Pain is scaring me, is this normal for IBS

Everyone is different with IBS so that is why you will hear different stories. Don’t concentrate on googling different sites to get answers.  Focus on what your doctor tells you. Trust, believe and accept what he or she tells you. Everyone has their own IBS. Dr Google will cause great anxiety which will worsen your symptoms.  Some feel more pain on their left side, whereas others feel it all over their stomach and the pain will move about.  It can be painful to lie down on at night.  I have experienced it and asked my doctor about it and he confirmed it too is part of IBS.  All of these scenarios are typical of IBS.  Bowel habit change is different for everyone as well.  Some get constipation, others get diarrhoea or a mixture of both. Some have food triggers; others don’t.  However, stress and anxiety is a symptom that is common to everyone with IBS.  Some will get depression if their IBS takes over their lives.

If you have been diagnosed with IBS, try antispasmodics, a food diary/Low Fodmap diet if you think you have a food trigger and relaxation therapy or distraction techniques such as light exercise or a hobby tp take your mind off your stomach. A combination of these strategies will help, especially stress management.

Your doctor can try you out on a variety of antipasmodics if you find some don’t suit you. Buscopan and nurofen help me but peppermint and Mebeverine upset my stomach.  Everyone’s response to medication will differ.

Well you see when doctors don't give you answers you will try to find them yourself, and Google seems to be the only way nowadays how many people have legitimately found life threatening diseases while their doctors couldn't or refused to diagnose them? The number is definitely rising! I know you might be thinking it's my health anxiety speaking, which in part is true, but these stories don't pop up out of thin air, and I'm sure there's loads more untold. Anyway!

I'm just really scared that maybe it s a tumor pressing down on something when I lay on my stomach. Stupid thinking but I can't help it

Trust me I've been trying to battle my stress and anxiety for more than 2 years now, I've tried a lot of things! Going back to a psychiatrist next week and see if they have anything to offer me this time round. It seems I get a second to relax then the next pain comes back and it's a never ending cycle again

Anxiety will cause your symptoms to get worse.  Googling your symptoms will not help you. It gives very general information and does not take account of individual cases.  My  dad had a sore foot and googled his symptoms.  He was convinced he had bursitis but his doctor correctly diagnosed plantar fasciitis.

No doctor could diagnose me for three and a half months.  I got desperate and googled everything.  I imagined every possible worst case scenario.  The result was it threw me into extreme panic, anxiety, terror and despair and I was unable to  listen to any reassurance from any doctor or anyone for that matter. I firmly believed doctors were missing something. In the end, my abdominal  pain was correctly diagnosed as IBS. I immediately calmed down and my symptoms started to improve.  Mine is one success story and there are many like it!  Many prople on this forum have eventually got a correct diagnosis and successful treatment too from persevering with going to their doctor.

Of course there are cases where doctors get it wrong, however, the majority of the time they get it right. If every doctor up and down the country always got it wrong, no one would get successful treatment and no one would get better.  But people do get correctly diagnosed and do get help.  It is always better to try to think positively rather than negatively.   You best course of action  is to keep going back to your doctor no matter how hopeless you feel and change your doctor if necessary.  This is the only way you will get a correct diagnosis.

Try distraction techniques such as a hobby and light exercise.  This will help to take your mind off your symptoms amd worries and will in turn calm your symptoms.  Both gastritis and IBS are fuelled by anxiety but are helped enormously by calmness.

 

Although Dr Google is very popular these days, there is no substitute for a professional medical diagnosis.  Diagnosing is a doctor’s skill that has to be learned and practised for many years in order to do it accurately.  Dr Google cannot give you the human element that your doctor can.

I understand where you're coming from pippa, but it's just so difficult to trust doctors when every single time they just brush you off because you're suffering from health anxiety. As if hypochondriacs can't get actually sick. I'm very very scared that they will eventually miss something especially when so many diseases are so vague symptom wise

Go back to your doctor and explain how anxious and terrified you are.  List all your health anxieties and ask your doctor to rule them out one by one. Tell your doctor about your period symptoms. Ask for more tests.  If you don't get help, don't give up.  See different doctors until you get answers.  Ask to see specialists.  If you do all these things, you will give yourself a better chance of diagnosis and treatment.  I tried these strategies and they worked for me in the depth of my despair. I bit back my fear and I got  through it in the end. You have nothing to lose by trying these suggestions and everything to gain.

