lets discuss about everyone's present condition & life style having barrett's oesophagus

I was just diagnosed this week. I m waiting on biopsy results. I had acid reflux several years ago but the meds are so bad for you I just upped and stopped taking them. Big mistake. I had no idea so.eone could get cancer from acid reflux. Scary thought. I was reading and it says a small number of people end up with cancer and if it's caught early there are a lot of treatment options. I worry about cancer a lot my family has a history of breast, lung, and skin cancer. My anxiety is ridiculously high since I just found out I have this and a hiatal hernia. I was already worried about aneurysms because my family has a history with those as well. This is just another thing to add to my worry pile. I am taking a PPI and the doctor says I will need to be on one for life. In the last two months since the pain started and I was waiting for my GI appointment I have lost 40 pounds. I dont drink caffeine, alcohol, tea, juice, coffee. I now drink only water and a Powerade every once in awhile. Last night I decided to not eat after 7:00 and not drink after 8:00 at night. I'm asking my doctor's to see if they have any special diet requirements to try and avoid the Barrett's from progressing. I think all we can do is the best we can and maybe a lot of prayer.

I've told my story on this site so just ignore this if it's a repeat for you.  A routine blood test showed that I had a very low hemoglobin count.  After two blood transfusions and an iron infusion, they did a colonoscopy and endoscopy to find the source of bleeding.  It was coming from a 9cc hiatal hernia.  The biopsy showed Barrett's with high grade dysplasia.  I was referred to a GI doctor at a nearby teaching hospital who specializes in treatment of Barrett's.  At our first appointment he did a musocal resection to remove the dysplasia.  The biopsy showed a few early stage cancer cells.  Three months later he did another endoscopy and a biopsy that showed no dysplasia and no cancer cells.  

The next step was to have a Nissen fundoplication and hernia repair.  That was done 6 weeks ago.  The recovery is going very well.  I'm scheduled for an ablation to remove the Barrett's at the end of January.  If he can't ablate it all, he'll schedule another one in a couple months.  At that point I'll be monitored with endoscopies on a regular basis (probably every three months).   

The GI specialist said I have no diet restrictions since the reflux was due to the hernia and not what I eat or drink.  I'm very lucky this was found because I had silent reflux and didn't know anything was wrong.  The doctor said if the Barrett's doesn't recur in a year after the ablations, the risk of cancer will be reduced to 1%.  It's now between 5 and 10%.  

I know finding out you have Barrett's is very scary but a qualified doctor can take steps to control it.  If it's in the early stages by routine monitoring and with more aggressive treatment if it is further along.  It seems like the moree aggressive treatment occurs when there is high grade dysplasia.  I'm in my 70's and people were concerned about my ability to recover from the surgery.  I seemed to have bounced back before people half my age.  

I had Barrett's. Cured it with PPIs longterm. Am 26 now. Started PPIs at 20...