing function doesn't work very well when I don't have appetite to eat. So don't try to eat too much if you don't have any appetite. You need to exercise well. Try to have a slim body without much fat as this will aid the swallowing function I believe. Why I say is that if you have so much of fat on your stomach then when you sit and eat , the fat will push around the esophagus area and that will make the LES function much harder. So try to have a less fat body and healthy foods. More of like non acid foods. Exercise is a must for achalasia people I believe because it will enhance your appetite and I feel if your appetite is good the swallowing function would be much better too. 

I' ll keep this discussion updated whenever I can. We can battle this issue out together. I support Achalasia. I have experienced the pain. So anyone has queries and would like to give advices, share your experiences and share your advices. I am sure we can battle out this problem together.

I'll keep it updated. Cheers! Have an active and happy life!

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