Hello! Male in my late 20s, and for 6 years now I've had varying degrees of pain/discomfort in my gut. Get full after eating small amounts of food, feel bloated. Slight burning pain across the waist, especially right above the pubic region. Heaviness in the gut. At its worst, the bloating made me feel shortness of breath and heartburn.

I feel better if I lay back and elevate my legs. Also, if I press in on my belly some of the tension disappears and it almost seems like the pressure of my hand helps stimulate those "gurgling" stomach sounds. I've had two Upper GI's, and a pelvic cat scan. Nothing unusual detected. Blood tests indicate there's no internal bleeding. Doctors shrug and mutter that it's IBS. I don't know.

Also of note, when these problems first showed up I had been taking lots of ibuprofen for headaches and was into my third year of using ssri antidepressants. Ever since then if I attempt to go back on just the tiniest dose of antidepressant medicines the symptoms flare up even worse. It's been years since I took a therapeutic dose of psych meds for more than a few days, and now over six months since I took even the tiniest little crumb of a pill. But I still have symptoms, and therefore feel it is not just some allergic reaction to medicine. I always thought it was some kind of hernia, but "no" claim the docs.

To anybody who actually read this far, any advice would be very much appreciated. If you don't have any, well, thanks for at least listening.

Bryan

Hi there Bryan,

I don't actually know what exactly the trouble with your stomach is but I can tell you that while researching numerous articles on stomach problems for my husband, I came across many that said that taking drugs like aspirin and ibuprofen can be extremely damaging to your stomach. Please do consider discussing the possibility of taking paracetamol with your doctor instead or maybe some other painkiller that's gentler on the stomach than ibuprofen. It may be working on one area of your body while damaging to the other. Some people actually end up with stomach ulcers as a result of aspirin, ibuprofen and the likes. Sorry if this is of no help but I hope your doctor will help you sort it out. Do mention to him/her that you're on ibuprofen and would like to change it to something kinder to the stomach. Because even if it's not the cause of the problem, at least it won't become one in the future. Good luck.