If you don't go to your doctor,and decide to google your symptoms instead you will not get a firm, accurate diagnosis and your anxiety will increase.

Try distraction techniques to help you to relax.  Try light exercise like walking, concentrate on hobby and listen to soothing music.  I had exactly the same health anxieties as you, I thought I would never get diagnosed, I firmly believed that all doctors routinely misdiagnosed patients and that my symptoms were serious and were being missed and that I would get very bad news that it was too late for effective treatment.

But on my eighth visit to one of several doctors, I found that my doctor did not fob me off and did listen when I told him I was consumed with anxiety.  That was the one symptom that got me diagnosed.  I hadn't mentioned it to any other doctor because I didn't think it was relevant. 

When you have health anxiety, it changes the way you think and very quickly logic becomes illogic.  It makes you feel that no one on this earth can help you and it blocks out any positive and reassuring explanation that you are given.  But once you tackle each of your fears one by one and allow yourself a little positive thought each day, you will start to feel better.

Remember, there is always hope.

 

When you are in a heightened state of panic, terror and anxiety, it will distrupt your cycle.  This is a positive, logical and reasonable explanation for this.

They clearly see how anxious I am I don't think I even have to explain myself at this point! Whenever I try to tick off at least one of my problems they try to brush it off as something simple. Logically shouldn't you be ruling out the worst case scenario first? Then they brush me off because of my age (mid 20s), oh as if 'young' people are untouchable. Most might feel like that but I certainly don't, not with all my pains and lumps from nowhere. And just how many doctors does one see... When all of them have this brushing off technique. Honestly I think most of the specialists I have seen so far have been amazing except a couple, but GPs, well.

Google isn't as bad as some people paint it. At least 2 of my GPs googled my symptoms IN FRONT of my eyes. So much for them telling me not to Google lol a single gp can't know every single ailment while a million page database surely can squeeze in more knowledge. I've actually found a diagnosis for one of my lumps that way, three attempts later got a scan and guess what I, and Google, was bloody right. Thank heavens its a benign condition but what if next time it isn't. Anyway enough about my health anxiety.

I just have so many things going in my right abdominal area now its ridiculous. Those "ibs" pains haven't gone away or gotten better and I keep getting those sharp pains where I roughly think my gallbladder is, the colon definitely doesn't go that high. None of my pains have ever lasted this long, EVER. This is absolutely pointing to no good and I am literally scared for my life, sadly

See your doctor again and ask for a HIDA scan and ultrasound to check your gallbladder.   The fact that one of your problems was a benign condition is very good news.  However, there is no point in torturing yourself about a worst case scenario that hasn’t happened and may never happen.  Very serious conditions are rare at your age; your doctor is right about that.

I'll try and see if I can be seen tomorrow or the day after. I'm now getting a bruised feeling from the gallbladder area towards my back but it sort of hurts even if I press down on those areas, don't know whether I bruised them myself or whether it is a weird muscle issue or it really is gall bladder disease because the area adds up I doubt they will let me have anymore scans but worst case scenario I can at least afford a private ultrasound.

An ultrasound would detect gall stones and a HIDA scan would show how the gallbladder is working.

I think panic is a given with health anxiety. I don't have them as often as when my HA was triggered (thankfully) but when they hit, they hit well that's the thing, if I see a change that is not Normal for me, I naturally want someone to check it out for me! But after being brushed off so often I just keep thinking oh to hell with it they won't care anyway might as well just roll over and die it won't change anything. And then if I do go I feel bad because I feel I'm wasting resources. That's why I turn to Google. If this is something minor surely I can fix it myself and save doctors time, right? But then they say no Google isn't a doctor. What a double edged sword I swear! I know how you feel. I sometimes feel like shouting. One of my docs said I'm sure this is not cancer and if it is you can sue me. I just wanted to be like yeah right sue you from my deathbed and then you'll get backed up by medical boards anyway? I just want my concerns for my health to be addressed especially when pains very unnatural to my body last for two weeks I honestly feel like crying

I'd swap doctor if I was you and insist they do something. This is unfair on you if you feel you're been pushed away. Good luck, hope you get an understanding doctor this time.

Doctors keep changing in my clinic so I keep seeing a new one quite frequently lol but they all seem to have the same outlook towards me

What was the end result? You need clear information for your own sake!