Pencil stools or worm like or bits and pieces - is it PI IBS

Jan

Sometimes after something like Semonella it can be something to do with tummy problems and the problems with your stools. Eventually everything should sort out and return to normal, although I would advise you discuss these problems with your GP. Espeially if you are passing blood or other problems.

Your GP could arrange for inspection of the colon to make sure all is ok. Just to put your concerns to rest talk to your GP

BOB

 I have had pencil like, soft stools with IBS.  PI IBS is still IBS; the only difference is the cause. My IBS is entirely stress related.  Don't worry if your stools don't return to normal; with IBS they will vary depending on whether you have IBS C,D or A.  The more you worry, the worse your symptoms will be.  The key to controlling your symptoms is to accept IBS, adjust your diet if necessary and take painkillers and antispasmodic medication.

I don't think I've passed a normal looking stool for at least 5 years.  Not at all uncommon to experience weird shaped stool.  I've seen so many different shapes, sizes, floaters and clunkers, etc. including mucus.  All part of the nasty IBS condition. Don't fret it because the more you "chew that bone" the worse it gets.  

Talk about a bad day (sorry for you cause I know what that's like), I had a flash flare in our Super WalMart.  Nightmare finding the bathrooms and I think I haven't walked so fast in 15 years.  Just made it. 

Hope you are feeling better.

Attacks of IBS produce stools that are anything but solid appearing.  There can be pieces and strings of mucus that resemble little worms.  The "pencil stools" could be alleviated with more fibre in the diet.  That's what a GI physician suggested to me years ago when I briefly experienced them.  I have had periods of IBS at various times in my life and then years in between when I had no such symptoms.  When I was a young woman in my twenties, I was troubled with it for many months and had all the diagnostic tests.  The abdominal cramps were so severe that I nearly passed out from the pain.  I was given a medication called Lomotil that helped stop the cramping but made me so woozie and drugged-up feeling that I had the idea it was probably not easy on the heart.  Fortunately, I had the heart of a race horse then but I certainly would not take that drug now--if they still make it.  For the past year or so, in addition to other very distressing Upper GI symptoms, I have been having attacks of IBS after about seven years of none.  Between that and having difficulty eating, my life has become rather like sitting on Hell's front porch.  The cramps are not nearly as severe as those I experienced in my twenties--except the very first episode months ago when the pain was awful--like old times.  I think I have read that, following any kind of food poisoning, one can have IBS for some time, even if one has never been a victim of it previously.

?I think it's fair to say that the cause of IBS can vary with the individual.  I am a believer in the genetic component and know that my family seems to be strong in some ways but weak in the GI department.  My father was chronically plagued by ulcers and nearly died of a perforated stomach right after WWII.  He had been a prisoner throughout and, lucky for him, he was working with the American forces there in Germany when it happened and received good medical treatment.  My younger sister was a victim of Crohn's Disease since her youth and suffered cruelly from that awful condition.  I found it was in my DNA, as well, but somehow my body has been able to fight that off.