blood?

[Guest guest]

Blood in my stools has me more than a little freaked out. I want to

tell you the short version of my story and see if anyone can relate to

it or has any helpful advice.

In April I went to my doctor because I have been struggling with

constipation, bloating, ever increasing food sensitivities, some

anemia for about 7 years now. He ran a bunch of tests. My blood test

for Celiac came back positive and the SIBO breath test was positive.

So he recommended a GF diet and put me on Xifaxan for the SIBO. About

three days into this course of antibiotics I spent about an hour and a

half on the toilet, violent cramping and diarrhea (when a normally

backed up person has this happen, it is really something) and had some

dripping blood at the end of it. Not much blood. And blood had never

before been an issue for me. I called him about it. He recommended

taking a break from the med, then starting at half dose and easing

back up to full dose. I did this. I didn't have any more diarrhea. I

felt weird the whole time I was on it and developed some pressure in

my left rib cage that hadn't been there before. But also was doing

intro about this time so the general weird feelings could have been

from that too. I talked with my doctor again when I was done with the

antibiotic. He was concerned about bleeding and fatigue, said he

didn't know anyone who had gotten worse during that treatment and

wanted to consider doing a colonoscopy. We agreed at that time (about

3 weeks ago now) that we would give me about a month to see if it got

better. Well the first two weeks, my bowels only moved like 3 times

total. I went 9 days without going once, and four days a couple other

times. Didn't see any blood until a few days ago. Although it does

seem to be in streaks or like a spider web sort of, it also appears to

be clotted perhaps??? Today there was a larger clot. Now the good news

is that since starting SCD a month ago, I am much less bloated, I have

more energy than I can remember having in years, I am regular again as

of the past seven days. So improvement is happening. My questions are:

How worried should I be about this blood? Do any of you have these

kinds of experiences or a way of thinking about this?

I have never had a colonoscopy. IS this something I should be

considering at this point?

When I am seeing blood, am I wise to return to intro til it clears up?

Any other thoughts or advice?

--

Kelley

Celiac? 4/10

SCD 5/10